Joseph "Joe" Berrios (born February 14, 1952) is an American Democratic politician who was the Assessor and Chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party of Cook County, Illinois, as well as a registered Illinois state government lobbyist. He was the first Hispanic American to serve in the Illinois General Assembly and the first and only Hispanic American to chair the Cook County Democratic Party. He was also a commissioner on the Cook County Board of Review, a property tax assessment appeal panel.
Throughout his career, Berrios combined government sector jobs, elected office, unpaid political party leadership positions, and private-sector proprietorships in lobbying, consulting and insurance sales. His political campaign strategies included ballot access challenges to potential opponents. He has been the focus of investigations into allegations of ethics violations and political corruption with respect to campaign fund-raising and nepotism. In the press and in the courts, Berrios has repeatedly defended his right as an elected official to hire relatives and to accept campaign contributions from those with business with his office.
Berrios was defeated in the March 20, 2018 Democratic primary election for Cook County Assessor, conceding to Fritz Kaegi.
Early life, education, and early political career
Berrios was born on February 14, 1952, the oldest of seven children. His parents were Puerto Rican natives. When he was six, his family moved into the Cabrini-Green public housing high-rises. At age 13, Berrios got a job as a dishwasher in the Tower Club, a private restaurant on the 39th floor of the Civic Opera House, worked there for seven years, and eventually become a waiter. Berrios graduated from Lane Technical College Prep High School in Chicago, and received a bachelor's degree in accounting from the University of Illinois Chicago.
Berrios' first political role was the unpaid position of a precinct captain in the 31st Ward political organization of Alderman Thomas Keane, Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley's chief ally on the Chicago City Council. Berrios first met Keane while a student at the University of Illinois Chicago, Berrios was ticketed for speeding on the Kennedy Expressway and called on his alderman and committeeman Keane. In October 1974, Keane was convicted of conspiracy and mail fraud for using his elected office to profit from illegal real estate deals. His wife, Adeline succeeded him as alderman and Edward Nedza as committeeman. In 1978 Nedza won the Illinois state Senate seat from the 5th Senate district, which encompasses the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago, and much of the 31st ward. Nedza, a Polish-American, recognized the growing Puerto Rican population in his district, and groomed Hispanics within the Democratic Party. Nedza's political protegés included Alderman Miguel Santiago of the 31st ward, the only Hispanic on the Chicago City Council at the time, and Berrios.
Illinois State Representative
Chicago-area Latino groups contested the legislative district map of the Illinois General Assembly in United States federal court. The panel of judges that decided the case ordered a new map that gave Hispanics a majority in two Illinois House of Representatives districts in Chicago, the 9th, which is predominantly Puerto Rican, and the 20th, which is predominantly Mexican American. In 1982, Nedza sponsored Berrios, at the time chief clerk to Cook County Board of Appeals commissioner Harry H. Semrow, in the 9th district. Berrios was one of three candidates who filed nominating petitions to run in the Democratic primary, but Berrios ran unopposed when the petitions of the other two candidates were successfully challenged. Republicans fielded no candidate in their primary, so Berrios ran unopposed in the general election, and at the age of 30 became the first Hispanic American to serve in the Illinois General Assembly. Berrios ran for re-election unopposed in the Fall 1986 general election. He won re-election twice, serving three two-year terms.
Berrios maintained his job in Chicago as chief clerk of the Cook County Board of (Tax) Appeals while serving part-time as a legislator in the state capital in downstate Springfield, Illinois. In December, 1985 he was one of 21 state legislators criticised for holding a second, taxpayer-salaried government job in a report issued by the Coalition for Political Honesty, founded by Board of (Tax) Appeals Commissioner Pat Quinn, later Illinois Treasurer, Lieutenant Governor and Governor.
Democratic party posts
31st ward Democratic committeeman
In March 1987 then former State Senator Edward Nedza, Berrios' mentor, was indicted in a federal investigation of bribes allegedly paid to city licensing officials. In April, 1987 Nedza resigned his position as committeeman of the 31st ward in Chicago and named Berrios as his replacement. In August, 1987, Nedza was convicted on federal charges of using his political office for illegal financial gain.
Berrios allied with Alderman Edward Vrdolyak, during Chicago Mayor Harold Washington's first term, the Council Wars era. In 1987 Raymond Figueroa, with Washington's backing, defeated Berrios's candidate for alderman, Miguel Santiago, which helped close the Council Wars. A year later Figueroa defeated Berrios for committeeman. In 1991, Figueroa decided not to run for re-election as alderman, and left the committeeman's job the following year. Berrios regained the committeeman's post, a role he has held ever since.
Chairman, Cook County Democratic Party
Thomas G. Lyons, a veteran 45th Ward committeeman who had held the unpaid party position of chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party for nearly 17 years, was seriously ill and announced his retirement in January 2007, and died on January 12 at age 75. Democrats met in Chicago on February 1 to fill the vacancy and elected Berrios as their new chairman. Berrios was the first Hispanic to hold the post, which he held until April 18, 2018, following his defeat in the Democratic primary for Cook County Assessor.
Commissioner on the Cook County Board of Appeals/Cook County Board of Review Berrios' boss at the Cook County Board of Appeals, Harry H. Semrow, died November 23, 1987, at age 72. In accordance with state law, the Chief Judge of the Cook County Circuit Court appointed a temporary replacement, attorney Thomas A. Jaconetty, 34, a deputy assessor with the Board of Appeals since 1981. Jaconnetty was a 31st ward resident and the secretary of Berrios' 31st ward Democratic organization with whom Berrios had been a precinct captain in the 31st Ward under Alderman Keane. Berrios ran for the vacancy with the backing of the Democratic party organization. In the Democratic primary, Berrios won the nomination with a sizable margin over Jeffrey Paul Smith, an assistant corporation counsel with the City of Chicago whose candidacy was sponsored by Quinn, by then a former Commissioner. He ultimately won the special election in November 1988. Berrios would be reelected to the Cook County Board of Appeals in 1990 and 1994.
When first elected to the Board of (Tax) Appeals in 1988, Berrios was paid about $56,000 a year. In October 1990, Berrios added a part-time job as a legislative aide to a political ally, Democratic State Representative Miguel Santiago. The job paid Berrios nearly $10,000 over the next two years. Also while working at the tax appeals board, Berrios worked as a lobbyist and a consultant to the state government, sometimes in association with his longtime business partner, Sam Panayotovich. From 1988 to 1993, Panayotovich and Berrios won a $185,000 no-bid contract as the Illinois Department of Transportation's (IDOT's) liaison with lawmakers and municipal officials.
On March 11, 1994, FBI agents executed a search warrant to confiscate records from the Cook County Board of (Tax) Appeals as part of an ongoing investigation. Weeks later, federal agents investigating ghost payrolling subpoenaed financial records regarding several past and current employees of the Board, including Berrios and Panayotovich. The US Treasury Department investigated the IDOT contracts with Berrios and Panayotovich, and a federal grand jury subpoenaed the contracts. A federal grand jury in Chicago subpoenaed records documenting the recipients of tuition waivers to state universities request by three current and two former state legislators, including Berrios and Panayotovich. The scholarship program, begun in 1905, allowed each state legislator to waive the tuition and fees of any of the state's 12 public universities, for any two students who live within the legislator's district, without regard to academic achievement or financial need. No charges were filed against anyone in the Cook County Board of (Tax) Appeals.
The Cook County Board of Appeals was reconstituted and renamed the Cook County Board of Review in 1998. Berrios was elected to the reconstituted body's 2nd district in that year's inaugural election. Berrios continued to serve until 2010, being reelected in 2002, 2006, and 2008 After Berrios resigned to become Cook County Assessor, Michael Cabonargi was appointed as his successor.
In a 2013 federal bribery trial of a Board of Review analyst, in secret recordings by an undercover FBI informant from 2008, the defendant named Berrios as a recipient of bribes. Berrios was not accused of any wrongdoing.
Hiring of relatives and friends
While Commissioner on the Board of Review, Berrios' sister, sister-in-law, son and daughter worked for the county at annual salaries ranging from $48,000 to $86,000. "Let me see, one, two, three ... yeah, four," Berrios told the Associated Press. Berrios also hired, as a deputy chief commissioner, election law attorney Jaconetty, who wrote the chapter on ballot access in the courseware of the Illinois Institute for Continuing Legal Education. Berrios responded to criticisms of his hiring of relatives and friends, said,
What you're basically saying is that Joe Berrios should get out of politics. If my brothers or whoever wants to come and work in government, they shouldn't be allowed to work in government. If you want to pass a law that says one individual is in government, then none of their friends or relatives can work in government, then you should pass that law.
Political fundraising from tax appeal lawyers
Board of (Tax) Appeals Commissioner Berrios regularly accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in campaign contributions from lawyers who appealed property tax assessments before the Board. Berrios controls five personal political action committees, not including the fund for the Cook County Democratic Party, which he also controls. Berrios collected more than $3 million in political contributions between 2000 and 2010, 64 percent from property tax appeal lawyers. About one-third of Berrios' campaign contributions in that decade came from the 15 property tax appeal law firms that gained the most for their clients between 2006 and 2008, contributing almost $1 million to six political action committees controlled by Berrios and his daughter, Illinois State Representative Maria Antonia Berrios, Democrat of the 39th Illinois House district on Chicago's northwest side. Berrios started 2008 with $1.2 million in just one of his several campaign funds, much of it from attorneys who appeared before him.