Sunday, June 03, 2007

GO FIGURE!

Clout helped build flawed luxury homes
City missed defects in Bridgeport Village plans


By Laurie Cohen and Todd Lighty:
Tribune
Clout at ground floor
Early on, the development appeared to be stalled.


The partners were no lightweights: John Kinsella, a longtime Daley supporter and former chief executive of the advertising agency Leo Burnett; Sidney Diamond, a novelty candymaker; and Snitzer, a real estate developer.

Still, they didn't have the City Hall access they needed. Ald. James Balcer (11th), whose blessing was required for the project to proceed, had refused for a year to even discuss it, according to Snitzer's suit.

Court documents now show that the project's dealings with the city began to click after Kinsella brought in as an adviser Timothy Degnan, an 11th Warder and former top aide to the mayor, to steer the project through official channels. Degnan's business associate, Thomas DiPiazza, was hired as a consultant, to be paid up to $1.3 million..........

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Snitzer also developed Dearborn Village, across from 001 on 18th street, as well as one or two developments in Bucktown.

As far as I can tell, there were lawsuits from all of his developments, due to, for example, imperfect construction practices that had to be corrected with condo special assessments.

City inspectors? You would think the city would put a moratorium on developers with existing complaints, at least until the existing complaints are administratively reviewed by the city.

No such luck. Way back when, it was rumored that Snitzer was a campaign contributor.

Anonymous said...

. . . . Still no post about the bullshit LTs Exam / Mark Brown's column? Z

ZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Anonymous said...

hey, when the hell is the current sgt's class going to be getting out on the street?? I need to get off midnights!

-a tired sarge

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