Advisory on Department of Law’s Cooperation with Oversight of Its Employment Actions

Executive Summary

Oversight of the City’s employment actions and related activities is among the statutory functions of the City of Chicago Office of Inspector General (OIG). In January 2026, OIG advised the City’s Department of Law (DOL) that it had failed to meet its duty to cooperate with that oversight by refusing to provide hiring records to which OIG is entitled, and recommended that, going forward, DOL comply with oversight of its employment actions. DOL declined, in part, to provide the records OIG requested because they related to a position DOL described as “high profile.” OIG noted in its advisory that neither OIG’s legal authority to review employment actions nor DOL’s duty to cooperate with OIG permit exceptions for “high profile” matters. OIG’s advisory further reflects that, following DOL’s refusal to provide OIG with the requested records, OIG submitted a covert and anonymous request for those records under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). DOL produced the records which it had previously declined to provide to OIG in response to that FOIA request, in a determination at odds with a suggestion that the records were so confidential as to be exempt from oversight.