won back her right to drive<\/a> after her attorney argued she wasn\u2019t given proper warning of the consequences of refusing a breathalyzer test.<\/p>\nShe was fined another $1,000 by the ethics board this week and her top aide, Dan Balanoff, $750 for permitting an employee to attend an unauthorized conference unrelated to his county duties on county time.<\/p>\n
That employee, Ryan McIntyre, was fined the equivalent of 16 hours of county pay after he improperly attended the 2023 International LGBTQ+ Leaders Conference in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
McIntyre managed Steele\u2019s calendar, meetings and outreach events. He told the ethics board he was \u201ctold to go\u201d to the conference with Steele in late 2023.<\/p>\n
After learning about the trip, the Board of Review staff told Balanoff twice that McIntyre would need to use paid time off to go because the conference was \u201cpolitical in nature and unrelated to McIntyre\u2019s County duties,\u201d according to the board\u2019s ruling. Balanoff told them Steele pushed back and he went on to approve travel and lodging expenses.<\/p>\n
The board did not determine attendance was \u201cprohibited political activity,\u201d but did conclude it was unrelated to his job at the county. Balanoff, the board said, \u201cstill approved and submitted\u201d McIntyre\u2019s request for reimbursement, permitting him \u201cto misuse County property,\u201d and failing to ask about the purpose of the conference or review any materials related to it. Steele, meanwhile, \u201chad even more of a duty\u201d to meet the highest ethical standards as the head of the office, including getting preauthorization for attendance at conferences and training sessions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had no idea it was anything political. When I was made aware of the perhaps-political nature of it, I made steps to correct it with our HR department,\u201d Balanoff told the Tribune Friday. \u201cHe was never reimbursed for anything, so there was no county funds lost on that.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the third finding, the ethics board concluded Balanoff, Steele\u2019s director of special projects, \u201cconducted dual employment\u201d by doing legal work for his own firm and attended nongovernment activities \u2014 including two Cubs games \u2014 on county time on four separate occasions.<\/p>\n
Balanoff admitted to answering client calls and working on three real estate transactions during county hours, though he contended he did not have a set 9-to-5 schedule at the county.<\/p>\n
Balanoff posted pictures of himself at Wrigley Field and the nearby bar, Murphy\u2019s Bleachers, on social media on Aug. 4, 2023, when the team played against the Braves, after clocking in at the county that morning. He posted on his Instagram from Wrigley again on April 1, 2024, the day of the Cubs season opener against the Rockies. According to the board, he used sick time to attend when he should have used vacation time, a violation of the county\u2019s attendance policy.<\/p>\n
Balanoff also joined a Board of Review meeting virtually in September 2023 while on a plane for a personal trip after clocking in that morning and not requesting time off. He said he had notified Steele of the travel. The board reported a similar incident in which Balanoff traveled for personal reasons without clocking out.<\/p>\n
The board separately found Balanoff took calls not related to the county during normal working hours.<\/p>\n
Balanoff tried to challenge the board\u2019s investigatory findings after he resigned on May 25, arguing the board didn\u2019t have jurisdiction anymore, that he did not knowingly violate the county\u2019s rules, and that his use of county resources was \u201cde minimus,\u201d because they did not interfere with his county duties or impose extra taxpayer cost.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had permission to work remotely from various places,\u201d and on his own schedule, Balanoff told the Tribune. \u201cWe presented that evidence, which was ignored. I never engaged in outside employment on company time.\u201d<\/p>\n
The board said those arguments were \u201cunavailing,\u201d that his behavior was \u201ctroubling,\u201d and that the commingling of the outside activities \u201ccreates the appearance of impropriety\u201d and misused taxpayer funds, but was not \u201can indictment of Balanoff\u2019s performance of his County duties.\u201d<\/p>\n
He was fined a total of $4,500 for various ethics provisions, which are due within 30 days.<\/p>\n
Balanoff on Friday said the ruling was a political attack by opponents to unionization within the office. \u201cWe obviously don\u2019t agree with it, I\u2019m going to appeal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Originally Published: June 27, 2025 at 6:16 PM CDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cook County\u2019s Board of Ethics fined Board of Review Commissioner Samantha Steele and aides for a series of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":21332,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,5404,5386,1818,1370,728,50,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-21331","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-chicago","9":"tag-cook-county","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-illinois","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-local-news","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-politics"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114760042603555374","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21331\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}