CORRUPTION: Quinn “Neighborhood Recovery Initiative” scandal architect now running Chicago’s similar anti-gun program

We know you’re going to find this hard to believe.

Back in 2010, Illinois’ Democrat Governor Pat Quinn was facing a tight race for re-election.  The state is broke, but Quinn managed to find fifty-some million dollars for a “Neighborhood Recovery Initiative” to reduce violent crime in Chicago.

In reality, it was nothing more than a scheme to buy inner-city votes in the city of Chicago.

The FBI is now investigating the program, on the scent of criminal wrongdoing and malfeasance.  (See “How Quinn’s Anti-Violence Program Spiraled Out of Control“)

Toni Irving was an architect of Quinn’s program, working at that time as the deputy chief of staff for Quinn.

In August 2013, she landed a similar role for Rahm Emanuel in Chicago doing similar work for Chicago’s version of the NRI called “Get In Chicago”.

Chicago (Sun-Times) – The head of a new city alliance with business titans to reduce gun violence in Chicago was one of the architects of the governor’s scandal-plagued Neighborhood Recovery Initiative.

Toni Irving, the head of Get In Chicago, was a deputy chief of staff for Gov. Pat Quinn when the Neighborhood Recovery Initiative was formed in 2010.

Irving acknowledged in an interview she helped come up with the ideas for the program, which is now under investigation by federal and Cook County prosecutors. An audit by the state’s auditor general slammed the program earlier this year, concluding Quinn’s administration didn’t “adequately monitor” how state grant dollars were spent; community organizations that hired people with those grants weren’t maintaining time sheets, and city aldermen dictated where the money was to be steered.