Illinois governor fires outgoing board chief

Christopher Wills

Thursday, June 26, 2003 | 9:43 a.m.

MOUNT CARROLL, Ill. -- Gov. Rod Blagojevich fired outgoing Illinois Gaming Board head Philip C. Parenti from the state payroll Wednesday, saying that Parenti's new job with a casino operator is a conflict of interest.

Parenti resigned June 18 to accept a job as an executive with Harrah's Entertainment Inc. of Las Vegas, but he would have remained on the state payroll until the end of July.

The board put Parenti on administrative leave until the end of his tenure, which means the state would have paid Parenti $18,000, said the governor's spokeswoman Cheryle Jackson.

"We don't think the taxpayers should be paying Mr. Parenti on administrative leave when he has already decided to make his bet with Harrah's," Blagojevich said.

A phone call to Parenti from the Associated Press Wednesday evening was not immediately returned. Gaming board officials also did not immediately return phone calls.

Parenti said when he resigned that his new job as a vice president at the gambling company did not conflict with the board's code of conduct.

The code prohibits members or employees from working for or representing a riverboat licensee or applicant within a year of leaving the board.

Harrah's owns riverboat casinos in Metropolis and Joliet.

Blagojevich said Parenti's actions emphasize the need for ethics reform for state workers.

"It goes to the issue that we think is important for ethical reform, and that is to end the revolving door," Blagojevich said.

Parenti said he wanted to leave his $160,000-a-year job partly because he has to pay tuition for two daughters in college.

The board on June 20 selected Deputy Chief Legal Counsel Jeannette P. Tamayo as Parenti's interim replacement.

The administrator oversees a staff of about 100 in Springfield and Chicago and runs the daily operations of the board, which licenses, oversees and collects taxes on the state's riverboat casinos.

Parenti was key in brokering a deal for Emerald Casino to give up its state license in return for investors' original stakes in a planned Rosemont casino. The board derailed that casino in January 2001 by voting to revoke Emerald's license, claiming that top casino officials lied to the board and that some investors had mob ties.

New board members went along with the deal to avoid a possibly lengthy revocation process. A planned sale of the license has been held up by bankruptcy proceedings involving Emerald.