* The Illinois Answers Project back in 2022…
The state’s former public health director — a well-regarded advisor to Gov. JB Pritzker during the COVID-19 crisis — is under investigation by a state ethics agency for taking a CEO job at a medical non-profit overseen and funded by the state agency she led.
Dr. Ngozi Ezike, a steady, reassuring figure alongside Pritzker during pandemic news conferences, stepped down from her $178,000-per-year state post in March. In April, she accepted an offer to lead Sinai Health System — one of the state’s top medical nonprofits.
The Illinois Ethics Act requires department heads like Ezike to wait a year before accepting positions with companies that hold contracts overseen by their departments, or with companies their departments license or regulate. And while in office they cannot engage in job negotiations with companies that lobby their agencies.
The law is designed to prevent the cozy revolving door between state officials and the companies their agencies fund and regulate.
* The Executive Ethics Commission issued its decision today…
This cause is before the Executive Ethics Commission (“Commission”) upon joint Motion of the Attorney General Kwame Raoul, in his official capacity and pursuant to his authority under Sections 20-45 and 20-50 of the State Officials and Employees Ethics Act (“Ethics Act”), and Dr. Ngozi Ezike, Respondent and former Director of the Illinois Department of Public Health (“IDPH”), requesting the Commission grant approval to their negotiated resolution of the matter (the “Settlement Agreement”).
The Complaint in this matter was filed on October 13, 2023. Respondent filed written objections to the sufficiency of the Complaint, and the Commission found the Complaint legally sufficient to proceed on February 20, 2024. On November 8, 2024, the Attorney General and Respondent jointly filed the Settlement Agreement, including:
1. Conditional Stipulations in which Respondent:
(a) admits a violation of the Ethics Act and the facts comprising the violation, in that she accepted employment and compensation from an entity which had contracts involving IDPH with a cumulative value of $4.2 million and over which she had exercised regulatory and licensing authority in the year before her departure from State employment, and
( b) agrees a fine of $150,000 should be levied against Respondent;
2. Respondent’s Mitigation Statement; and
3. The underlying investigatory report issued by Petitioner on February 21, 2023.
* From Ezike’s mitigation statement…
The Ethics Act prohibits high ranking employees, referred to as “h-list employees”, from knowingly accepting employment or compensation from an entity, or its parent or subsidiary, that has or had contracts with a cumulative value of $25,000 or was the subject of a regulatory or licensing decision during the year prior to leaving State employment, regardless if the employee participated in or had knowledge of a contract or a licensing or regulatory decision. 5 ILCS 430/5-45(h). The Ethics Act does not define the term “contract” or “licensing or regulatory decisions” and the ethics training provided while Dr. Ezike was a State employee did not include definitions of these terms.
According to the OEIG Report, “A determination of whether an employee is restricted pursuant to 5-45(h) is based only on whether the agency contracted with, licensed, or regulated the prospective employer, information readily available to H-listers such as Dr. Ezike.” Dr. Ezike disagrees with this statement. First, the plain language of the Ethics Act applies the prohibition to entities that were the subject of any licensing or regulatory decision within a year before leaving state employment, not only those licensed or regulated. Second, the information necessary to conduct a revolving door determination is not always easily ascertainable. H-list employees must make their own revolving door determinations using their own knowledge, publicly available resources, or information they can gather from others, such as a chief of staff or ethics officer, and hope that the information is accurate. The OEIG does not provide h-list employees with an opportunity to seek a determination before accepting other employment. Rather, h-list employees are urged to review EEC precedent and consult their ethics officer, although they do not have the ability to require an ethics officer to give them a written opinion or require other staff to provide information. Thus, it is up to each h-list employee to decide what information they need to request from the agency, and there’s no guarantee they can get the needed information from their agency, particularly if the individuals they rely on for information don’t know the proper questions to ask or what is considered a “contract” or a “licensing or regulatory decision.” As a result, employees are left to rely on 4 information they can gather and advice from their ethics officer and then hope the information is complete and the ethics officer is correct. […]
As part of a final effort to do everything she could before signing a contract with Sinai, Dr. Ezike emailed the OEIG and disclosed that she was going to sign a contract with Sinai and asked if there were any concerns. The OEIG responded with the following advice:
“The OEIG does not make determinations for employees subject to the restrictions of section 5-45(h) of the Ethics Act (h-listers). As you are an h-lister, we encourage you to continue to consult with your counsel and your ethics officer with respect to this employment opportunity, or any other employment opportunities you are offered during the year following the termination of your State employment.”
That’s precisely what Dr. Ezike did. She relied on the information she was provided by her ethics officer and chief of staff, and she consulted and followed the advice of her counsel. She asked the two people within the agency that would have responsibility or access to the needed information and was told there weren’t any contracts and that Sinai wasn’t the subject of any licensing or regulatory decisions. She worked closely with private counsel who gave her a written opinion indicating it was permissible to accept employment. […]
It is also worth noting that the Director of IDPH is required to be a physician, and if the renewal of a hospital license is considered a licensing decision under the revolving door, a director would be precluded from working for any health system, in any capacity, for a year.
- ChrisB - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:27 am:
How Kafkaesque. It sounds like she exhausted every available resource at her disposal to try and stay above the table, and still got dinged for it. That’s unfortunate.
- Once again - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:34 am:
honestly the state should be paying her that money extra for what she did for us. this is ridiculous that you can go through all this and still be fined yet a lawmaker can resign and turnaround the next day and do whatever they want. gee we wonder why people don’t want to do public service.
- Lincoln Lad - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:35 am:
The fine seems extreme considering her efforts to seek input from appropriate parties. Unfortunate for her she’s not a former President.
- TheInvisibleMan - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:42 am:
“accepted employment and compensation from an entity which had contracts involving IDPH with a cumulative value of $4.2 million”
This is a pretty open and shut case.
She did a good job in her position with the state, unfortunately she did not do such a great job in negotiating her next position.
Similar to non-compete agreements at higher levels, the common approach is to enter into an agreement for future employment which starts one year and one day after the end of the current position. The important part of such an agreement is that it also includes backdated compensation for the previous year starting on day one of the new employment.
The employer in the present time is buying the rights to the employees future employment, but paid for at a later date. It’s like a futures/options contract on an employee.
Rushing right into the next position was a tactical mistake. A quite costly one too if this job-related expense/fine isn’t a contingency included in the current employment contract she negotiated in her new role.
- levivotedforjudy - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:44 am:
This is an instance where one size does not fit all. The revolving door rule makes sense for many, like a commerce commissioner but not for a physician who is probably taking a huge pay cut to accept the IDPH job in the first place. This is another negative for future candidates to consider.
- Retired from the state - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:46 am:
Guess she should’ve waited a year before she took the job. If you have to ask whether the offer violates the revolving door policy…you should prob just wait a year.
- Donnie Elgin - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 11:50 am:
The ethics rules apply equally to angels and demons.
- Annonin' - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 12:07 pm:
looks like a good legal malpractice claim should be in the works
- obvious - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 12:08 pm:
== Rushing right into the next position was a tactical mistake. A quite costly one too if this job-related expense/fine isn’t a contingency included in the current employment contract she negotiated in her new role. ==
hat do you suggest she do? She’s a doctor and the law would prohibit her from working at any hospital in the State. How does she earn a living and pay for her family? Should she have moved or gone to work at Starbucks for a year?
- Ducky LaMoore - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 12:52 pm:
“The ethics rules apply equally to angels and demons”
God, I wish that was true.
- Amalia - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 12:54 pm:
sad because she is fantastic. and that hospital really needed her to come on board and right the ship. if you know you know. her leadership is clearly great there now. in this case the law is an idiot. we are lucky she works in health care in Illinois.
- Once again - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 12:55 pm:
She works for a safety net hospital, invisible man. Not sure that’s even a possibility. maybe if she went and took a big corporate gig, but that’s not what she did
- hmmm - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 1:12 pm:
I know she’s well off but can she afford a 150,000 fine. That seems very steep. I don’t mean to sound silly, but perhaps JB can step in and pay it off. I sure would hope so if I was her.
- Original Rambler - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 1:33 pm:
Agree with much of the sentiment here that this really penalizes some employees and acts as a disincentive to hiring qualified employees. Especially hypocritical considering what GA members can get away with. This whole Ethics Act penalizes a large group of people (State employees) while leaving a garage door sized hole for GA members to walk through.
- Pot calling kettle - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 1:40 pm:
===If you have to ask whether the offer violates the revolving door policy…you should prob just wait a year.===
Disagree; the laws and rules are not that clear. We want people to ask (she did) and they should be able to get an straightforward answer (which she did not get - the answers she received were either misleading, wrong, or “don’t ask us”). This can and should be remedied by designating an entity that can provide a yes-no answer which is binding.
- Rich Miller - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 1:42 pm:
===This can and should be remedied by designating an entity that can provide a yes-no answer which is binding. ===
Agreed. And there should be an appeals process because this decision is kinda crazy.
- TheInvisibleMan - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 1:52 pm:
“Not sure that’s even a possibility”
Then that should have been part of her negotiation and decision making.
“She’s a doctor and the law would prohibit her from working at any hospital in the State.”
There are 49 other states.
At the end of the day, she made the decision she thought was best. Maybe she thinks the financial penalty is still worth taking the job she currently has. I can’t speak for her on that. Although she very much seems like the ‘money isn’t everything’ type of person.
- Notorious JMB - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:22 pm:
If the Ethics Officer gave her the ok, the fine should fall on the Ethics Officer. And if their approval can be over ruled by the OEIG, then what’s the point of running any outside employment or future employment past the EO for approval in the first place?
- Candy Dogood - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:24 pm:
===It sounds like she exhausted every available resource at her disposal to try and stay above the table, and still got dinged for it.===
She hired an attorney that drafter her an opinion that said it was fine for her to leave state employment and immediately accept employment at an entity in a manner that seems to violate at first face the Ethics Act. The fact that this appeared to violate the Ethics Act was discussed on this blog and in the end she agreed to a pay a significant fine for violating the ethics act.
Relying on internal agency opinions is also a bit of a concern, since, you know, she’s running the show.
===She works for a safety net hospital===
There 2023 form 990 says she earned $489,834 during her first reported fiscal year of employment, and includes the 7 figure salary of her predecessor.
She’s not exactly rounding on patients and her ability to be hired as a CEO who can expect to make a 7 figure salary was certainly influenced by her role with the State of Illinois.
- City Zen - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:35 pm:
The previous Sinai Health System CEO made $1 million per year. Ezike earned a half million for the fiscal year end 6/30/23. Shed no tears.
- Interested observer - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:44 pm:
This law has the effect of temporarily blackballing highly-qualified people from working in Illinois. If an H-lister wants to work in their field after they leave government, they basically have to leave the state. While the law’s intent makes perfect sense, I think it’s clear from this case that it’s way too broad and restrictive.
- Friendly Bob Adams - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:49 pm:
The intent of the revolving door law was to prevent direct benefit to an employee upon leaving state employment. The state should have to demonstrate that, in this case, she took some action knowing she would benefit.
- From DaZoo - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:52 pm:
And this is why some mid-level executives at State agencies find ways to re-direct signing authority (e.g. for contracts) to other staff for a year prior to an anticipated retirement date.
- Phineas - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 2:56 pm:
Sounds like she should have applied for CTU ‘union leave’.
- Notorious JMB - Friday, Jan 10, 25 @ 3:07 pm:
Replace an established individual with a high salary like Ezike with 27 year old liaison who just got hired by an association for 75k that thought they were following the rules. It’s a much different ball game then.