Chicago Wants To Stop Bad Contractors From Starting Other Building Projects
(CBS) -- City officials are proposing an ordinance that might have prevented last year's line-of-duty death of a firefighter.
The building where firefighter Dan Capuano died a year ago on 92nd and Baltimore had been undergoing work.
Buildings Commissioner Judy Frydland says a check on that contractor's work at other buildings -- done after Capuano died -- turned up lots of violations.
Frydland says had the proposed ordinance been in effect last year, the city would have been able to keep the contractor from getting permits to do other work, like the job at 92nd and Baltimore, based on code violations at other job sites.
She says the proposed ordinance would have tough penalties so that contractors or developers could not just move on to the next job.
"Taking away their license and not being able to work in the city of Chicago. That is a very heavy penalty," she says. "That directly affects their livelihood. What I'm hoping is that, when people see that we're serious, that they get their act together and do it right."
Currently, the city can only stop a contractor's work if it sees violations at a particular location.
There's just a small number of contractors who might be the "bad actors" who don't follow the rules, Frydland says.
