The FBI is reportedly investigating a $20.5 million no-bid contract that the Chicago school district awarded to a company that trains principals and once employed the district’s CEO, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, local news media say.
Citing unnamed sources, The Chicago Sun-Times said the FBI and the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago had been looking into the contract for about a year and investigating the role that Ms. Byrd-Bennett might have played in it. The Chicago Tribune story stressed that she has not been accused of any wrongdoing.
Ms. Byrd-Bennett worked at the company, SUPES Academy, before she was tapped as an adviser to the district’s former CEO. She was picked by Mayor Rahm Emanuel in 2012 to head the school system.
