Burr Ridge Hires 'Crisis' Public Relations Firm

BURR RIDGE, IL – Burr Ridge hired a "crisis communication" public relations firm just hours before the Chicago Tribune wrote a story about the April drunken-driving arrest of the village's deputy police chief.

Patch had already written two stories about the matter – on June 10 and June 17.

In the early evening of June 18, the Chicago Tribune published a story about Deputy Chief Ryan Husarik's April 13 arrest while he was behind the wheel of a police car in Virginia.

Four hours before the publication, Lissa Druss, CEO of Strategia Consulting, emailed Village Administrator Evan Walter.

She said her email would stand as a memorandum of understanding that Strategia would provide a "crisis communication strategy" to the village at its regular hourly rate of $295.

Five minutes later, Walter emailed Police Chief John Madden and the other deputy chief, Marc Loftus, that he was authorizing $2,500 to be available to spend with Strategia.

"Please use as you see fit," he said.

After the Tribune contacted the village, officials may have become concerned that Chicago's TV stations would follow suit with their own stories. That did not happen.

Patch contacted Strategia twice. In an email, Patch asked the firm's representative assigned to Husarik's situation about whether the deputy chief drove the police car back to Illinois after his arrest. The representative did not reply.

Then Patch reached the person by phone. She said she would contact the village to find out the answer and get back to Patch. She did not follow through.

More than a week later, Patch asked Mayor Gary Grasso the same question. He said Deputy Chief Loftus was sent to Virginia to drive back the car.

The arrest was not publicly known until Patch's first story.