Incompetence and inexperience are never obstacles when you have the right connections
Chicago Transit Authority President Dorval R. Carter, Jr. announced his retirement from the agency on Monday, nearly eight months after a majority of Chicago's City Council called for his resignation or termination by Mayor Brandon Johnson. Carter, who was the city's top-earning official with a salary of $391,108 as of July 2024, has landed a new gig that may be even more lucrative.
Carter is heading for St. Anthony Hospital, which largely serves low-income Medicaid patients. In 2023, the hospital reported $150 million in revenue and $147 million in expenses. Salaries and wages accounted for 46.8 percent of its operating budget, at just under $69 million. That same year, St. Anthony paid President & CEO Guy Medaglia $771,365 in salary, and "other compensation" of $499,295. Medaglia's total compensation of $1,270,660 clocked in at 1.84 percent of total payroll for the entire hospital.
Medaglia had a background in healthcare before coming to St. Anthony, including prior executive management positions for urban community hospitals and private health companies. Carter, on the other hand, has worked exclusively in the public transportation sector since graduating from Howard University's law school in 1983, and his only apparent healthcare experience was as a board member at St. Anthony, where his father previously worked as a physician. It seems that Dorval R. Carter Sr.’s service as chair of the hospital’s Obstetrics and Gynecology Department was sufficient to earn his son a seat on the board around 2006. That’s the first year that Carter Jr. appears as a director on public tax filings by St. Anthony. (Documents filed each year since then indicate that Carter spent an average of one hour per week on board duties.)
After rising to the top of his field as a transportation attorney and administrator, Dorval spent the last nine years driving the CTA into the ground and championing the ill-advised Red Line extension. As the system's performance spiraled downwards following the pandemic, Carter directed CTA employees to construct a larger trophy case for his office in 2022 — a poetic illustration of his apparent priorities.
One hopes that St. Anthony is hiring Carter at a salary commensurate with his experience and performance. Between his abject failure at the CTA, and prevailing wages at the hospital — where top doctors earn between $215,000 and $545,141 — one hopes the board takes its not-for-profit mission seriously, and dedicates financial resources to serving poor patients, rather than lining Carter's pockets.
