CHICAGO — Mayor Brandon Johnson’s new human resources chief was accused during her time in the city’s procurement department of threatening staffers and interfering with attempts to correct employees who fell short of the city’s contracting protocols.

Tiheta Hinton, confirmed last month as Johnson’s commissioner of the Department of Human Resources, faced harassment complaints when she was second in command at the Department of Procurement Services, according to personnel files released to the Tribune in a public records request this week.

In one report a staffer alleged Hinton made “political threats” after discovering a mistake in the bidding process for a contract at the airports.

“(Hinton) stated, ‘you don’t know who I am’, ‘you don’t know who I know’. She then proceeds to say, ‘I’m going down to the Fifth Floor’ repeatedly,” the April 2024 complaint says. “It’s awfully disturbing to work in fear that if another mistake or error occurs that I will surmise the threat of being fired by ‘Fifth Floor’ because of (Hinton’s) political connections.”

The Department of Human Resources declined to investigate those allegations, saying they fell outside its purview. Another memo from the department says Hinton was subsequently scheduled to attend a “meeting for performance termination” in 2025.

In statements on Thursday to the Tribune, Hinton and Johnson press secretary Allison Novelo denied all allegations of Hinton violating HR or procurement policy but did not answer questions about why that meeting was called or what it entailed.

Hinton’s personnel file shows she has remained employed at the city, but she was investigated last year by the procurement department’s HR director over accusations of meddling with the commodities team’s work processes.

“The allegations and characterization of my conduct listed in these reports are egregious and unfounded,” Hinton said in a statement. “I consistently advocated for a professional and respectful workplace, and my efforts were focused on ensuring all employees were treated with dignity and respect.”

The mayor appointed Hinton in September to lead the Department of Human Resources after Commissioner Sandra Blakemore retired this summer. The department in charge of City Hall’s HR investigations has been in the spotlight throughout Johnson’s term, as controversy has swirled over staffers leaving after being accused of misconduct or alleging they faced retaliation.

This time, Johnson’s new Department of Human Resources chief faces her own checkered history. The allegations also touch upon concerns with city employees fulfilling procurement responsibilities — another topic mayoral critics have latched onto amid scrutiny over major contracts such as the city’s anti-violence programs and pending new gunshot detection system.

Novelo said in a statement that the administration remains confident in Hinton’s leadership and that no contracts were jeopardized amid these disputes.

The 2024 harassment report came after an employee sent out letters to firms bidding for construction contracts at O’Hare and Midway airports that were signed with Hinton’s name. The complainant, who was not aware those letters went out, alleges Hinton began shouting and making political threats about going to the mayor’s office, believing she had been “set up.”

“(The complainant) was emotionally overwhelmed, aspirated with confusion, frightened by (Hinton’s) Fifth floor threats of losing her job,” the report says.

Only the procurement chief can sign off on letters for the department, but an employee apparently used an old 2021 letterhead from when Hinton was interim chief procurement officer. That staffer was not in the meeting but was later reprimanded, records show, and the project was rebid.

The next month the complainant reported Hinton — who is listed on the website of a church in the Austin neighborhood as serving as a “prophetess” at the institution — for allegedly responding to her accusations of making political threats with, “I am political and politically spiritually,” according to the report.

Hinton’s statement claims that the Department of Human Resources “found no evidence to substantiate wrongdoing on my part, and no disciplinary action was taken against me.” However, an HR employee wrote the department did not investigate those allegations because they would not fall under discrimination against protected classes or violate the city’s violence in the workplace policy.

The 2025 procurement department probe, meanwhile, included accusations that Hinton yelled at staff members to the point of an employee resigning, and obstructed the performance improvement plans of five subordinates as part of a suspected “quid pro quo.”

One document from that investigation says the latter allegation came after the complainant flagged issues with those five employees, including improper data and contract tracking, vendor complaints, “numerous” contracts being out of force for two to four years and an “inability to develop RFP’s (requests for proposals).”

“There is documentation that Hinton is interfering with the work processes of the Commodities team, resulting in … unsubstantiated critique on the professionalism and knowledge of leaders,” a separate memo from the investigation says. “There is grave concern that she has shared proprietary information of leadership discussions with subordinates.”

The report also notes a dispute with City Hall security on July 15, 2025, following the “meeting for performance termination.”

A police officer’s incident summary says that after he asked Hinton if she had spoken with HR, she replied, “I’m not having this,” and called Johnson’s chief of staff, Cristina Pacione-Zayas. The cop was instructed to help unlock Hinton’s office and allow her to retrieve her belongings, which he did, according to the incident summary.

The next day, Hinton emailed the officer asking, “Was there anything in particular you wanted out of my office?” He was directed by Chief Procurement Officer Sharla Roberts to not respond, according to the incident summary.

The memo concludes: “It is imperative for the focused performance of DPS that she moves on to her new assignment.” It’s unclear what the new assignment would have been. Hinton’s personnel file says she had a “supervisor change” in November 2025 and was denied a merit raise this March.

In her statement to the Tribune, Hinton said, without elaborating, that the July 15 incident was “resolved internally.”

Novelo added, “Department leadership has the authority to manage personnel matters and address disputes within their departments. … Some of the disputes referenced in the letters were handled internally by department leadership in accordance with these processes.”

A few days earlier, Hinton also allegedly shouted at one of her deputies, who then walked into another staffer’s office to relay her concerns.

“Later that morning I asked to meet with T. Hinton to discuss the inappropriate yelling,” that second staffer wrote. “I restated the importance of professional behavior. She yelled at me to get out of her office.”

Hinton denied all allegations of bullying, saying, “The characterization of my management of employees as intimidating or retaliatory is also baseless.”

Nonetheless, Johnson critics have long pointed out the steady stream of personnel issues during his term and questioned whether the mayor has done enough to stamp out bad behavior. His former communications chief Ronnie Reese was fired in 2024 amid a litany of harassment allegations, along with staffers complaining that Pacione-Zayas proposed a peace circle instead of firing him sooner. Reese has denied any wrongdoing.

Reese and Johnson’s senior adviser, Jason Lee, also faced a round of HR reports in 2023 that led to the complainants being fired and placed on the city’s do-not-hire list until Reese’s ouster. Aldermen at the time criticized the mayor for not fostering a healthy workplace culture, but the revolving door of exits has continued.

The mayor’s cultural affairs chief, Clinee Hedspeth, resigned in 2025 after a harassment investigation.

Meanwhile, some ex-employees have accused the administration of retaliation. Garien Gatewood, deputy mayor of public safety, was fired in March after filing a complaint with the inspector general against Pacione-Zayas and Lee over allegedly interference with the gunshot detection bidding process.

Johnson has denied any impropriety with that contract, and Novelo said in her Thursday statement, “The City takes employee concerns seriously and has established processes for addressing workplace disputes and allegations of misconduct.”

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