FORMER CANDIDATE ENDORSES: BURGESS, TATES AND JONES FOR TRUSTEE

Danny Hammond- Photo Provided

by Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |  Danny Hammond, Jr., who was not certified by Village Clerk Debbie Williams for the April 7th ballot said he can't continue a costly legal battle.  Hammond has suspended his campaign for Village Trustee and now endorses 3 of his former opponents for the job. 

Hammond has issued the following statement:

To the Residents of Sauk Village:

A very heartfelt thank you to the voters of Sauk Village who signed my nomination petitions to get my name on the ballot.  Unfortunately, because of dirty politics we were not able to achieve our goal of victory!  We hoped to bring the important issues to the table and make some important changes in the direction of Sauk Village.  Because of a tactical political decision by Village Clerk Debbie Williams and her supporters to not certify my name for the April 7^th ballot, it is not to be this time.  I cannot continue a fight in Cook County Circuit Court, which is financially draining when I have a family which is my priority.  I do not have unlimited resources like many who run our Village feel the Village has.

The way to continue our fight now and to accomplish the goals which we stand is to take our energy, our passion, our strength to the polls and do all we can to re-elect Derrick Burgess as Village Trustee and support him as he fights for the people of Sauk Village in hopes that we can Change Direction.  There is nothing “forward” about the “motions” that the village has experienced. 

Today, I suspend my campaign for Village Trustee, I support Derrick Burgess as a true Independent candidate for Village Trustee and wish him victory in this election.  I endorse him and throw my full support behind him and ask you, the residents and voters of Sauk Village to do likewise.  Derrick Burgess is a good, honest and decent representative for Sauk Village and he is worthy of our votes.

Knowing that Trustee Burgess is just one vote, it’s going to take more than just him to fight for the residents of Sauk Village and therefore I strongly encourage a vote for decorated and Retired Lieutenant-Colonel Cecial Tates and Kelvin Jones for Village Trustees as well.  All three of these men have strong convictions about what is needed to move Sauk Village in the right direction.  They do not believe in the business as usual attitude like the other Trustee candidates who have proven time and again that they will not act on behalf of the residents.  

Tates and Jones, along with Burgess can be counted on to bring fresh ideas and sound decisions to the Trustee Board.  All three will give you the voice in government you have not had in years. 

Village Clerk Debbie Williams may have won the battle, but I will win the war against this administration's sense of arrogance and entitlement.

Sincerely,

Danny Hammond, Jr.

Former Candidate for
Village Trustee

Residents of Sauk Village will go to the polls on April 7th and will pick 3 Trustees.  There are only three other candidates challenging Burgess, Tates and Jones and they are Jeff Morden, John Poskin and Gary Holcomb.

TRAVELGATE: WILLIAMS SAGA CONTINUES

Village Clerk Debbie Williams

By Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |  By now hopes where that the people of Sauk Village would know just who paid for a trip that Village Clerk Debbie Williams and her daughter Trustee Rosie Williams had taken to Washington D.C.

The Williams mother and daughter duo took a trip to a Building One America Summit in Washington D.C. in July, 2013 along with a Village vendor.  Williams solicited donations on the Village’s website and from among Village vendors, but called the matter a “personal trip”.  Williams later shared video of her presentation at the summit on the Village’s website, which is taxpayer funded.

A Freedom of Information Act request was filed following a July 23, 2013 meeting in which Village Clerk Debbie Williams had a virtual melt down.  The Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan's office issued a non-binding opinion in the matter in March, 2014 stating that Village should provide all information requested.  The Village ignored the Attorney General’s opinion.  So we made a follow up request to the Village requesting the same information, since the Village had failed to deny or honor the request in the first place.  The Village again refused to provide the information.  We then asked the Attorney General to issue a Binding Opinion in the matter.  The response came finally after months as the Attorney General’s office issued a rare Binding Opinion stating that the Village violated the Freedom of Information Act by failing to provide all information about the trip which was requested.

The Village, through the taxpayer funded attorney, in November, 2014 has sued the Illinois Attorney General stating that the Attorney General and I had essentially colluded against the Village in what is known as ex parte communications.  In December, 2014, the Attorney General filed a lengthy multi-page legal motion to dismiss the Village’s frivolous action.  The Attorney General, in their motion to dismiss the Village's action the Attorney General reminded the Village that the State of Illinois has Supremacy over the Village and that its power is derived from the State. 

A hearing was scheduled for Monday, February 9^th; however, the Village was unprepared and requested a continuance.  The Continuance was not objected to by the Village or I and the hearing will go forward in March.

Taxpayers are likely paying for the legal services to protect the actions of Debbie Williams and Rosie Williams as they are not in compliance with the Illinois Attorney General’s Binding Opinion.  The Illinois Attorney General’s office has vehemently defended their Binding Opinions as a matter of law and for the most part has always been upheld and maintained.

AUDIT REVEALS MULTI-MILLION DEFICIT

By Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |The Village Board received a copy of the audit from April, 2014 which was due in October but as they say better late than never.  Susan Jones of Miller Cooper and Company of Deerfield, Illinois presented a 7 page management report to the Village Board.  The 12 month audit report, which has been available on the Illinois Comptroller’s website since mid-January was only presented to the Trustees on Tuesday.  The audit paints a bleak picture of the village’s finances the Village’s net position is showing a multi-million dollar deficit and deficits in various funds. 

Chart provided by SAUK VILLAGER NEWS:  History of the General
Fund  Balance since 1999 (Source: Village Audits)

Despite the fact that Hanks’s 2013-14 Budget called for $5.2 million in revenue the Village actually brought in $5.6 million but still outspent the revenues brought it by some $493,610.  For the 12-month period ending April 30, 2014, the audit reveals that the Hanks Administration spent $6,149,110 well more than was taken in adding to the General Fund deficit.  The General Fund began the fiscal year with a deficit of $1.38 million and ballooned to $2.02 million by April 30, 2014.  The General Fund funds police and general administration functions for the Village.

Trustee Derrick Burgess, who voted no on the most recent budget, projected in his budget analysis that the General Fund will be $962,677 in deficit going into this budget cycle in July, 2014 and the actual amount according to the audit report is $632,706.  Burgess said that this figure would have been even greater had the Village booked the additional $758,080 which was owing at the beginning of the fiscal year.  The actual amount is probably worse than even Burgess projected which would balloon the General Fund Deficit to closer to $2.7 million according to the Audit Report.

Above Chart was created by Trustee Burgess.  Hanks disagreed with Burgess's
Analysis and the circle and arrow indicates where Hanks thought the numbers
were going to be.   Hanks's comments are in the box above
The TRUTH is that BURGESS WAS RIGHT!

Mayor David Hanks called Burgess’s General Fund projections “skewed and incorrect” and Hanks actually was calling for a more modest deficit of $700,000 in July during Hanks’s 2 ½ hour review of Burgess’s Budget analysis.  The actual numbers are about what Burgess had projected at about $2 million in deficit.  Burgess said that if there are no changes in the policy of this administration that the General Fund Deficit will continue to sink near $3 million. 

“This is proof positive that the current budget that this Board passed was anything but balanced” Burgess said.  “I tried to warn the Village Board then that this budget was not right, provided a 23 page analysis pointing out some points we were going to have a difficult time with and asked to work together on solutions and was slapped down in a political game.  I’m not playing a game. I was elected to represent the residents and nobody should run their business or a government the way that this village has been running” Burgess said.

Burgess warned his fellow board members Tuesday night that they are responsible for the finances of the Village and they will be held to account for the votes that they take on the finances of the Village.

Also revealed in the Audit report is a mess that the Hanks Administration appears to be kicking the can to another administration to address the unfunded pension obligations.  The Village’s Police Pension Fund is owed some $2.2 million and other post-employment benefits totaling some $784,000 nearly $3 million.  Hanks has not directed a penny into the Police Pension Fund since taking office.  The Police Pension Fund has not had an independent Audit conducted or filed since 2008.

The Hanks Administration also blew past the amounts appropriated by the Village Board of Trustees to the tune of $1,620,545 without a supplemental appropriations ordinance the Audit Report revealed.

 

To view the entire 2013-14 Audit Report:  CLICK HERE

VILLAGE SETTLES LAWSUIT

by Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |  Village officials voted unanimously Tuesday night to settle a lawsuit with Susan Dobrzeniecki and her late husband Thomas for $290,000.  Dobrzeniecki, a Village employee since 2003, brought the suit against several village police officers as well as St. James Hospital and two of its emergency room doctors, alleging that she was unlawfully committed and her home was unlawfully searched in retaliation for conflicts between her family and the Sauk Village Police.

In Dobrzeniecki’s 8 count lawsuit filed in Federal Court she alleges that her Fourth Amendment rights were violated, that she was falsely imprisoned by the hospital and she also sought to recover against doctors and the hospital for intentional misrepresentation, medical malpractice, intentional infliction of emotional distress and negligent infliction of emotional distress.

The entire incident unfolded on November 9, 2009, after members of the Sauk Village Police Department informed Dobrzeniecki, while she was at work at Village Hall, that her son was shot and was in the hospital.  While at the hospital visiting her son a member of the Sauk Village Police Department along with Hospital Security escorted Dobrzeniecki from the room into a secure room in the Hospital’s emergency room where they informed her, wrongfully, that they had a court order to hold her since she had allegedly made the statement earlier “I’m a good person.  Why does this keep happening to me?  If something happens to my son, I’ll just die” according to Federal Court documents and court transcripts.

A Police officer asked her to turn her purse and jacket over to them and they would give them to a friend who had driven her to the hospital.  According to court documents, police officers allegedly removed her keys to her home and without any court order went to Dobrzeniecki’s home and “illegally” searched it while her wheelchair bound husband repeatedly told officers to leave.  Officers used as a pretext a search the home, that they were searching for the gun which shot her son, but according to Federal Court records there was no reason to reasonably believe a gun was at the home nor was there a search warrant.

During the time that followed hospital personnel kept Dobrzeniecki under video and audio surveillance.  According to Federal Court documents, Hospital defendants “failed to observe the procedural protections against wrongful involuntary commitments, and their treatment of Susan fell below the standard of care”.  Dobrzeniecki was transferred to a psychiatric hospital on orders from a doctor at St. James Hospital and later released.

Without any discussion from the board of Trustees Tuesday night, the vote to approve the settlement was unanimous.  Taxpayers will only be responsible for the first $50,000 while the Village’s insurance carrier will pick up the other $240,000 according to Village officials. 

NATE BURNS MURDER FACES ADDITIONAL CHARGES

DEVON STIDWELL (Source Cook County Sheriff)

CHICAGO |  A Cook County jail inmate already behind bars on a murder charge tried to hire someone inside the jail to kill three witnesses against him, according to police.

 

Devon Stidwell, 19, has been in jail since Sept. 19, 2014, on murder charges in connection with a Sauk Village case involving Nate Burns, according to the Cook County sheriff’s office.

Sheriff’s police learned in November that Stidwell was trying to hire a hitman, a statement from the sheriff’s office said.

 

He twice met with an undercover sheriff’s officer whom he thought was a hitman, and offered to pay $5,000 each to have three witnesses killed, police claim.

 

Stidwell, of Ford Heights, is now charged with solicitation of murder and solicitation of murder for hire, the sheriff’s office said.

 

Already being held without bond on the murder charge, he will appear in bond court Saturday on the new charges.

Source: http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/Police-Man-in-Jail-for-Murder-Tried-to-Have-3-Witnesses-Killed-288891581.html#ixzz3P5YfQX38

ILLINOIS ATTORNEY GENERAL: HOLCOMB AND HOUSING COMMISSION VIOLATE LAW

Pictured LtoR: Housing Commissioners Heidi Parker, Gary
Holcomb and Sharon Nowak

By Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |  The Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan's office has issued a determination that the Sauk Village Housing Commission “violated the OMA (Open Meetings Act) by failing to record its closed meeting held on September 28, 2014, and by having improper discussions and taking final action during the closed session”. 

In a three-page determination the Attorney General’s office stated that Chairman Gary Holcomb and his Housing Commissioners violated the Open Meetings Act because they did not record their closed session meeting as required by law, they discussed “contract matters and housing reports” and Holcomb’s response to the Attorney General did not assert any specific exemptions claimed.  The violation of the law also is cited by the Attorney General’s office because it was noted in the Commission’s minutes that “final action by voting on several matters during the closed meeting” took place.  “These votes violated (the act)… which expressly provides that ‘no final action may be taken at a closed meeting’” the determination states.

Holcomb is a candidate for Village Trustee in the April election also came under intense criticism as he published a photo of a resident’s state identification and her son’s Social Security Card and number on social media pages he controls following the cleanup of an abandoned house in 2014.

It has not yet been determined if any fines will be assessed to the Commissioners for the Violation, the Act does provide for individual fines.  The Sauk Villager News will ask that fines be assessed as required under the Act.

ELECTION UPDATE: SCHOOL BOARD CHALLENGES FAIL & NEW BOARD MEMBER EXPECTED

By Joseph Wiszowaty
SAUK VILLAGE |  The School Board election for District 168 has taken a twist of events the last few weeks.  One Candidate has withdrawn 3 others successfully fought off challenges which would have removed them from the ballot.

Incumbents Board members Sharon Davenport, Tammy Jones and Sene Garrett along with newcomer Latonya West filed petitions to have their names on the April 7th ballot on the first day December 15^th.  West is seeking a 2 year unexpired term following the resignation of Melvin Stevenson in November.   Davenport, Jones, Garrett and West's petitions were not challenged but all other candidates faced unsucessful challenges.

Board members failed to make an appointment to replace Stevenson by December 30th.  West’s name was the only name put forth for appointment following the unexpected resignation of Stevenson.  Actions to block West’s appointment were successfully carried out by Board Members Jimo Kasali, Deloris Green and Mary Howard, who is the sister to Mayor David Hanks.   The Executive Director of South Cook Intermediate Service Center Dr. Vanessa Kinder has the legal authority to appoint a “temporary” replacement to the seat vacated by Stevenson since the School Board failed to appoint a replacement.  The only issue is that the vacancy is only until the election outcome is determined so the person may only be there on a temporary basis.

"I am preparing to interview candidates for the vacant seat and I intend on making the appointment by the end of this month" Kinder said.  Kinder admitted that she is not mandated to appoint but it is her legal duty to do so.  "It would not be fair to the people of the district to have the seat vacant and decisions by the board not getting made" Kinder said.

Kinder did not identify who she would be interviewing for the vacancy but said "it is disappointing that the local board could not make a decision and that I am forced to appoint.  Decisions such as these should be made at the local level, but there is a provision when it can't be that it falls upon the person in this position" Kinder said.

Resident Larry Stewart filed objections to candidates which included Rachel Eastman, Phillip Bazile, husband of former School Board President and current McConathy Library Trustee Arleta Bazile and Sandra Isom who are seeking the 4 year terms.  Former Village Clerk Candidate Marva Campbell-Pruitt who is seeking the 2 year unexpired term was also considered to replace Aisa El-Amin who resigned last year.  Campbell-Pruitt put her name into consideration for the appointment to El-Amin’s vacant seat, however, was passed over for Garrett.

Stewart said he filed objections to ensure that those candidates who filed did so correctly.  “Look, when you run for office you’ve got to make sure you start out right.  It begins by making sure your papers work is in order” Stewart said.  “This is not politically motivated.  I know each of the people who are running.  It’s about following the rules” Stewart said.

Since the objections were filed, Eastman withdrew her name as a candidate and will not be on the ballot in April.  Eastman had obtained well over 100 signatures of registered voters to get her name on the ballot, only 50 are required.  “I just wanted to make a difference for the kids of the Village” Eastman said following her withdrawal.  “It seems that no matter what you do someone is going to be mad at you for doing something.  I had no idea that people would get so personal” Eastman said.  Eastman serves on the Neighborhood Watch Committee.

The electoral board, which use to rest with the local school boards has been moved to the jurisdiction of Cook County to expedite the handling of hearings and save the financially struggling school districts tens  of thousands of taxpayer dollars.  The Cook County Hearing Officer tossed out all challenges made by Stewart ensuring that all candidates, except Eastman who withdrew, will be on the ballot.

In the Village Trustees race, for the first time in many years no objections were filed.  The seats of Trustees Derrick Burgess, Jeff Morden and John Poskin are up for grabs in April.  Burgess, Morden and Poskin all filed nomination petitions seeking their old seats.  Poskin has never faced election for his seat but was appointed  twice by Hanks in 2012 and is currently the longest serving unelected Village Trustee.  Hoping to unseat them are controversial Housing Commission Chairman Gary Holcomb, and former School Board President and Retired Lieutenant Colonel Cecil Tates, Kelvin Jones and Danny Hammond, Jr.

"People of Sauk Village want change.  They are tired of this administration and the lack of direction" Hammond said. 

The two seats up for the Nancy L. McConathy Public Library are uncontested.