Arne Waltmire Assaults John Hammerand with Mailings & Robo-Call

Fueled by thousands and thousands of dollars of teacher union money, Crystal Lake South auto mechanics teacher Arne Waltmire is filling mailboxes and people’s ears with campaign messages.

Pretty much all are negative, aimed at defeating incumbent Republican John Hammerand.

Hammerand and newcomer Chuck Wheeler are facing off against Democrat Waltmire.

Let’s talk about a robo-call that came today first.

One person described it like this:

Just got a really nasty robo call from Illinois Citizens for Accountability on John Hammerand.

Said he is paid $40k per year and misses most of meetings.

Do either of you know who is behind this group?

The phone number was 815-219-1641.

The answer is that I have never heard of the pop-up committee, but the technique of using non-traceable committee names is one that has been used by supporters of Jack Franks, who also gets teacher union money and does their bidding, even if it hurts poor inner city kids.

The question of meeting attendance is one that can be researched. Below you see Hammerand’s attendance record for 2014, along with that of other District County Board members.

County Board attendance for 2014 through October 30th, shows John Hammerand with the best attendance of all District 4 County Board members.

County Board attendance for 2014 through October 30th, shows John Hammerand with the best attendance of all District 4 County Board members.

County Board members get paid about $20,000 a year, so I suppose the negative robo-call is talking about two years’ salary.  County Board members also receive health benefits and are in the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund pension system.

Although one can’t know who did the robo-call, it certainly came from a Waltmire supporter.

There also have been three mailings I have been able to chase down.

We’ll look at them in the days ahead.

I don’t know the order in which they were sent, but the number of mailings is appropriate for a campaign for state representative.

Here’s one on Waltmire’s signature issue, cutting the size of the McHenry County Board.

Other county boards with smaller numbers of members get paid a lot more than McHenry County Board members.  Waltmire’s calculated savings undoubtedly do not factor in that likely offsetting cost increase.

The Democrat talks about DuPage and Cook County having smaller county boards.  I believe the DuPage County Board members get paid about $50,000 a year.

Waltmire cites Hammerand’s health benefits and pledges not to take them.  Certainly, he would not need them as a teacher in Crystal Lake’s High School District and a member of the Teachers Retirement System.

In 2012 Waltmire was paid about $120,000.

So, if elected, he will be on two public payrolls.

Waltmire lit politicians salaries back


Comments

Arne Waltmire Assaults John Hammerand with Mailings & Robo-Call — 7 Comments

  1. Robo – calls, I hang up and don’t bother with them.

    Don’t even listen to them.

    By now people know who they are voting for and all the dirt comes out now and all the lies.

    Hang up your phone.

  2. The teacher unions are attempting to extend their political influence and ideology to county government.

    First, Mr. Waltmire will receive a pension and retirement benefits from his employement as a teacher.

    The retirement program is called the Teachers Retirement Insurance Program (TRIP).

    Let’s look at the teacher pension Mr. Waltmire will receive.

    The starting pension for a teacher in Illinois outside of Chicago is 75% of the average of the last 4 years earnings.

    The name of the pension fund is Teachers Retirement System (TRS) of Illinois.

    Teachers can retire after 35 years of service with full benefits.

    That’s “years of service” and not “years worked.”

    TRS has programs for teachers to retire earlier than 35 years worked with full benefits.

    One program is exchanging unused sick leave for years of service credit.

    Another program is Early Retirement Option (ERO).

    TRS rules state a teacher year for pension purposes is 170 days (34 weeks), which is 65% of a 52 week year.

    Teachers can exchange up to 340 days (2 years) of unused sick leave for years of service credit.

    The number of sick days a teacher receives each year is stipulated in the collective bargaining agreement which is required by law to be posted on the school district website.

    In the Chicago suburbs 11 or 12 sick days per year is common, with unlimited rollovers from year to year.

    Looking at Mr. Waltmire’s last 4 years worked on FamilyTaxpayers.org and the District website we have:

    Year – Earnings – Years Worked

    FY 2015 – $121,095+? – 30.

    FY 2014 – ? – 29

    FY 2013 – ? – 28

    FY 2012 – $120,538 – 27

    FY 2011 – $113,873 – 26

    FY 2010 – $107,323 – 25

    FY = fiscal year.

    FY 2015 is this year, which begins the summer 2014 and ends in summer 2015.

    $121,095 + $120,538 + $113,873 + $107,323 = $462,829.

    $462,829 / 4 = $115,707.

    $115,707 * .75 = $86,780.

    Mr. Arne Waltmire’s starting pension will be at least $86,780.

    It will likely be higher for many reasons.

    We don’t know the earnings for 2013 and 2014.

    We would have to FOIA those earnings from TRS.

    The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) has not released teacher earnings for 2013 and 2014 yet
    (they are two years behind schedule).

    Hard to scrutinize teacher pay for the last two years, if you don’t have teacher pay for the last two years.

    And Mr. Waltmire’s employer, Crystal Lake High School District 155, took down (assuming they had it up in the first place) the state mandated posting by school districts of teacher and administrator pay on the district website for 2013 and 2014.

    The current year is the only year that’s mandated to be posted on the website, but many school districts leave prior years postings up so the public has a historical view of how their money is being spent.

    There are end of career salary increases that are listed in the collective bargaining agreement between the union and the school district.

    There has been no indication he will retire at the end of this year.

    CHSD 155 is lousy with transparency and has high salaries.

    So it’s extremely doubtful Waltmire would save taxpayers money if elected to the McHenry County Board given his background.

    The highest costs for government is employee salaries and benefits.

    It’s questionable that Waltmire would increase transparency if elected to the McHenry County Board given his background as a union leader at a school district which is not transparent.

    The union typically exerts a high degree of influence on board and administration decisions in school districts, and as a former union leader, Mr. Waltmire had more clout than the average teacher.

    He and his son are very involved in the public sector union labor movement so he may want to hike collective bargaining agreement salaries and benefits for public sector labor unions employed by McHenry County.

    And now for the disclaimer, there is nothing wrong with labor unions in general, the problem in Illinois is the vast majority of the public hasn’t a clue what has transpired from the pay, benefit, and work rule hikes at all levels of government.

    The Illinois General Assembly and Governors have changed public sector union labor law over the years to greatly expand union power.

  3. I’m well aware of what the Public Sector has been doing to enrich themselves for years now.

    But I’ve been acting on my disgust for over a decade now.

    Just closed and funded on another property sale Oct. 14th, taking another $12 K of property tax off my books, $8400 of which was going into the likes of Arne’s pockets.

    It was another great day, in MY eventual retirement plan.

    Last one out will need to turn off the lights.

  4. Waltmire if only fooling himself when he claims he is going to cut costs and downsize the county board.

    What Union ever did that?

    He is bought and paid for by the teachers union.

  5. Looks like another generous contribution from a teachers union to Waltmires campaign.

    If I was a teacher contributing union dues and I saw an abuse of the union dues I’d go ballistic.

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