Dina Frigo making point at a Grafton Township Board meeting. Now she is Oakwood Hills Village Clerk.
When I called the Village of Oakwood Hills Saturday morning, at first Deputy Village Clerk Cheryl LoSosso refused to release the names of those who have filed for Village President and Village Trustee.
I told her that Oakwood Hills was the only municipality in McHenry County that had refused to provide who was running for office.
Then I thought of the history of secrecy concerning the gas-generated electric power plant.
So I guess I should not have been surprised.
(As I write this story, I admit to having made a mistake in talking to the Deputy Clerk. The City of McHenry could not provide who was running for alderman when I called yesterday. Its Clerk had apparently locked the information in her office and no one had a key they were willing to use to retrieve the information.)
I asked LoSosso why she couldn’t read me the names of those who had filed.
“Because I don’t know where on her desk are any packets that have been [filed],” she told me.
She said that the new Village Clerk, Dina Frigo, “is expected at 11 o’clock” on Monday.”
Paul Smith
I asked for the Clerk’s home phone number, but LoSallo said that she could not give that out.
Again it seemed to me that Oakwood Hills has a continuing transparency problem.
Then she told me a resident had just walked in the office and asked if I would I mind waiting.
That sounded reasonable, so I waitied after giving her my phone number just in case we got disconnected.
When LoSosso got back on the line, she told me that Paul Smith was running for Village President. She had found his petition on the Clerk’s desk when she looked.
A Trustee, Smith was appointed to replace Melanie Funk when she resigned.
I asked about who had filed for Trustee and she told me that she had not seen any petitions for that office on the Clerk’s desk.
“I looked on her desk and we don’t have any packets turned in today,” she told me about 9:30 Saturday morning.
LoSosso wanted to make sure people knew they could file for office through 5 PM on Monday.
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The Oakwood Hills power plant crowd at the second zoning hearing..
It’s really hard to believe that no one has filed for Village Trustee after all the citizen involvement over the power plant.
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Before posting this article, I reached out to some Oakwood Hills activists asking if anyone were running for Village Trustee.
One replied that the following are candidates:
- Dave Robak
- Mike Breseman
- Charlotte Kremer
- Paula Dorian Gray
- Everett Pratt
Another Trustee candidate identified by another Oakwood Hills resident is
- Mike Riley
On Tuesday, the Northwest Herald reported another Trustee candidate:
- Kristina Zahonk
Proving once again, I guess, a variation on the old line that the grapevine is more accurate that the office newsletter.
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And, looking at the Village web site, I see a typographical error.
The tab for village officials says, “Village Official’s.”
I couldn’t get the email links to work either.
No, it’s not proven that the grapevine is more accurate — that looks like a listing of candidates for the Village of Prairie Grove.
And it has been reported elsewhere that Kristina Zahorik filed on the first day of filing.
When I was studying organizational theory in grad school, I read about the grapevine’s vs. the company newsletter’s accuracy.
And I did see the Northwest Herald reported incumben Zahorik’s candidacy Tuesday.
Dina Frigo was the Grafton Township Clerk and we had the same problems until she resigned.
She even called the police once because she thought something had moved on her desk!
Barnhardt axiom “Seeking and/or holding office, especially national-level office, is today, in and of itself, proof that a given person is psychologically and morally unfit to hold public office.”
Is the Oakwood Clerk elected or hired?
I was the village resident that Ms. LoSosso was helping and mentioned on the phone call. I was in the lobby before the phone call started and was able to hear one side of it.
Given the number of sentences that she could not complete due to being interrupted, and the number of times she had to answer the same question (over and over), she showed patience and professionalism.
She explained that she was not allowed give out personal information (home phone numbers) for village officials.
Are you really suggesting that this is a transparency issue?
Absolutely.
All but one of the other municipalities I called willingly provided me with the names of those running for office.
There were not available from Oakwood Hills.