From Illinois Leaks, reprinted with permission:
Algonquin Township Sanctioned by Court, ordered to pay Watchdogs’ Attorney fees –
BY JMKRAFT ON MARCH 4, 2020 • ( LEAVE A COMMENT )
Algonquin Township – (ECWd) –In this morning’s Hearing for the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by Kirk Allen and John Kraft against Algonquin Township (18CH238), the Township’s attorney showed up apparently unprepared asking for a continuance.
Plaintiff attorney, Denise Ambroziak objected to the continuance, said plaintiffs were prepared and ready for today’s hearing.
The Court granted a 7-day continuance, and as a condition of the continuance, Sanctioned the Township $400.00 payable at the next hearing scheduled for March 16, 2020.
The Sanction payment was for reasonable attorney fees of Plaintiff’s attorney.
Algonquin Township was granted 7 days to file answers to Plaintiff’s Motion for In-Camera Inspection and Plaintiff’s Objection to Defendant’s FOIA Index of records.
See the signed Order here.
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Townships are dens of secrecy and corruption.
Wow – the township is on the hook for another $400 an hour attorney that has been enforced by a court order.
I sure do hope Algonquin Township wins because if they don’t that is going to be one hell of a legal bill to cover the tracks of of the former regime.
That court order for sanctions is very telling.
Why is Jim Kelly still the township attorney?
We have new blood on the board and the same old BS incompetence.
Owaaaa, that $400 is gonna hurt them.
The best way to get them is to give them 1 hour to proceed, then rule and sanction.
No delays.
FOIA violations should be required to be paid out of the pocket of the person responsible for the declination, that would stop the BS.
Atty Kelly already has been on the hook for FOIA violations in the Village of Ringwood as the Attorney General issued a binding decision for FOIA violations just last year. The Village of Ringwood had to pay $$ in 2019
Townships are the government closest and dearest to the people.
They need to be supported, not eliminated.
Townships are the safety net for the needy: https://www.toi.org/township/Winnebago-county-Roscoe-township-General-Assistance
Stop the 1%! The Township general assistance is such a small amount. Don’t you township haters care about single moms and their kids? No compassion or decency?
Vote NO! on township dissolution in McHenry and Nunda Townships on March 17! Or early voting.
Have a heart. You are part of a COMMUNITY!
As a person who has received a binding decision against the village of Ringwood for not following foia I think it should be automatic that the village has to pay some fines to the state and also pay the person who filed the foia that was not followed.
That person should not have to file a lawsuit it should just be an automatic $5,000 fine with a village doesn’t follow the foia and they get a binding decision. Also attorneys who have a history of this should also be fined.
My binding decision with Ringwood took over six months to get and in fact I have been asking for foia request from the village of Ringwood since 2017 and they have received several non binding decisions for not giving me that information which they never did.
This laws put into place to protect the public from Villages who believe they are above the law unfortunately it requires a lot of time and effort from the president requested this way I can get any help.
The Attorney General needs to put some teeth behind this law so that the villages would quit doing this. The law for foia is they have 7 days to answer it. T
here is no reason why they need more time. In my opinion the only reason they don’t answer it is because they have something to hide that they don’t want the public to know what they’re doing.
That’s what I have figured out from this process I have been going through since 2017.
Who was Ringwood’s attorney?
According to the minutes from the Ringwood board meeting in October of 2019 Jim Kelly is there attorney.
Before October of 2019 the minutes had a different lawyer representing them even though mr. Kelly claimed in many emails that he was really representing lawyer the board did not hire him through a meeting until October of 2019.
Not sure how you can represent yourself as a village lawyer if the board has not hired you yet but I have many emails from dealing with the state of Illinois from 2019 where he is asked if he is the village attorney and he answers back with answers to the questions the state and I were asking him in my foia request.
Not only that when the village attempted to answer part of my foia request from the Binding decision Mr kelly tell you one that answered.
Mr. Kelly is the village attorney for Ringwood. He was hired October 2019 according to the board minutes.
Only problem with that is mr. Kelly has been representing himself to the state of Illinois Attorney General’s office and myself as the village attorney well before October of 2019.
I know he handled all of The Binding decision issues with my case in 2019
The Binding decision came down in January or February of 2019.
My only question is how is it legal for a lawyer to represent themselves as the legal representation of a village when they do not get hired by the board until October of 2019 and had been doing business as their lawyer for months and months before then.
Mr. Kelly sent communications that indicated he was the Attorney for the Village of Ringwood in early 2019 (maybe earlier) yet it wasn’t until October of 2019 that the Ringwood Board voted to hire Mr. Kelly as their Village Attorney.
Do a FOIA request to Illinois Attorney General regarding complaints for Ringwood’s FOIA non-compliance.
There will be Mr. Kelly communications found.
There are numerous/many non-binding FOIA violations and one BINDING determination against Ringwood.
There is also a McHenry County court case 18CH000570 that assessed a hefty fine against Ringwood for FOIA violation.
(I believe the fine was in excess of 2000.00)
Ringwood FOIA violations continue currently. Mr. Kelly seems to be a part of those continuing violations.
Hey Cal Skinner, I just read all the comments and UnderwoodNow sure sounds like Dan Aylward and his friends, preaching about voting NO.
Did He Just Out Himself???
According to the foia i recevied under my binding decision the minutes from the village of ringwood 2018 and 2019
joe Gottemoller was in 1 regular board meeting in 2018 and none in 2019.
He was listed in the minutes as the village lawyer but was not present in the meetings except for that one meeting
I would venture to guess that UnderwoodNow is jack Franks’ minion, Hillary Clinton voter, and Township hoglitrog, Tina Hill.
Why does Illinois even have this corrupt level of government?
All the surrounding states have gotten rid of them.
Over a decade ago Indiana abolished their township tax assessors.