McHenry County Blog

Bob Abboud spoke to the McHenry County Democratic Central Committee when he unsuccessfully ran against Republican Congressman Don Manzullo.

Next month, Martin McLaughlin will take two-term Barrington Hills Village President Robert Abboud’s place at the spot with the gavel in front of it.

There will also be some changes on the Barrington Hills Village Board.

Let’s look at the numbers on a county-by-county basis.

Challenger Martin McLaughlin won in all four counties.

The margins were

• McHenry County – 42
• Lake County – 27
• Cook County – 72
• Kane County – 2

145 votes in all.

In McHenry County Martin Mclaughlin beat Bob Abboud by 42 votes.

In Lake County the margin was 27 votes in Martin McLaughlin’s favor.

In Cook County, Bob Abboud lost by 72 votes.

A small part of Barrington Hills is in Kane County.  Martin McLaughlin bested Abboud by two votes there.

Now, let’s look at the results for Village Trustee on a county-by-county basis.

Here are the results for Village Trustee in McHenry County.  Only 23 votes separated the five candidates.

In Lake County, the spread was 32 votes, but over twice as many people voted.

There were about half as many votes in Cook County as in Lake County.

Very few live in Kane County.

Here’s how the numbers add up:

• Colleen Konicek Hannigan – 604
• Michael Harrington – 573
• Fritz Gohl – 566
• Kelly Mazeski – 563
• David Stieper – 553

The top three were elected.

Harrington, Gohl and Mazeski were supported by Abboud.

A press release from Barrington Hills Village President candidate David Stieper. He is challenging Robert Abboud.

Barrington Hills Trustee Candidate, David Stieper, invites all candidates to Open Public Forum

David Stieper

David Stieper, an independent candidate for Village Trustee of Barrington Hills, announced today that he invites all candidates for President or Trustee in the Village of Barrington Hills to an open forum to discuss the important issues and their positions.

The invitation calls for an open forum hosted by an independent moderator to be named.

Citizens for Stieper reserved the “Multi-Purpose Room” at Countryside Elementary School on Tuesday, April 2 from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM CDT.

In providing this open invitation, Mr. Stieper stated to his fellow candidates seeking office:

“All candidates have announced that government transparency is important to our Village. We should provide our fellow residents an open forum to learn firsthand our views on important issues such as fiscal management and transparent governance.”

In order to ensure fair and even representation, Citizens for Stieper recommends that an unbiased and independent organization such as Better Government Association provide a person to moderate and recommend a procedure for process.

Mr. Stieper also suggests that representatives of each campaign meet with his representative on March 22nd to confirm format.

In the absence of a moderator, all candidates are encouraged to attend and respond to Village voter questions.

Regardless of participation, David Stieper intends to be available for open public comment and questions on the date and at the location provided and listen to the ideas and concerns of citizens in order to promote good and open government practices in Barrington Hills.

Press Release by Citizens for Stieper: David Stieper is a practicing attorney in Illinois, holds a Masters in Business degree and has served the Village in capacities such as Chairman of the Plan Commission. His wife Darla and David have two sons, John and Michael. David is the only Independent candidate seeking election in Barrington Hills.

It’s time for mail to start coming in hotly-contested, well-financed campaigns. (Candidates who want to share their efforts and those receiving them who would be kind enough to scan and send them to McHenry County Blog can expect to see them shared with our readers.)

Here is Barrington Hills Village Trustee candidate David Stieper’s first mailing:

The first mailing from Barrington Hills candidate for Village President David Stieper.

David Stieper’s message on the back compares the increase in the Consumer Price Index increases in the cost of Barrington Hills village government.

Campaigning until the last minute, Barrington Hills Trustee David Stieper has issued this press release:

David Stiepler

Barrington Hills- Supporters of David Stieper, candidate for a 4-year term on the Village of Barrington Hills Board of Trustees, will meet tonight at the Penny Road Pub at 7:30 P.M. to celebrate with him the end of the election campaign and hopefully confirm his victory later in the evening.

David believes his message of the importance of independent Board Members was embraced by Village residents, due in part to the contentious tenor of the opposing Abboud supported slate “Save5Acres” and the “Common Sense Party”.

David conducted an issues oriented campaign and avoided the personal attacks often associated with slate and party campaigns.

Unlike the opposing slate ($90,000) and party ($140,000) in campaign donations, Citizens for Stieper, a single candidate committee, raised just over $15,000.

The campaign was run by David and his wife, Darla, with moral support by a few loyal friends.

David’s goal was to prove that a lone, independent candidate could run a quality campaign on modest resources without the assistance of a professional consultant.

Should he prevail, David believes that other residents will be encouraged by his example to run in future elections as true independents obviating the need for high cost slates and parties in our small community of just 1,500 households.

Stieper surmises that a significant victory in this election “would be a mandate for Independence on our Board, not a mandate for David Stieper.”

Darla Stieper
Citizens for Stieper
847-519-7970
ElectionDarla@StieperLaw.com

As charges fly that election campaign contributions to the slate backed by Village President Robert Abboud and that a witness was deliberately not made available so the election would be over before an Illinois
State Board of Elections decision could be rendered, the only independent in the race, David Stieper, makes this last minute appeal:

Dear Neighbors of Barrington Hills:

As our journey of independence continues, I want to reiterate that the biggest threat of losing land to disconnection is our inflated spending.

Property owners legally qualified to disconnect will be encouraged to move from VBH to lower taxing municipalities.

The biggest threat to our property values is high real estate taxes resulting in part from our inflated spending.

I humbly ask again for your vote on Tuesday, April 5th. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Please pass this on to your friends.

Sincerely,

David Stieper

Stieper provided the following post cards that were part of his campaign:

Click to enlarge.

Again, click to enlarge.

The Stiepler campaign reports:

In a missive sent out today, Barrington Hills Village President Bob Abboud calls on opponents to his slate to “Tell the Truth.” His own words follow:

Stieper and CSP Should Tell The Truth

Bob Abboud speaking the the McHenry County Democratic Central Committee during his congressional campaign in 2008.

Telling the truth in a campaign is a litmus test for a candidate’s moral compass. We expect our local candidates to be truthful and up front on their intentions.

Mr. Stieper calls for radical change in how Barrington Hills spends money. Today, every budget, every dollar of expenditure is put before the Board in a public roll call vote per state statute. So Stieper proposes violating state law?

Stieper and CSP call for cutting expenses on attorneys, suggesting disconnection issues. The truth is that because of our tough stand we have not spent money on disconnections in more than 2 years as developers no longer challenge our community. They should tell you we spend less than 10% of budget on attorneys, mainly for prosecution of police issues and normal building and zoning activities.

Should we not prosecute drunk drivers? Should we not plow snow?

Maybe weaken our police department?

Wamberg has already disconnected prime commercial tax generating property west of Hart Road. I was the lone vote against this disconnection when first elected to the Board. Their development subsequently failed and we permanently lost the tax revenue.

CSP should tell you about their $130,000+ in campaign money, much from developers. They want to high density ‘feather’ the 51 miles of the Village border making up 70% of the Village land mass reaching even to Otis Road. Feathering is worth hundreds of millions to developers at the expense of your property value and life style.

Tell the truth Stieper and CSP.

Robert G. Abboud
President, Barrington Hills, IL
President, RGA Labs, Inc.

A Barrington Hills friend of McHenry County Blog sent the following November 8th email from Village President Bob Abboud. The highlighting shown were done by the person who sent it to me.

The message prior to the email follows:

I have been enjoying your blog.  As to Bob Abboud and his slate of “Independents”, please note the following text from an email Bob sent around in November in answer to a question “will he have a slate”.

I have removed the email addresses of all but Abboud’s to protect the innocent (?).  The question and answer have been highlighted.  Abboud also complains about Halo’s consultant, but it is his consultant, Casey Justice, that is advising his slate.  State records show that she was paid $4,800 in the last few months of 2010, don’t know yet about 2011.

The email follows. Below it is Abboud’s response.

From: Robert G. Abboud [mailto:Bob@RGALabs.com]
Sent: Monday, November 08, 2010 12:00 PM
To:
Subject: RE: Slate

Thanks for asking.  Yes, I believe there will be a slate. Trustee Joe Messer, Clerk Karen Selman, and Patti Meroni are planning on running for the regular 4-year seats.  Dawn Davis is running for the 2-year seat.   She will compete against Walter Smithe.    Dave Stieper says he is running as an independent.   Please recognize that no one has yet completed their required petition signatures.

Bob Abboud

I support these 4 candidates – Messer, Selman, Meroni, and Davis.  I believe they have the energy, knowledge, objectivity, and judgment to help steward our Village forward.    Most importantly, they will have an independent perspective that the Board depends on.  The next few years will be challenging for the Village.  We will face issues with declining tax revenues, a variety of operational issues, and more land use and boundary challenges.   We need people with experience, vision, independence, and frankly a little toughness and moxie so as to repel those who seek to intimidate us with loud voices.

I am amused at the latest HALO/Non-sense Party mailing.  It is filled with outright lies of just unmitigated proportion.  I am amused at the claims of fiscal issues since Beth Mallen has voted for every expenditure and every budget and every tax levy.    You can see the current Village budget at:
http://www.barringtonhills-il.gov/foia/pdfs/OpBudgets/2010%20Operating%20Budget.pdf

I make no apologies for my belief that the HALO/Non-sense Party’s mission is to degrade zoning and land use in the Village, and our security.  HALO’s overly loud complaint about the

HALO is funded by the same folks who challenged us in past – developers, and those who will profit from converting our unique community into a suburban high density area.  A quick check of their state filing shows who the developers are.  Ms. Wamberg has already disconnected valuable land from the Village.  She is still mad at me for voting against her disconnection that cost our taxpayers valuable future revenues.

The candidate’s e-mails are the first 4 CCs of this mailing.  I hope you will come out in support of these individuals.  They will need your help and the help of all of our neighbors.  I expect the HALO/Non-sense Party to be loud, abrasive, well funded and bent on misrepresenting facts as they already are in their latest mailing.

The candidates will also need your assistance in funding for their campaign.  While it’s never pleasant to talk about campaign money, they need funds to get their message out.  This will be a very expensive election for our candidates.  The HALO/Non-Sense Party has already spent thousands of dollars and they are just getting started.  They have brought in outside professional campaign staff. I hope you will consider a contribution to support these four candidates so they get their message out.  Contact Patti Meroni for making a contribution.

You may pass this mailing around if you feel it is helpful.  Our fight is to Save 5 Acres and our incredibly unique community. Please let me know if I can be of any additional help to you or your neighbors.  Thank you again for all your support in the Village.

Best Regards.
Bob A.

Abboud’s response when I sent him the above email:

Cal:

Yes, this e-mail was written by me back in mid-November when the campaigns were are not as clear cut as they are now.  At the time I wrote this, no one had yet filed.

Note that the context of the word ‘slate’ was not meant in the party sense as in the Common Sense Party.  It was meant in sense posed to me by the questioner.  I was  indicating there was a complete  group of candidates for the open seats who are generally running together.    The candidates are still INDEPENDENT as they registered as INDEPENDANT after this e-mail was written and they will appear and INDEPENDENT on the ballot.  They are sharing resources but have somewhat differing views on certain subjects as I understand.

I hope this helps.

Best Regards.
Bob A.

Barrington Hills Village President Robert Abboud, not up for election this year, took exception to parts of the article run earlier. What follows is his email:

Cal:

I read your blog entailed “Hot Village Board Race in Barrington Hills “. There are several items that concern me about the accuracy of your reporting. I am somewhat surprised you did not do a better job of fact checking before posting your blog.

Barrington Hills Village Board President makes presentation to the McHenry County Democratic Party Central Committee about his 2008 congressional campaign against Republican Don Manzullo

First, the Save5acres group is not running as a party but rather as a loosely connected slate of independents. They are as independent as Mr. (David) Stieper. They are listed as INDEPENDENT on the ballot. This race is decidedly about whether developers will unwind the unique zoning in our community.

It is the so-called ‘Common Sense Party’ that is not independent and heavily financed by developers and outside interests. (See SBOE filings). Note that CSP has not registered any candidates per a loop hole for new Tea Parties but intended by the campaign finance law.

Second, Mr. Stieper’s literature falsely suggests that the Village approves budgets and spends money without the majority pre-approval of the Board of Trustees. The Village manages money strictly according to state statute. Please see the attached mailing I sent him on 2/22/2011 when I discovered he was fostering this non-sense. I have since noticed him a second time asking him to be ethical and accurate. To date he has refused to do so. I hope you will call him out on this.

Third, your anonymous commenter at the end of your article accuses my previous campaign, and by proxy the current Save5Acre campaign, as being “vicious”. I would challenge you to demonstrate any “vicious” activity or messaging by my campaign or that of Save5Acres in either of these elections. It is Ms. Wamberg and her party, fueled by developers, that has fostered the negative rant, false information, and disruption in our community.

The Lighting Ordinance issue was resolved some time ago with the Village Board approving an INCREASE in allowable lighting. Principally the allowance of lighting for play areas such as tennis courts, pools, and the like. Only the HALO / CSP people voted against this. One might ask, why would the HALO / CSP group vote against expanding the allowances of property owners – the very thing they polluted our Village with horse urine colored signs for. I suggest that their efforts had nothing to do with the ordinance and were entirely political. I see you failed to report on these aspects in your mention of the Ordinance.

Finally, I have included a bit of background information from a couple of years ago to address a number of frequently asked questions that may be helpful to you.

I enjoy reading your blog. But I am at the least troubled by your reporting of events in Barrington Hills. I expect you to report accurately and with attribution of your sources who make such wild claims. While you expect transparency from government, we in Barrington Hills expect the same transparency from you.

Please let me know if you have any further questions about our very unique Village. Please feel free to print my letter in your blog.

Best Regards.
Bob A.

It’s Village President Bob Abboud’s slate versus those who don’t like the way he’s been running things.

The village has been torn by a fight over how much light should be allowed on lots that are, on average, larger than any other municipality in McHenry County.

Save 5 Acre versus Common Sense Party.

Former Democratic Party congressional candidate Abboud is backing the Save 5 Acre group.

But there’s an independent in the mix named David Stieper.  Not exactly an unknown, since he is chairman of the Plan Commission.

A letter from him can be seen below.  Click to enlarge.
An observer writes, “Because of the very vicious nature of the last election, someone prepared a ‘Civility Statement’ for all candidates to sign (they’re one election too late Abboud’s slate was undeniably vicious). Stupid that grown adults would find it necessary to sign such a paper, just like high schoolers signing 0 tolerance contracts.”

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Other candidates who would like to see their messages published are welcomed to email them.  The address is on the left hand side of the page.