McHenry County Blog

November 12, 2009, Grafton Township Meeting that the four trustes did not attend.

As reported by McHenry County Blog November 12th, the four Grafton Township Trustees who wanted to build a new township hall, but didn’t want to ask the public for permission in a referendum, boycotted a township meeting.

Township Supervisor Linda Moore, Township Clerk Dina Frigo, Road Commissioner Jack Freund and Assessor Bill Ottley attended the meeting.

Township Trustees Barbara Murphy, Robert LaPorta, Betty Zirk and Gerry McMahon weren’t there.

Here’s what the Assistant State’s Attorney Cynthia A. Schaupp said in a January 7th letter to Moore:

This investigation revealed the following:
Mr. LaPorta did contact the Grafton Township attorney to inquire whether he could boycott the November 12, 2009, meeting since the agenda did not contain items he requested to have placed on the agenda.The attorney informed him he can choose to not attend the meeting.

Mr. LaPorta then contacted by telephone Trustee Zire and Trustee Murphy, individually, to inform them that he would not be attending the meeting.

Mr. LaPorta, never told the Trustees that they should also miss the meeting.

Trustee Murphy was not able to go to the meeting due to a work conflict and did not miss the meeting due to the any other reason.

Trustee McMahon did not recall if Trustee LaPorta even contacted him prior to the November 12, 2009 meeting.

The facts presented do not indicate any designed plan or “chain” to violate the Open Meetings Act.

Based on the above facts available to me at this time, this office does not believe there was any violation of the Open Meetings Act and thus will take no further action. However, should any additional information become available, this office may review this decision.

After receiving the above letter Supervisor Moore, who filed an Open Meetings Act violation complaint, sent the following letter to the State’s Attorney’s Office:

Cythia Schaupp
Assistant State’s Attorney
January 8. 2010

Dear Attorney Schaupp,

I have received your letter regarding the boycotting of meetings by the Grafton Township Trustees.  Thank you for contacting the trustees, however, I am concerned that you have overlooked some evidence from reporter Pete Gonigam and new evidence has occurred.

Please review the quote by Trustee LaPorta made at the time that the boycotting occurred to reporter Pete Gonigam who wrote a story the next day on the subject,

“We as a group of trustees decided to do that.”

LaPorta said.  You do not refer to this evidence in your letter even though on November 18th I wrote a letter to you asking you to consider this evidence and contact Mr. Gonigam.

The word boycott defined means

“to join together in refusing to deal with, so as to punish or coerce.”

Source is Webster’s Dictionary and online Your Dictionary.

In your letter, dated January 7th you state that Mr. LaPorta asked the attorney to inquire whether he could boycott a meeting.  Your letter states, “The attorney informed him that he can choose not to attend the meeting.”

Ancel Glick partner Keri-Lyn Krafterfer advising Grafton Township Board.

On November 6, Krafthefer advises the trustees in a letter,

“Further, there is nothing to prevent the Township Trustees from boycotting the regular meeting with your proposed agenda,“

Attorney Krafthefer’s response is also documented in a letter to the trustees dated November 17th,

“There is nothing that prevents one trustee from calling another trustee, then hanging up and calling another trustee.  Such would not constitute a meeting under the Open Meetings Act.”

In other words, she has said there is no such thing as a “chain” call that would violate the Open Meetings Act.

In my opinion, Ms. Krafthefer has given the trustees inappropriate legal counsel in these statements.

Per the Open Meetings Act, “Meeting” means any gathering, whether in person, or by video or audio conference, telephone call, electronic means, or other means of contemporaneous interactive communication of a majority of a quorum of the members of a public body.

November 12, 2009, Grafton Township Meeting that the four trustes did not attend.

In other words, the definition of a meeting can be calls made one after another between more than two board members.  Mr. LaPorta may have told you that he did not tell the trustees to boycott the meeting, however he admits to doing just that when he is quoted by Pete Gonigam,

“We as a group of trustees decided to do that (boycott the meeting.)”

Since my previous contact with you, the trustees have chosen not to attend four meetings in the month of November and as a result many items of township business are not addressed at this time.  In fact, the trustees did not attend meetings dated November 12, 16, 18 and 24th.

Clearly this was not a one time unplanned coincidental event.  It is reoccurring and intentional.

On January 4th Trustee McMahon was quoted by the Daily Herald reporter Jameel Naqvi as follows,

“I don’t want to go to a meeting called by Linda Moore…don’t care about anything she has on the agenda.”

McMahon said.

Is not this further evidence that the trustees plan to continue to violate the Open Meetings Act by joining together to refuse to deal with, so as to punish or coerce with the township attorney’s apparent permission as documented in your letter of January 7th?

In light of this additional information, you have offered to review this decision.

I am asking that you do reconsider the Open Meetings Violation Compliant that was made by myself and an unnamed McHenry County resident.

After receiving your letter I tried to contact you by telephone, but you were unavailable at that time.  For clarification purposes, I have sent you various documents at various times, but I was under the impression that the investigation was started at the request of another McHenry County resident.

I look forward to hearing from you.
Very Truly Yours,

Grafton Township Supervisor
Linda Moore

Attachments include:
Jan. 7 letter from Office of State Attorney
Nov. 17 letter, page 2 Ancel-Glick
Nov. 18 letter from Linda Moore
Jan. 4 Daily Herald article
Nov. 13 Pete Gonigam article
Nov. 6 Ancel Glick letter

When I asked the First Electric Newspaper’s Pete Gonigam if he had been interviewed by the State’s Attornedy’s Office, he said that he had not.

Pete Gonigam of the First Electric Newspaper got Marc Munaretto to talk to him about the $66,000 commission paid him by Grafton Township when Supervisor John Rossi and the trustees sold the Grafton Hall to the Grafton Township Road District.

Prior to publishing the list of who got what out of the aborted deal, McHenry County Blog left repeated phone and email messages Munaretto asking for an explanation.  There was no reply.

Gonigam refers to the deal as “a transaction so apparently simple it would almost amount to a bookkeeping entry.”

Munaretto said that he found a $1.1 million offer, but a higher offer came through.

The township board, however, sold the property to the road district for $611,000.

As Gonigam puts it,

“How $611,000 trumped a $1.1 million offer is part of what makes trying to unravel the Grafton Township controversy something like trying to sort out a plate of spaghetti.”

And, so far this information has not been published by either of the daily Heralds.

Very interesting.

Both the lack of coverage…

and the deal.

Crystal Lake’s Patrick Murfin writes the blog

He also ran for Nunda Township Trustee this past spring with running mate Meredith Reid Sarkees.

Even though the Dems knocked on doors, they lost.

Murfin, Secretary of the McHenry County Democratic Party offered an analysis of the election.

Murfin’s comments on my township pork article and focuses on his township, Nunda, which Murfin says is

“a wholly owned subsidiary of Brent Smith Empire Builders Inc.”

More analysis, focusing on Republican Precinct Committeeman Brent Smith, a member of Local 150 of the Operating Engineers, suggesting Smith would take over from Nunda Township Road Commissioner Don Kopsel and

He has this intriguing sentence, among others:

“Smith clearly is aiming to seize leadership in the County party at the head of resurgent conservative purists out to purge ‘trimmers’ and suspected moderates like Tryon.”

Part of the article is based on my incorrect information that Nunda Township only received $75,000, as the least populated townships did. That proved incorrect, as I learned on a new Southeastern McHenry County information source, the First Electric Newspaper, written by Columbia Journalism School grad Pete Gonigam. My correction is here:

The Devil Made Me Do It

Chuck Keeshan’s Daily Herald story based on McHenry County Blog’s story about how the real motive of the person labeled the “Angel of Death” by Pete Gonigam caught the attention of Chicago media.

The novelty?

How often have you heard of an “Angel of Death” story where mercy was not the motive?

I certainly have never heard of a nurse who killed patients because they were tough to care for.

It’s a different angle, hence, newsworthy.

The Chicago Tribune put up a story by Jeff Long about noon.

ABC Channel 7 had a story last night.

So did CBS Channel Two.

CBS reporter Mike Puccinelli was surprised that the woman he interviewed, Jennifer Guasta, already knew what was in the Illinois Department of Public Health report he was reading her.

When asked how she knew, the now-deceased sister of John Sherman replied that she had read it on a blog.

Pucinelli asked which one.

You don’t need to ask which one printed Pete Gonigam’s story first, do you?

Guasta’s brother was a very large man who was quite difficult to move.

Chuck Keeshan’s Daily Herald story based on McHenry County Blog’s story about how the real motive of the person labeled the “Angel of Death” by Pete Gonigam caught the attention of Chicago media.

The novelty?

How often have you heard of an “Angel of Death” story where mercy was not the motive?

I certainly have never heard of a nurse who killed patients because they were tough to care for.

It’s a different angle, hence, newsworthy.

The Chicago Tribune put up a story by Jeff Long about noon.

ABC Channel 7 had a story last night.

So did CBS Channel Two.

CBS reporter Mike Puccinelli was surprised that the woman he interviewed, Jennifer Guasta, already knew what was in the Illinois Department of Public Health report he was reading her.

When asked how she knew, the now-deceased sister of John Sherman replied that she had read it on a blog.

Pucinelli asked which one.

You don’t need to ask which one printed Pete Gonigam’s story first, do you?

Guasta’s brother was a very large man who was quite difficult to move.

It’s pretty short as it appears in The (Alton) Telegraph, but the Associated Press story obviously was first written by Pete Gonigam on McHenry County Blog.

AP got it from the Daily Herald follow-up story.

The Northwest Herald’s web site also has posted a story.

If you have not read the original stories, they are here:

Wednesday, September 24, 2008 – Woodstock Residence Deaths Not Mercy Killings

Thursday, September 25, 2008 – Woodstock Residence Deaths Continued for Two Years

Another story will appear tomorrow.

It’s pretty short as it appears in The (Alton) Telegraph, but the Associated Press story obviously was first written by Pete Gonigam on McHenry County Blog.

AP got it from the Daily Herald follow-up story.

The Northwest Herald’s web site also has posted a story.

If you have not read the original stories, they are here:

Wednesday, September 24, 2008 – Woodstock Residence Deaths Not Mercy Killings

Thursday, September 25, 2008 – Woodstock Residence Deaths Continued for Two Years

Another story will appear tomorrow.

Motorists won’t flock to a new Bolz Road toll bridge being pushed by area municipal, Kane and McHenry County officials.

That’s what a newly released study by Wilbur Smith Associates indicates, according to an Elgin Courier News article by Pete Gonigam (picked up from sister paper Algonquin Countryside) I read Friday.

Elgin’s Courier-News reports that a 50-cent toll would lure only 16,000 of the 110,000 crossing the Fox River. That’s less than 15% of the traffic.

At the highest toll examined–$2.50 a crossing—only 4,000 of our more affluent neighbors would be willing to pay to avoid the Route 62, Route 72 and Carpentersville crossings.

Traffic consultant Eugene Ryan advised that a $2 toll would yield the most money. That looks like it would between 4,000 and 9,500 vehicles a day. Funny that the consultant did not provide a number.

Of course, the Carpentersville to Algonquin toll bridge supporters don’t yet know how much it would cost to build the bridge.

The question citizens might want to ask is why the Democrats in control of Springfield refuse to build a toll bridge across the Mississippi, but are willing to allow one across the Fox River.

And, if a capital construction bill is every passed, why none of our northern Kane, southern McHenry County legislators have even put this bridge on the negotiating table.

Using an estimated cost of $80 million, Daily Herald reporter James Fuller wrote,

“…an $80 million toll bridge that moves 16,000 vehicles off other roads translates to a traffic congestion relief project that costs $5,000 for each car diverted daily from the existing bumper-to-bumper routes over the river.”

For you potential commuter users, by the way, the consultant recommended a $1.50 a trip toll in order to maximize revenue for the project.

Just as the folks who put together the Illinois Tollway, Longmeadow Parkway Toll Bridge Task Force Chairman Bill Wyatt promised that the tolls would go away after the bonds were paid off.

You believe that, don’t you?

I think I’ll take Route 62 or, if going to Chicago, take the tollway that costs me 40 cents from the Elgin toll plaza to O’Hare Airport.

= = = = =
The graphic is from Pete Gonigam’s original article in the Algonquin Countryside.

Motorists won’t flock to a new Bolz Road toll bridge being pushed by area municipal, Kane and McHenry County officials.

That’s what a newly released study by Wilbur Smith Associates indicates, according to an Elgin Courier News article by Pete Gonigam (picked up from sister paper Algonquin Countryside) I read Friday.

Elgin’s Courier-News reports that a 50-cent toll would lure only 16,000 of the 110,000 crossing the Fox River. That’s less than 15% of the traffic.

At the highest toll examined–$2.50 a crossing—only 4,000 of our more affluent neighbors would be willing to pay to avoid the Route 62, Route 72 and Carpentersville crossings.

Traffic consultant Eugene Ryan advised that a $2 toll would yield the most money. That looks like it would between 4,000 and 9,500 vehicles a day. Funny that the consultant did not provide a number.

Of course, the Carpentersville to Algonquin toll bridge supporters don’t yet know how much it would cost to build the bridge.

The question citizens might want to ask is why the Democrats in control of Springfield refuse to build a toll bridge across the Mississippi, but are willing to allow one across the Fox River.

And, if a capital construction bill is every passed, why none of our northern Kane, southern McHenry County legislators have even put this bridge on the negotiating table.

Using an estimated cost of $80 million, Daily Herald reporter James Fuller wrote,

“…an $80 million toll bridge that moves 16,000 vehicles off other roads translates to a traffic congestion relief project that costs $5,000 for each car diverted daily from the existing bumper-to-bumper routes over the river.”

For you potential commuter users, by the way, the consultant recommended a $1.50 a trip toll in order to maximize revenue for the project.

Just as the folks who put together the Illinois Tollway, Longmeadow Parkway Toll Bridge Task Force Chairman Bill Wyatt promised that the tolls would go away after the bonds were paid off.

You believe that, don’t you?

I think I’ll take Route 62 or, if going to Chicago, take the tollway that costs me 40 cents from the Elgin toll plaza to O’Hare Airport.

= = = = =
The graphic is from Pete Gonigam’s original article in the Algonquin Countryside.

Last Sunday McHenry County Blog posted copies of the five petitions that former Gary Pack assistant state’s attorney Kristen Foley passed for this year’s former assistant state’s attorney Gary Pack challenger Dan Regna.

They were notarized by none other that Republican County Chairman Bill LeFew, the one who, along with defense attorneys who want to be able to cut deals again, have spearheaded the dumping of first term State’s Attorney Lou Bianchi.

LeFew is the one who made the complaint public and LeFew is the one who anonymously mailed reprints of the article that instigated the complaint.

Thursday, the Algonquin Countryside’s Pete Gonigam gave evidence that he noticed.

Here’s what he wrote:

” Political observer Cal Skinner Sunday reported on his McHenry County Blog Web site that Foley had filed five petitions Oct. 29 to place Woodstock attorney Dan Regna on the upcoming Republican primary ballot.

“Foley’s letter of complaint against Bianchi was dated two weeks earlier, Oct. 15, and received Oct. 23. Bianchi and Regna are the only candidates running Feb. 5 for the Republican nomination for McHenry County State’s Attorney.”

The article further points out that Bianchi asked for the resignations of all employees when he took office, but re-hired Foley. She later resigned.