McHenry County Blog

The Republican Parties in all of the five largest townships in McHenry County seem to have decided or soon will decide to hold primary elections in February, rather than hold caucuses.

Those five are

• Algonquin
• Dorr
• Grafton
• McHenry
• Nunda

Paperwork apparently has to be filed first with a local township official, who is supposed to forward it to the McHenry County Clerk’s Office.

According to the County Clerk’s Office as of mid-Friday afternoon, none of the five has jumped through all of the loops yet.

Salaries have to be set prior to the election, before November 21st, according to Algonquin Supervisor Dianne Klemm.

The legislative intent for the law was so that those running would know what they would be paid, plus, if someone won a primary that the incumbents didn’t like, they couldn’t cut the salary.

Since the 1973 fiasco of a caucus conducted by the Algonquin Township Republican Central Committee, McHenry County largest township has allowed voters to decide who GOP candidates for township office shall be.

That was the year that first-term Assessor Forrest Hare was challenged by a young school teacher.

While the caucus looked like a three-precinct primary, after the 3 AM Crystal Lake Community High School Field House results showed the school teacher winning by a handful of votes and even the judges weren’t sure the count was correct, the Central Committee members would not allow a recount.

There was no way to legally force a recount, because the committeemen set the rules.

At that time losers could run as a write-in and Forrest Hare did.

And he won.

The local Republican Party really took a beating as every weekday it was taken to task by Crystal Lake WIVS Radio station owner Mal Ballairs on his morning talk show.

To avoid future similar problems, our State Senator Jack Schaffer and I passed legislation to allow township party organizations to select candidates by citizen votes.

When I brought up the idea at Monday night’s meeting in an Algonquin Township Road Commissioner’s building, only I and Lou Anne Majewski remember the 1973 fiasco.

Precinct Committeemen attending the Algonquin Township Republican Central Committee organization meeting on April 9, 2012.

I was immediately met with the objection of cost.

I couldn’t come up with a figure, but with the low turnout of 19% from both party primaries in March (plus non-partisan only votes on referendums) it’s pretty easy to predict that the turnout will be less when only township officials are on the ballot.

The result will be a high cost per vote, which could be lowered if McHenry County Clerk Kathie Schultz can combine precincts.

The projected expense was really the only argument.

But it was a long discussion.

I pointed out that Democrats could have a field day challenging Republican candidates who had been selected in a secret meeting.

Conversely, Republicans could make hay of any Democratic Party candidates who were not selected at the ballot box, but rather by party bosses.

With township government under attack, I argued, the potential negative publicity would not be helpful.

In the end, all of the Algonquin Township Republican Precinct Committeemen present voted to authorize a primary election next February in which candidates for Township Supervisor, Road Commissioner, Assessor, Clerk and Township Trustees would be selected.

Marc Munaretto

McHenry County Board member Marc Munaretto decided not to run for re-election.

The Algonquin man also is Algonquin Township Clerk.

$17,173.70.

Good pay for attending and writing up minutes for about 13-14 meetings a year, plus sitting in on the opening of Highway Department bids.

The County Board pays about $20,000 a year.

Figure a bit less than 100 meetings.

You do the math.

Here’s what the State Statute says:

(50 ILCS 110/2) (from Ch. 102, par. 4.11)
Sec. 2. Simultaneous tenure declared to be lawful. It is lawful for any person to hold the office of county board member and township supervisor, and in counties of less than 100,000 population the office of county board member and township trustee, simultaneously. It is lawful for any person to hold the office of county board member and the office of township assessor or town clerk, simultaneously, in counties of less than 300,000 population.
(Source: P.A. 90-748, eff. 8-14-98.)

An IRS finding handed down January 31st will surely be the talk of the next meeting of the Township Officials of Illinois.

Use of Grafton Township Road Commissioner Jack Freund's truck has been ruled taxable by IRS.

It says that heretofore fringe benefits, such as the Grafton Road Commissioner’s vehicle and the reimbursement for dinners at the McHenry County Council of Governments, are income for Federal tax purposes.

And, since the state tax code is built upon the national one, probably subject to state income tax as well.

The Internal Revenue Service writes that Grafton Township owes the Federal government $2,030.36 for 2010 for income, Social Security and Medicare taxes.

“Fringe Benefit Issues” is what the Internal Revenue Service investigator was looking at.

A topic subject to a tirade by Trustee Gerry McMahnon at one of the last meetings I attended was the taxability of reimbursements for dinners at the McCOG. [I have to tell you, except for the volume of his voice, he seemed to be making sense.]

But the IRS Specialist disagreed.

The “audit,” for lack of a better term, specifically addressed this topic:

“In 2010, the elected officials and trustees of the Township received a stipend varying from $26 to $40 per month to attend monthly dinners for the McHenry County Council of Governments. The Township does not require these members to attend these meetings. The total amount of stipends issued to all officials and trustees was $1,300 for the year. These stipends were provided under a non-accountable plan.”

If I am interpreting the documents correctly, the Trustees, in toto, will owe taxes on an additional $729 because of the McCog dinner reimbursements.

Road Commissioner Jack Freund had similar $200 of non-accountable reimbursements, Supervisor Linda Moore $253 and Clerk Harriot Ford $118.

Freund was also cited for $3,125.70 which he received for “medical reimbursements made to the elected official. However, there was insufficient substantiation provided to receive reimbursement. Thus, the payment falls under a non-accountable plan.”

Freund was further cited for getting reimbursement for his spouse’s travel expenses. This included $120.56 for a number of meals, plus “a $35 spouse fee for the conference.”

Township Road Commissioner Jack Freund’s Ford F250 pickup truck was the subject of the final finding.

Purchased on December 8, 2010, “for the Road Commissioner’s use. The vehical was inspected by the Specialist and the vehicle is not deemed to fall into the category of a Qualified Nonpersonal Use Vehicle.

“There was no adequate substantiation of business uses v personal use of the vehicle.

“Therefore, the automobile lease value for this vehicle is $7,250 (see tables in Publication 158). As it was used for 23 days in 2010, the calculation is as follows:

• Annual Lease Value = $7250
• Days of Use in 2010 + 23.365
• %7,250 X (23/365) = 456.85

Also targeted by the IRS were meals provided by Assessor Bill Ottley’s office when employees were not away overnight. Called “Day Meals” by IRS Examiner John Lauer, the reimbursements of those and non-overnight meals for Ottley and Moore totaling $369.28 have been deemed taxable.

Also mentioned are uniforms costing $480.01, but detail is not given regarding the employees affected. The report sys that “under an nonaccountable plan” are considered “wages and are treated as supplemental wages”…”reportable as wages on the employee’s Form W-2.”

“It as been determined by the FLSG Specialist that the taxpayer is wiling to correct all the above mentioned isues found during the examination,” one report concludes.

Implications for the 2011 tax year were not addressed in the report.

Linda Moore

“I was instructed to follow the precedent sent by the 2010 audit when amending the 2011 W-2′s,” Supervisor Moore said.

“All taxpayers know they that have to comply with IRS regulations.

“It’s important that township officials are IRS compliant, too, but I don’t look forward to delivering this bad news to my colleagues.”

It is not clear whether the elected officials will have to repay the township the cost of the fringe benefits targeted by IRS.

The State Constitution says that no elected official can earn no more or less than what was set before he or she was elected:

Illinois Constitution Article 7
Section 9 Salaries and Fees
(b)An increase or decrease in the salary of an elected officer of any unit of local government shall not take effect during the term for which that officer is elected.

Some of the documents can be found here.

Of course, township elections are not until 2013, but I know people are already discussing running for the offices.

Some have commented that some officials’ salaries are too high.

Odds are good that most will be raised for the next four years.

If a candidate thinks the salary for the office he or she is thinking of seeking is too high, one can always promise to refund all or part.

Current Avon Township Officials Sam Yingling, Tom Brust, Lisa Rusch, Chris Ditton, Randy Evangeledes and Mark Feldstein pose with oversized check of salaries being refunded.

If health insurance and/or pension payments are part of the compensation package, one can promise not to take them.

I learned from “Round Lake District 116” blog that Avon Township officials are giving back the pay raises presumably approved by the people whom they presumably defeated.

Not a bad campaign pitch in the middle of a deep recession.

Quinn Keefe, just apppointed Dorr Township Clerk.

As expected Woodstock resident Quinn Keefe was appointed Dorr Township Clerk as Tuesday night’s meeting.

Keefe was appointed Deputy Clerk after Kathleen J. Schlap resigned from the office.

So how many times did the “Family Feud” Grafton Township Board meet in the first year since Linda Moore replaced John Rossi as Supervisor?

Past boards have met once a month, plus the Annual Town Meeting of Electors.

The Supervisor and Clerk get paid a salary, but the Township Trustees get $100 a meeting.

You can do the math to figure out how much the Trustees could have earned had they attended every meeting.

A November meeting that Township Trustees boycotted. Sitting at the table are Road Commissioner Jack Freund and Supervisor Linda Moore.

5-21-9

5-26-9

6-17-9

6-25-9

7-6-9

7-9-9

8-13-9

9-3-9

9-10-9

9-22-9

10-8-9

10-29-9

11-12-9 Trustees boycotted meeting.

11-16-9 Trustees boycotted meeting.

11-18-9

11-18-9 Trustees boycotted meeting.

11-24-9 Trustees boycotted meeting.

Feb. 22, 2010, Grafton Township budget meeting.

11-24-9

12-10-9

12-17-9

1-14-10

2-11-10

2-22-10

3-2-10

3-11-10

3-23-10

And with all the meetings since October, don’t you think there might have been time to approve the October minutes that were unavailable when I filed a Freedom of Information request?

Newly sworn in Grafton Township Trustee confers with Township Trustee Rob LaPorta just after being sworn in. Trustees Gerry McMahon and Betty Zirk are to the left and Trustee Barb Murphy is on the right.

Newly appointed Township Clerk Harriet Ford wrote,

“Apparently, the Township board has previously reviewed them and found them to be inaccurate. I need to review the tapes of the October meetings, which I understand were very long meetings, in order to prepare correct minutes. I will be happy to make the minutes available once they are approved by the Township Board.”

Ford then goes on to suggest Grafton Township Freedom of Information Office (and Supervisor) Linda Moore that she should advise me that

“to the extent that these documents are not yet available and they are are exempt from FOIA, because there are no documents to produce yet. To the extent that incorrect preliminary draft minutes exit, they are exempt from disclosure under Section 7(f) of FOIA. One the minutes are approved by the Township Board they will be made available for public inspection within 7 days, in accordance with Section 2.06(b) of the Open Meetings Act.”

One thing is certain. Grafton Township officials make enough use of law firm Ancel Glink’s services that readers of the legal fee invoices can discover a lot of what is happening on a day-by-day basis.  Today’s bill covers the last half of March.

As we continue through the fourteen pages of Grafton Township’s law firm’s bill for the month of March, we see that the outside auditor selected without any Request for Proposal by the Township Trustees (Wally Brown is the name used) is the subject of consideration.

Page 3 of Ancel Glick's legal bill to Grafton Township. (Click to enlarge.)

Again the agenda comes up. “Closed session minutes” also occupy the time of the attorney.

Perhaps readers get a clue when the idea for hiring a professional videographer was conceived On March 22nd, Township Administrator Pam Fender faxed a proposal to Keri-Lyn Krafthefer. It took a quarter of an hour to review, costing taxpayers $46.25. (Not the videoing of the meeting. That costs $250 a night.)

Preparing for and attending the special township board meeting at which Harriet Ford was appointed Township Clerk took 5.25 hours. Not quite $1,000 for the day’s work. Add the extra quarter hour for reviewing the March 11th closed session minutes and it gets really close, however.

And, it looks like someone other than I file Freedom of Information requests. I see one for General Assistance and Emergency Assistance that took three-fourths of an hour on two different days.

Getting ready for the new township clerk to take office took over a half an hour. At least it looks like more than a half an hour was billed.

The Annual Town Meeting appears commingled in a bill notation with Town Clerk research. As with the phone call with a Trustee on the first page of this “Corporate” section of the bill, the person asking the questions is unnamed.

Besides the almost $1,000 related to the Special Township Board Meeting on March 23rd, the final entry for 3.5 hours ($647) to prepare for and attend another Special Meeting on March 30th, plus meeting with Trustee Betty Zirk concerning “pending litigation” is next highest on this last page of the Corporate billing.

Also appearing for the first time are legal expenses related to property acquisition. The identity of the property is unclear. Ancel Glink attorney Paula V. Randall spent two hours reviewing file materials, conferring with Fender and looking at “contractual documents.”

Total for “Corporate?”

$8,343.75.

Five attorneys. 45.75 hours, all documented in quarter hour increments.

The final page of the "Corporate" section of Ancel Glink's bill for March.

In addition, there are photocopy bills and fees for filing pleadings for lawsuits involving Linda Moore, which would seem to be better placed in the separate billing for “Linda Moore v. Grafton Township.” The total for these extras is $334.44, making a grand subtotal of $8,678.19.

= = = = =

Although a videographer has been hired by the Township Trustees, I cannot find his work on the internet.

David Moore’s videos, on the other hand, can be found here.

The Huntley-centric Grafton Township Board reached out to the northeast corner of the township to select a Lakewood woman as township clerk.

Grafton Township Supervisor Linda Moore swears in newly-appointed Grafton Township Clerk Harriet Ford.

On a 5-0 vote, the board voted for Harriet Ford.

Grafton Township Clerk applicants Joan Citro, Harriet Ford and Kristy Borchart raise hands when asked by a board member to identify themselves.

Ford edged out Kristy Borchart and Joan Citro, both of Huntley. Citro was disqualified because she had not voted in a Republican primary election.

The appointee had to be a Republican because Dina Frigo had been elected running as a Republican.

Ford was sworn in immediately after the meeting adjourned by Township Supervisor Linda Moore.

After being appointed Township Clerk, Harriet Ford thanked the trustees and stopped briefly to confer with Rob LaPorta.

Ford has served six years on the Glendale Heights-Bloomingdale Grade School Board, was Bloomingdale Village Clerk for eight years, is President of the NISRA Foundation and is on the Grafton Township Food Pantry Foundation Board.

She used to handle public relations for Del Webb and previously did similar work for Grafton Township.

In other business the trustees voted 4-0 after a secret meeting with their attorney (with Linda Moore abstaining)

“to direct the attorney to act as directed in closed session relating to the Moore vs. Grafton Township litigation,”

which turned out to be Linda Moore’s separation of powers suit against the four trustees.

Township Assessor Bill Ottley gained approval to purchase a new computer software program from Elgin’s Cirone Computer Consulting, which also serves McHenry, Nunda, Dorr, Marengo, Richmond and Coral Townships.

The cost was $58,800 spread over two years with a 15% a year maintenance fee (just under $9,000, as Trustee Betty Zirk pointed out) starting in the second year.

In other things computer, Township Administrator Pam Fender recommended the hiring of Leading IT Solutions, which she said was a member of “our Chamber of Commerce,” as well as Woodstock’s.

The board agreed, with Trustee Rob LaPorta saying, “This should be the only authorized person to work on township computers.”

Gerry McMahon

“Except for my office at home,” Supervisor Moore interjected.

“If you incur a bill, don’t expect us to pay it without prior approval,” Trustee Gerry McMahon said.

To obtain read only access to township financial records, Fender reported would cost $2,446 for the hardware and $1,200 for installation. She said that if the township signed an annual contract with Leading IT Solutions for $3,656, the $1,200 would be included.

The firm charges $75 per hour.

Discussion of using the township bus to bring seniors and the disabled to the April 13th Annual Town Meeting was a bit contentious with Township Attorney Keri-Lyn Krafthefer suggesting applications that would indicate the time a request for a ride was made.

Reading the agenda item, which talked of serving “regular” riders, Moore asked, “How can we discriminate against irregular riders?”

Various suggestions were made.

“One thing we shouldn’t be doing is picking this to death,” McMahon said.

Grafton Township bus loads up after the 2009 Annual Town Meeting.

Attorney Krafthefer observed,

“We don’t want to end up with any political discrimination suit?”

“If it’s impossible to create an audit trail, maybe we shouldn’t do it,” Trustee Rob LaPorta said.

Trustee Barb Murphy pointed out that the bus was used two years ago.

“But not last year,” LaPorta said.

Moore suggested perhaps Senior Service Associates and Faith in Action might provide rides for people who wanted them.

After a bit more discussion, LaPort said,

“This appears to be creating more trouble than it’s worth,”

and the meeting moved on.

Township Attorney Keri-Lyn Krafthefer with Township Administrator to her left.

The reason I went to the meeting was that preparing the agenda for the Annual Town Meeting was on the agenda.

But, it was a non-started.

The township attorney said she wasn’t prepared because no one had asked her to do anything on the agenda.

That strikes me as a bit odd, considering the effort that was made to make certain the order entered concerning the taxpayer suit filed by Dan Ziller, Jr., et al, would not preclude moving ahead on things like buying the Haligus Road property and having the Township Road District buy the Grafton Township Hall.

Indeed, McMahon expressed the desire to word questions put to the Township Electors in a format in which they could ratify past actions found illegal by Judge Michael Caldwell and the 2nd Appellate Court.

Talking about the Haligus Road property, which Krafthefer said she had just received new information on from Lake in the Hills the afternoon of the meeting, McMahon said, “Ratify and sell it on the open market.”

“I didn’t have any information about Haligus Road until this afternoon,” she said.

Krafthefer did not reveal what new information she had learned, despite being repeatedly asked by Moore, but it was Lake in the Hills Attorney Richard Flood.

Krafthefer did, however, allowed as how she “could provide an educational statement.”

“We need to legally fix things,” she added.

“Couldn’t we ask to have acceptance, Yes or No?” McMahon asked.

“Those are the two choices,” the attorney replied.

“We don’t need to think that everything has to be undone,

” McMahon continued. “Get a second set of electors to approve it.

“That’s what I want.”

Pam Fender makes her presentation to the Grafton Township Board of Trustees with her male supporters sitting behind her.

In contrast to the

“let’s give Pam Fender a $35,000 job without asking if anyone else might want it or be more qualified”

approach last Thursday night (lots of comments; no deadline as in the Northwest Herald) by the Grafton Township Board, public notice will be given through newspapers that the board is seeking applicants to replace just resigned Township Clerk Dina Frigo.

Those interested in the position, which provides the same full family health benefits worth about $15,000 per year that Fender, as “Township Administrator,” will receive on top of her $35,000 salary, should send a letter and resume to the

Deputy Grafton Township Clerk
10109 Vine Street
Huntley, IL 60142

It should be noted that Fender did not hand the trustees a resume.

There’s a March 1st deadline.

If you are interested, do it soonest.

The township clerk is a partisan position. Only those who are Republicans are eligible for appointment because Frigo won election running as a Republican.

The duties are light and the pay is good.

Take minutes, post notices, file forms. That’s about it and you’ll have a highly paid lawyer to help you.

The benefits are obviously outstanding…even outrageous.

Of course, the board could have already selected someone and be just playing charades with the public on this appointment.

On one web site, someone indicated that Fender herself wanted the position.

Appointing her could solve the problem of what office to give Fender.

Trustee Betty Zirk mentioned that Fender could be in the same office as Township Supervisor Linda Moore, apparently forgetting that Moore needs a private office to interview people seeking General Assistance.

If Fender were appointed township clerk as well as township administrator, the board could either up her gross pay to $45,000 or, considering she has already said she will do the job for $35,000, cut her pay for township administrator to $25,000. Giving her both jobs would also save $15,000 or so in health benefits, assuming that the person appointed clerk would want his or her family covered.