A petition is circulating in Oakwood Hills to encourage the village board to eliminate its police department and contract with the McHenry County Sheriff’s Department for protection.
Oakwood Hills Police Car.
It says,
We, the citizens of Oakwood Hills Illinois, demand that the Oakwood Hills Police Department be immediately disbanded and that all policing activities going forward be conducted by the McHenry County Sheriff’s department.
We believe that a part-time staff police officers, who do not provide around the clock service on a daily basis, are ineffective and unnecessarily costly.
We believe our community deserves a full-time community policing, which can be provided by the McHenry County Sheriff’s department more effectively and at a significantly reduced cost.
As I copied the petition content from the Facebook page, Brian Wilson, who started the petition, had obtained 153 supporters.
Beneath the petition are places for people to explain why they are signing the petition.
The comments focus on harassment of teenagers and others, tickets for minor offenses, lack of professionalism, 24-hour coverage, enforcement to raise revenue, the re-hiring of an office not found acceptable, etc.
Some people are quite explicit about their complaints.
Not all signers from the Oakwood Hills.
Election turnout two years ago for village board was low:
Lots of folks ran for the Oakwood Village Board two years ago, probably a result of the peaker plant controversy.
2015 election results in Oakwood Hills shows the number of people who determine who is in office.
This year’s April 4th elect ballot will lead people to think they can elect a write-in candidate:
And they can, as long as her name is Mary Beth Salvo.
State law requires write-in candidates to register such an intention way before the election.
Salvo currently serves on the village board.
There are many great part-time police officers but I have to say the majority that I dealt with were pretty bad.
All too often, power hungry wannabes seem to gravitate to these jobs.
Nothing scientific, just my opinion.
It is silly that what one can consider a neighborhood has it’s own PD.
Like Holiday Hills and many others.
Municipality is entitled to zone a Power Plant.
Or issue bonds for benefit of city services to one developer.
Or form a TIF District.
I would like to form a municipality, called the Village of Tif.
It would collect all future inflationary-generated property tax revenue to distribute back, pro rata, to all homeowners within.
I thought there was recently a story stating Oakwood Hills hired a full time female police chief that will start once she retires from North Chicago?
it would be nice since the police take up close to 50% of the budget.
Their whole dept has resigned.
Only left are the brass.
One of the new hires who hasn’t qualified with their weapon was placed on the street to patrol without a trainer.
9 officers have resigned over the last few months!!!
Something unsettling happening at this department.
I’m hearing officers were being forced to write tickets to generate more revenue.
This is why all the officers have left so quickly.
Does anyone know any of the officers? Would love to find out the truth about what is happening.
It is the new lieutenant that was just promoted from sergeant. Everyone knows her. She is mandating tickets which based on current statutes it is illegal. They need the attorney general to begin looking into them.
Yep.
New Looey recently promoted.
No one likes her either.
Barney Fife type and downright mean.
They hand out tickets for everything.
How are people supposed to buy new village stickers when they get tickets once a month?
Those tickets run twice the cost of a sticker.
I can see once a year to make up for not getting one.
But every month?
People who normally back up Law Enforcement refuse to do so now.
And now they re-hired a cop who has a very checkered history and went to North Chicago where the new chief hails from.
Coincidence?
I think not.
The entire department is a joke to the residents here.
Its no wonder they all left.
Now what they have is lawsuit fodder.
These 2 cops are questionable to say the least.
Now the new chief is as well as the mayor.
I think hiring real County professionals is the best way to clean things up and save money as well.
Police department is a joke.
We need a entity that can operate without any local affilliation or politics.
You have a very small population here.
A department is not necesary at all.
Especially one with such a bad history.
Not to mention the ‘new’ fired / rehired officer is suing his last department for Religious Discrimination.
Since he worked with the new chief and both are involved in another lawsuit, or were..it seems that whatever little secrets the two may have are bonding them tightly.
I hope we can remove the mayor as well for allowing both of these people into the department in spite of all the information they had to avoid this stupid move.
I think the States Attorney should be looking closely at this village with the shenanigans that have been rife in the department for so many years.
7 officers resigned due to one person, a Sgt who was promoted to LT.
Now rehiring an officer who was forced to resign from here years ago for mistreating Oakwood Hills residents.
Now after being fired North Chicago, he’s back.
The new Chief, a former Sgt from the same police dept, brings him back.
Everyone should go to next Village Board meeting ask all why all the officers resigned except one.
The one who nobody wants to work for.
Yeah its a mess.
That ‘new’ LT. is as bad as the new rehire in many aspects.
Another one who likes to bully people and push her authority around in a a very amateur way.
Just the fact that the new chief is buddy buddy AND involved in another lawsuit with this cowboy who was fired years back should be enough to remove both of them to relieve the Village of any appearance of poor judgement.
Now that new rehire is suing the N Chicago PD for religious discrimination.
With the lack of funding now, a huge lawsuit here will tip the scales against the Village if this clown decides to sue.
Plus McHenry County covers the evening and oddball shifts anyway.
Half the Village budget goes to a poorly run port time PD.
No common sense there.
Not good.
Very poor judgement hiring both of them.
When is the next election for Mayor, I’m in Law Enforcement, I I’ll make changes to help the residence and make everyone happy if I became Chief of Police.
Beware of the officer who was rehired–officer Sabet–he is muslim and made some very inappropriate comments about my last name.
he also wrote a ticket for no reason–going 5 miles over–what a POS!!!
Officer Sabet should not be allowed to wear a badge.
He abuses his authority issuing tickets for no reason.
He is arrogant with a chip on his shoulder and deserves to have his badge stripped permanently!
You guys all raise good points. BTW, a friend of mine told me that if the Village of Oakwood Hills was dissolved, the police force would be disbanded.
What do we need the “Village of Oakwood Hills” for anyway?
They get 5% of our taxes and part of our utility bills to pay for what??
the overpriced police department to harass us??
A friend of mine told me that all it takes is half of the people to vote to dissolve a village.
She said the townships take over the roads and street lights and tree trimming, the school districts stay the same, and our taxes and our power bills would go down.. . and in the end we’d get real and professional police support via McHenry County.
How do we get THAT going?