DuPage Twp Trustees Oliver & Burgess ignore the law during Special Meeting –

DuPage Township, IL. (ECWd) –

The DuPage Township Board of Trustees, including Trustees Burgess and Oliver, and Township Supervisor George,  violated the Open Meetings Act at tonight’s meeting in the following ways:

• Held a meeting where the electronic attendees could not contemporaneously hear the entire discussion (this is apparently a recurring problem) as required under the Open Meetings Act
• Discussed, by way of Motion, Second, and Vote of an item not listed on the special meeting agenda (Censure of a Trustee)
• Voted on an item not listed on the agenda for action (the Censure of a Trustee)
• Failure to provide public recital of the nature of the matter being considered and other information that will inform the public of the business being conducted (what was she censured for, for what reason, what was the purpose)
• Censured a Trustee without statutory or constitutional authority for the Censure

When the meeting first started, the public and Trustees Benford and Raga, all said they could not hear the discussions being held at the meeting location as required by the Open Meetings Act. The Board members present at the meeting proceeded anyway.

Towards the end of the meeting, I continued my objection to this vote to Censure in an effort to keep the board members from violating state law. They voted anyway.

This is an obvious political move, and using a public meeting for it, by Maripat Oliver and Ken Burgess, especially in light of the fact that the request for a special meeting was not even sent until a few minutes after the DuPage Township Republican Caucus had finished.

About any alleged Censure of a Township Trustee: It is meaningless, a township board does not possess that authority, and did we say it was meaningless?

More on this issue is forthcoming…