GILMAN, IL. (ECWd) - This article will cover three issues; Costs of complying with Freedom of Information Act ("FOIA") requests, who asked us to send FOIA requests, and School Board Member Kyle Kraft's offensive comments. CRAZY:Â The Watchdogs cost the school district $2977 in lost personnel hours...
BOLINGBROOK, IL. (ECWd) - Apparently, former DuPage Township Supervisor William Mayer has a problem with people posting negative comments about him in the closed Facebook group "Bolingbrook Politics" and contacted his attorney to threaten at least one of its administrators. On March 22, 2019, attorney John R....
ALORTON, IL. (ECWd) - According to local residents, on March 17, 2019, Alorton Village Mayor Jo Ann Reed was spotted using the Village of Alorton's Police vehicle to distribute sample ballots with her preferred candidate's names checked off. Our source indicated that Reed handed out the ballot...
ATLANTA, IL. (ECWd) - On March 21, 2019, the Edgar County Watchdogs filed an FOIA lawsuit in Logan County Circuit Court alleging that the Atlanta Public Library District violated the Freedom of Information Act by denying public records request for an unredacted copy of a Federal...
MATTOON, IL. (ECWd) - Happening now: Shores Jewelry fire in downtown Mattoon, Illinois. Emergency crews are on the scene. The fire started just prior to 6 p.m. today. No further information available at this time. Photos and video submitted by a reader are below: [gallery type="rectangular" ids="51097,51098,51099,51100,51101,51102,51103"] . [video width="480" height="848" mp4="https://edgarcountywatchdogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/ShoresJewelry-Fire.mp4"][/video] . ...
Homer Township (ECWd) - It appears that the Homer Township Fire Protection District is electioneering using fire district resources. On its webpage, HomerFire.org, it prominently displays a link to a video of the Fire Chief "explaining" the Bond referendum to those who choose to watch it. UPDATE: The...
CHICAGO, IL. (ECWd) - Below is a video clip, from WLS-TV, of the Paris Marching Tigers in the 2019 Chicago St. Patrick's Day Parade. They were entry number 41 in the parade. This is Paris Marching Band's first appearance in Chicago's St. Patrick's Day Parade. https://youtu.be/Bbit2D4W9Ms The entire parade...
DeKalb Township (ECWd) - In our initial report (here) on DeKalb Township's Shacklee purchases, we pretty much predicted what we would find after further public records were produced. In the video, we predicted the Township joined Shacklee under "someone" - the now-former Supervisor's wife, Jennifer Jeep Johnson,...
ATLANTA, IL. (ECWd) - A critic of the Atlanta Public Library Board has, in the past, opined on alleged "linger-longer" meetings of the library board held after its public meetings. The board had consistently denied participating in any such meetings. However, an FOIA request for certain emails has...
SPRINGFIELD, IL. (ECWd) - Video of testimony provided on HB2988 during the Committee Hearing held last week. https://youtu.be/P-IlAgMq3Jc . ...
