Last Tuesday, The Observer published a press release issued by Maria Pappas of the Cook County Treasurer’s Office that cited Barrington Hills among 63 other taxing bodies for not responding to a simple request for financial information. Now she had to resort to filing a FOIA request for financial information from our Village as a result of non-compliance of forwarding information.
We were not shocked by this latest news since we have published editorials and news stories on how reluctant our Village is when it comes to sharing Village government information. The lack of simple online access to meeting minutes of the majority of Village commissions and committees from the past several years is well documented. Readers of The Observer have also shared their own frustrations with our Village’s poor FOIA request responsiveness, but frankly we believe the situation will become worse before it gets better for residents and outsiders alike.
In March, a majority of our Village Board approved a $150,000 line item under “Legal Services” titled “FOIA Records Management” in their 2012 Appropriation Ordinance. The title, as innocuous as it might seem, indicates our Village is preparing to tighten its hold on information they would prefer not be released to the public through FOIA requests, once again making residents pay for Abboud’s efforts to quash the public’s right to know.
Anyone who reads The Observer and local newspapers, or attends Village board or committee meetings, understands all too well why this situation exists. Sadly, we believe matters have already gone too far, and the transparency problems are now chronic. When our Village thumbs its nose to a request for simple financials from the Cook County Treasurer (who collects and distributes over half of the property tax revenues that feed our Village government each year), residents have a serious problem.
As long as most of our Trustees continue to turn a blind eye to Abboud’s stonewalling of information, nothing will improve. Buffering the problem with a $1.568 million overall legal services appropriation won’t help, because if he snubbed the Cook County Treasurer, what chance does an ordinary resident have?
Our counties and state have knowledgeable personnel who are trained to intervene when those living or working with a problem can no longer cope with it. Perhaps they should be summoned to Barrington Hills before it’s too late.
– The Observer
Thank you Observer. The trail of money is an interesting area to investigate. Bob Abboud asks the ZBA attorney to be terminated from service because his opinions don’t match his own. Burke Warren complies by removing the attorney and protecting their legal fees – nice annuity to protect. Smart call by our Village’s “independent counsel” – with a Village President making decisions that call for increased legal expenses higher than any surrounding area, they wisely don’t rattle the goose that lays their golden egg. Attorney Kelly, with over $500,000 of his own legal fees from the Village under Mr. Abboud, investigates allegations of tampering and concludes that nothing was wrong without any modicum of professional investigation.
Anyone see the Documentary, Bully? Watching the trustees follow Mr. Abboud and Mr. Messer mock and suppress residents who speak up, no wonder a recent older resident answered at a recent meeting his reason for not speaking out earlier was fear of retribution.
The reason Abboud is reluctant to provide the County Treasurer’s office with B.H. financial information is the financial health of B.H. is not compatible with the propaganda regarding the same routinely spewed to the public by Abboud and his submissive Board.
Abboud cannot afford to let the public see the facts, especially now, with so many eyes watching. This makes his shell game harder to pull off.
Wake up residents, your apathy is allowing spendthrift Bobby and his Board cronies to squander already diminishing Village assets. We can see in order to replenish wasted assets residents are being served with ever increasing higher real estate tax bills and assumption of a greater future debt burden.
Abboud’s incompetence is costing all of us and it is time we say good-bye to Abboud, Burke-Warren, Kelly and the many other friends of the program.
Please don’t tell me Kelly is still on the payroll; are the FOIA responses, or lack thereof, his bailiwick? if so, that’s more than pathetic; it’s a travesty! We’ll support “intervention”; just show us the way.
Yes, Kelly is on the payroll – and there is more. The dismissed ZBA chairperson alleged tampering by Messers. Abboud and Messer in two important variance and special permit issues last year. When Village residents requested an independent investigation, Mr. Abboud hired crony Kelly to conduct the investigation. The puppet BOT shamefully complied without any hint of request for independence. Mr. Kelly of course found nothing wrong, but never interviewed the injured parties. He’s been paid over $500,000 by the Village (How much more by the Abboud family?), any surprise nothing was found. We need a strong investigative media and government agencies to begin investigating the corruption and special interest cronyism in our Village that smells a lot like certain Illinois governors now spending their twilight years behind bars. The Bully is running everyone scared of his retribution. Good people speak of fear.
Oh yes, interestingly, the two issues where accusations of tampering took place included residents known to contribute $15,000 and $30,000 respectively to the Save 5 Acres Campaign sponsored by Mr. Abboud. Yes, the same campaign that shamefully sponsored lies and false statements about 5 acre zoning.
Apathy in our town begets corruption.
The Home Occupation Amendment is another name for Horse Boarding Ordinance – they spread deceit, the public is uninformed and there is special interest communication from Village Hall.