We’ve received a copy of the recently filed lawsuit against the Village in the Circuit Court of Cook County by four resident plaintiffs on February 27th.
Trustees Patty Meroni and Karen Selman, both running for reelection under the SOS Party, as well as Trustee Joseph Messer, are among the Village officials mentioned often in the “Verified Complaint for Declaratory Judgment, Injunction, and Other Relief.”
A copy of the three-count lawsuit, including background narrative residents should read, can be downloaded here.
The Village Board is convening a special meeting tomorrow, March 9, beginning at 6:30 PM at Village Hall to discuss the selection of Special Counsel to represent the Village in the matter. A copy of their agenda can be viewed here.
JUSTICE IS NEARLY SERVED!
Based on the content of the complaint if this goes to court three of the four SOS campaign committee members could be called as witnesses. Think about it…
I am thinking about it…
Messer, Selman and Meroni now have to get into the weeds with all of their shenanigans that date back 4 years.
Could be painful for them. They didn’t take the advice of an extremely good municipal attorney, Mr. Bond, who warned them not to play with matches when they used the Zoning Board to push through the Anderson Amendment.
Hope that they hire one of Messer’s law buddies. If his buddies are as “brilliant” as he is, maybe we’ll see some justice for the residents of this village. They willingly started a fire and now there is a problem with putting it out.
Sure glad that President MacLaughlin has lowered the legal bills that this village was accustomed to during the last administration. Why? This law suit will cost us ALL tax dollars to defend the stupidity of a few. It will be “fair” price to pay for getting rid of the festering trouble this village has experienced for more than a decade. Good riddance!
BOT members, Messer, Meroni and Selman needed to pass “Anderson II” boarding amendment permitting LeCompte to raise Anderson II as a defense in the Drury lawsuit (former VBH). Specifically claiming the passage of Anderson II renders the claims of illegal boarding activities on Oakwood Farm “moot”. In fact, with the retroactivity provision snuggly placed in Anderson II, LeCompte will try to contend in court that commercial boarding beyond HOO was always legal VBH and VBH ZBA was incorrect for issuing “cease and desist” and all the litigation which followed and money spent by VBH taxpayers was the result of a simple misunderstanding of VBH zoning code.
The mootness defense was tried by LeCompte’s already through the “Schuman [Abboud] Letter”. It worked in the trial court but subsequenly failed at the Appellate Court level. VBH owes a great deal of gratitude to these nobel VBH residents who are standing up for all of us who support the rule of law. The allegations in their verfiied complaint simply sheds more light on the suspicious political activities by Abboud and SOS BOT.
The complaint filed by Messrs. Drury, Reich and O’Donnell is against VBH and no one else. Bond-Dickson was appointed by BOT to deal specifically with commercial boarding. No need for “special counsel” to protect VBH, VBH will be adequately protected by Bond-Dickson.
VBH was served with summons and complaint on March 5th and under the Illinois Code of Civil Procedure VBH has 30 days or until April 4th to appear, answer or otherwise plead in court. No need to call a “special meeting” as the manner in dealing with the complaint can be done in executive session after the regularly scheduled March monthly BOT meeting.
Since the election is on April 7th, maybe the more prudent course of action for Bond-Dickson is to timely appear and file a motion requesting additonal time to respond to the Complaint informing the court that a “new” VBH BOT will be seated in May.
Messer, who is standing down on April 7th, should have no say on how to defend the complaint. At this juncture, Messer’s time is better spent on preparing his farewell speech and ours applauding his decision.
This is just one of many examples, when it comes to horse boarding in VBH why is the reaction of SOS BOT disproportionate to the action at hand and made at such quick speed. What does SOS BOT have to hide?