A copy of the approved April 30 Village Board meeting minutes can be downloaded here.
A copy of the approved May 14 Special Village Board meeting minutes can be downloaded here.
Archive for the ‘Elections 2011’ Category
The unwelcome return of underhanded Village politics
Posted in BH Polo Club, Commercial Horse Boarding, Elections 2011, Equestrian Commission, FPDCC, FRVPC, Horse Boarding, Land Use, OMA, OP/Ed, Politics, Riding Club Commission, Riding Club of Barrington Hills, Save 5 Acres, Topics Of Interest, Village Code, Village Government, Zoning Board on May 31, 2014| 16 Comments »
Mark Twain once wrote, “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” Twain was right, but in our case its half way or more around our Village.
Ever since an appellate court recently denied a request to reconsider their March 28 decision on a matter between two neighbors regarding one particular horse boarding business in the Village, unnecessary fear and propaganda has been spread throughout our community.
Past and present elected Village officials, and some in local social riding clubs, apparently have been working feverishly to hoodwink those who board horses into believing that the possible fate of this one large boarding operation will force their operations to close.
One thing for sure is they’ve certainly caused a lot of noise lately.
The owner of the boarding operation involved in the private litigation recently implied in a letter that Village President or Board refused to take action on changing our zoning to his benefit. A newly circulated online petition on the other hand states it was our equestrian-dominated Zoning Board which “refuses to amend its zoning code to allow boarding.” Next thing you know our Police Pension Board will be roped into this unnecessary campaign of fear mongering.
Even the social media cloud is buzzing with wild speculation that the Village wants to outlaw even the keeping of personal horses. Commenters are questioning why and what will Barrington Hills do to augment the alleged significant tax revenues that will be lost from the boarding operations, tack shops, feed stores, restaurants and gas stations which are patronized by boarders.
Clearly, these individuals are very unfamiliar with our community and are not aware that the village receives no taxes from any boarding facilities.
It’s a shame that so much needless effort and emotion is being devoted to a non-issue, and that fabrications of reality is now being spread purely for political gain. Horse boarding and training have been and are now allowed under our Home Occupation Ordinance within reasonable neighborly limitations.
Our Zoning Board, whose May meeting was held despite an apparent violation of adequate notice, is currently accepting the input of residents toward goal of amending our code as it relates to boarding. They will be reviewing this and other matters at their next meeting on June 16th, but we believe this is just going through the motions.
Drafting of the horse boarding text amendment desired by some (or perhaps just one) began shortly after the March 28 appellate court ruling. It’s likely been proofed and edited by handful of “interested parties” already, but the lawful process which needs to be followed will take months, and some apparently cannot wait that long since the courts won’t wait.
The absolute shame of this whole nasty and ultimately costly situation is that it could have been averted.
Trustee Messer, the loudest of the Save 5 Acres Trustees at recent Village Board meetings on this matter, committed along with his running mates in their 2011 campaign that “We think the village should determine how both backyard boarding and large scale boarding should be regulated.”
Over three years have passed since that commitment with the trustees taking no action on boarding, and now, quite suddenly, boarding is the most immediate and important matter to be addressed in our Village.
Sorry to inform you, Trustee Messer, but lack of fulfillment of a campaign promise on your part should not, and will not, create an emergency on any board or residents’ part, so please do your best to curtail any fear and smear campaign within your power, and please let any properly considered text amendment process to our code take its course to what we expect to be the likely predetermined outcome.
– The Observer
May 14 Special Village Board meeting recordings released
Posted in Audio Recordings, Board of Health, Equestrian Commission, ETSB, Heritage and Environs Committee, Plan Commission, Politics, Save 5 Acres, Village Board, Zoning Board on May 21, 2014| 8 Comments »
The Village has released edited audio recordings from the May 14 Special Village Board meeting. To access the menu of the meeting’s topical audio recording segments, click here.
For reasons unknown, public comments have not been edited to individual resident comments, as they have been in the past. Instead, there is only one recording selection which starts with the first speaker and ends with the last.
Still, we really appreciated the remarks made by a longtime resident, and the manner in which they were made. A link to the beginning of her remarks can be found here.
The second recording readers should also take the time to listen to is the “New Appointments”segment where wo qualified, experienced and devoted residents were being considered for appointment to the Zoning Board of Appeals.
The conduct of some on our board and in the audience that night toward these volunteers willing to step into the politically charged arena that still plagues our Village was absolutely repugnant and inexcusable. That recording can be found here.
Here We Go Again. . . . Commercial Horse Boarding Drama Returns
Posted in BH Polo Club, Commercial Horse Boarding, Elections 2011, Equestrian Commission, FRVPC, Land Use, OP/Ed, Riding Club of Barrington Hills, Save 5 Acres, Taxes, Village Board, Village Code, Zoning Board on May 16, 2014| 8 Comments »
Commercial horse boarding was once again on the Board of Trustee’s agenda at the April 30, 2014 meeting. With deliberately short notice, Trustee Joseph Messer made a failed attempt to propose that the Village Board by consensus vote to direct the ZBA to prepare a “text amendment” to modify the existing Home Occupation Ordinance (HOO).
Two Illinois Appellate Court decisions have now made clear that one particular large scale commercial horse boarding operation is unlawful under the Village’s zoning laws and not permitted under the Village’s HOO. So Trustee Messer wants to change our laws—and apparently in a hurry, for reasons which only he knows. Now, horse boarding is again on the Zoning Board agenda for the next meeting on Monday, May 19, 2014.
These pages have long chronicled the drama of commercial horse boarding, including one notorious facility, in our Village, beginning with the first appellate court “win” for the Village – Veni, Vidi … Vici (we hope); followed by the former village president’s squandering of that win and failure to enforce the law as written – Is Bob Abboud a Liar? You Decide; and capped off by the startling revelations that then candidates (and now Trustees!) Messer, Selman, and Meroni accepted and tried to hide campaign contributions from the operator of one of the largest boarding businesses in town – Errors were made; others were blamed.
Unfortunately, with Trustee Messer’s recent actions, this drama is returning to our Village and now all residents must suffer through this matter again.
The Riding Club of Barrington Hills is doing its best to whip up fear among the horse riding community by advertising that one of the recent Appellate Court decisions threatens even private backyard “boarding of one or two horses for neighbors.” Not so! But their erroneous last minute email message, sent the day of the May 14 Village Board meeting to a select group of members, can be viewed here.
It is now beyond clear, after two Appellate Court decisions, that a large scale commercial boarding business, where the business and not the residence is the primary use of the land, is unlawful and not permitted under the HOO. There is no more room to debate that issue.
The HOO was intended to permit small, quiet businesses operating in homes, where the primary purpose of the land is residential—think piano teacher and even “backyard” boarding. But it does not allow massive horse boarding businesses (or any large, obvious businesses) with their attendant noise, pollution, traffic and unbridled and untaxed use of Village resources. All of that is now clear.
But what should be equally clear is that our current Village Board and ZBA cannot and should not be trusted to address the issue of horse boarding businesses in our Village. The Board includes three Trustees (Messer, Selman, and Meroni) who are hopelessly conflicted from making any unbiased decisions.
That’s because they accepted and tried to disguise campaign contributions from a large commercial horse boarding business owner. We shouldn’t forget that offense, which tells us something about their motivations. (The State Board of Elections ruled that they had violated campaign disclosure laws and imposed a two-year probation in 2011.)
Riding Club members, whose recent scare-tactics email demonstrates they cannot be trusted to be rational and objective, dominate our ZBA. The ZBA also includes many appointments from the former administration—an administration that behaved irresponsibly in handling horse boarding issues for years.
Instead, if the Village is going to take up again the issue of commercial horse boarding, it must do so in a responsible, transparent, and unbiased manner. It must be done with public involvement and without the conflict, or even the appearance of conflict, that prevents both the Board and the ZBA from handling the matter properly.
The solution, we submit, is for the Village President to appoint a special “blue ribbon” committee to study this issue, take public comment, and then provide an objective recommendation back to the Village Board for consideration and possible inclusion as a referendum, to be voted on by residents.
We have expressed in these pages an economic proposal to regulate horse boarding businesses that do not violate zoning codes – An economic proposal to control horse boarding businesses. That is one solution, recognizing that we have big businesses operating in our Village that do not pay commercial taxes to the Village (which would reduce our residential tax burden, as in the Village of Oak Brook).
Some have suggested a ban on the business of horse boarding altogether, which would surely preserve the quiet, residential character of our Village. But that is not likely a viable solution. We all must recognize that horses and equestrian pursuits are part of our character.
So something must be done, and what cannot be done (as Trustee Messer is suggesting) is to stretch and pull and twist and turn the HOO to accommodate a commercial operation. We have written about this wrongheaded approach before – The peg is still square, the hole is still round.
What is not part of our character, at least it should not be part of our character, is to allow bias and conflicts of interest to prevent a responsible resolution of this long playing drama. For that reason, the Village Board and the ZBA should and must refrain from attempting to deal with commercial boarding, and certainly should pause while litigation involving one of those businesses is ongoing.
Once again, the most rational and fair solution for our community as a whole is for the President to appoint an impartial, special committee to address the issue, leading to a referendum for action by all residents at the ballot box.
– The Observer
Lauzen talks Longmeadow Parkway bridge at state of the counties event
Posted in Kane, Longmeadow Parkway, Road construction, Save 5 Acres on May 16, 2014| 1 Comment »
Drivers who plan to cross the proposed Longmeadow Parkway bridge over the Fox River in northern Kane County can expect to pay tolls, but Kane County officials say that will be temporary.
Kane County Board Chairman Chris Lauzen said the toll bridge will be place in two or three years and will generate between $50 million and $70 million of the project’s estimated $125 million cost.
Read more here.
April 30 Village Board meeting recordings released
Posted in Algonquin Rd, Audio Recordings, BACOG, BCFPD, Building Department, Commercial Horse Boarding, Communications Committee, Cook, County, EJ&E/Canadian National, Financial Reports, FPDCC, Heritage and Environs Committee, Land Use, Longmeadow Parkway, McHenry, Plan Commission, Police Reports, Politics, Riding Club of Barrington Hills, Road construction, Roads and Bridges, Save 5 Acres, Taxes, VBHPD, Village Board, Zoning Board on May 8, 2014| 4 Comments »
The Village has released edited audio recordings from the April 30 Village Board meeting. To access the menu of the meeting’s topical audio recording segments, click here.
Nine residents provided public comments during the meeting. However one resident stood out with an incredibly honest and necessary message to some members of our Village Board pertaining to the ethics of them even considering amending Village Code as it pertains to commercial horse boarding.
A direct link to those comments can be found here.
April Flashbacks
Posted in 220, Elections 2011, Elections 2013, OP/Ed, Save 5 Acres, School Districts, Unite Barrington Hills, Village Board on April 30, 2014| Leave a Comment »
Following are some of the articles published by The Observer for the month of April in recent years. These articles, gathered from various publications and editorials, are noteworthy for residents in that they remind us of where we’ve been as a community.
Dist. 220 wants to teach younger students Chinese – 2010
Barrington Unit District 220 will soon apply for a federal grant that would allow it to partner with the University of Illinois to create a 17-year-long curriculum for the teaching of the Chinese language Mandarin.
Revisit the Daily Herald story here.
B. Hills ethics case continued – 2011
The next State Board of Elections hearing on a campaign finance complaint against Barrington Hills’ winning “Save 5 Acres” slate of candidates will be held on a yet unspecified date within the next few weeks. The board heard testimony Thursday from a “Save 5 Acres” office worker who admitted to filing the campaign finance report that did not properly identify resident Benjamin LeCompte III as the original source of $5,000 donations to candidates Joe Messer, Karen Selman and Patty Meroni.
Read the full story here.
Our View: Cheap power – 2012
You can lead a voter to cheaper electricity, but you can’t make him switch on the light.
Maybe that’s the reason why five Lake County communities — Waukegan, Park City, Wadsworth, Highwood and Barrington Hills — turned down the chance to spread their electricity costs through community “aggregate” purchasing plans. Twenty-nine county communities had the electricity aggregation vote on the March 20 primary ballot.
To read more of the Lake County News-Sun’s editorial, click here.
McLaughlin unseats Abboud in Barrington Hills – 2013
Two-term Barrington Hills Village President Robert Abboud conceded defeat to challenger Martin McLaughlin Tuesday night.
“I think the village is going to have a new village president,” Abboud said. “I think the electorate was looking for some change and I’m sure Mr. McLaughlin will bring it.”
Read the Daily Herald story here.
– The Observer
Offer BACOG a fair lease price
Posted in Audio Recordings, BACOG, OP/Ed, Politics, Save 5 Acres, Taxes, Village Board on April 25, 2014| 12 Comments »
For nearly two years now, Barrington Hills has provided virtually no-cost office space to the Barrington Area Council of Governments (BACOG). The current two-year lease will expire on June 30, and last month, our Village Board began discussing terms of a potential two-year renewal of the lease of 220 square feet of office space in Village Hall.
During their April meeting, the four Village Board members who were present were informed via a memo from Trustee Harrington, who was not present at the meeting, that the going rate for local office space ranged from $12-25 per square foot of office space per year. Trustee Harrington’s recommendation for approval was at the minimum of the scale at $12 per square foot.
The discussion that followed revealed BACOG does not pay for utilities, internet access, security system fees, interior common area video surveillance, cleaning services or conference room usage. They do, however, pay $35 per month for use of the copier and other “consumables” that are afforded in the break room or other cost items, however BACOG is not tasked with the day-to-day inventory or replenishment of those items as our Village staff is.
When it came time to determine what to charge BACOG, Pro Tem Gohl suggested $18 per square foot, but the motion for that rate wasn’t seconded. Matter of fact, if you listen to the recording, as we have, you can hear Trustee Selman mutter “Humph” and Trustee Meroni laugh a bit at the suggestion of $18. Gohl then retreated to the original recommendation from Trustee Harrington of $12 per foot, but that didn’t pass with only three Save 5 Acres trustees voting for that rate.
Their entire discussion can be listened to here.
The Observer researched available office spaces comparable to BACOG’s current 220 square foot (SF) of space and discovered the following in the Barrington area via Loopnet.com:
- 200 square feet for $20.25 per SF, per year
- 224 square feet for $33.20 per SF, per year
- 284 square feet for $28.52 per SF, per year
An expanded search of available offices ranging from 194 to as much as 320 SF resulted in an average of roughly $24 per SF, per year. We did find office space obtainable for as low as $12 per SF, however rates at this level were offered for much larger office spaces.
Given the current competitive lease market in the Barrington area, The Observer suggests the Village Board offer BACOG a very fair lease rate of $20 per square foot, per year, when they convene next Wednesday night. This is seems to be the least amount any potential lessee would have to pay for office space, and considering BACOG has paid nothing for two years, this would represent an effective lease rate of $10 per SF over four years, or in our minds, a bargain.
– The Observer
Appellate court decision sends local commercial horse boarding complaint back to lower court for further proceedings
Posted in Building Department, Commercial Horse Boarding, Cook, County, Elections 2011, Equestrian Commission, Land Use, Legal Committee, Legal Expenses, Plan Commission, Politics, Save 5 Acres, Village Attorney, Village Board, Village Code, Village Government, Zoning Board on April 14, 2014| Leave a Comment »
In the latest chapter of what is becoming a longstanding saga of a dispute between neighbors regarding commercial horse boarding operations within the Village, last month an Illinois appellate court reversed a decision made by the circuit court and remanded the matter for further proceedings before that court.
According to the unanimous decision, three justices held that the circuit court “erred in dismissing the plaintiff property owners’ amended injunctive relief against defendants, who were owners of a horse boarding facility, on the basis of failure to exhaust administrative remedies, mootness and lack of justiciability.”
A copy of the court’s March 28 twenty-four page decision can be downloaded here.
Those who may be unfamiliar with this matter can read further background from 2010 by clicking here.
March Flashbacks
Posted in Commercial Horse Boarding, Elections 2011, Land Use, Legal Expenses, Lighting Ordinance, OP/Ed, Pension Funding, Politics, Save 5 Acres, Village Code, Zoning Board on March 30, 2014| 1 Comment »
Following are some of the articles published by The Observer for the month of March in recent years. These articles, gathered from various publications and editorials, are noteworthy for residents in that they remind us of where we’ve been as a community.
State hears evidence in Barrington Hills disclosure case – 2011
Members of the Save 5 Acres slate of candidates for Barrington Hills Village Board testified Tuesday at a state election board hearing in Chicago that no deception was intended with donations to their campaigns.
Following the hearing, (Save 5 Acres candidate) Selman said the contentious proceedings have taken their toll.
“It’s been a very difficult and painful thing for everyone involved,” she said. “Did we make mistakes? We did make mistakes. Was the intent to launder money? That’s preposterous.”
Read the March 29, 2011, TribLocal story here.
Horses back on ZBA agenda – 2011
An upcoming meeting of the Barrington Hills Zoning Board will tackle an issue — commercial horse boarding — almost as controversial as the recently-settled Dark Sky outdoor lighting proposal and one that factors prominently in the April 5 election.
The village is trying to decide how many horses constitutes boarding as a business versus boarding for personal use. The former is not allowed in a town where there are few commercial operations and many residents want to keep it that way.
Read the 2011 TribLocal story here.
Bartlett, Barrington Hills alone in opposing electricity referendum – 2012
Bartlett and Barrington Hills were the only holdouts in Cook County’s Northwest suburbs on a referendum allowing municipal leaders to negotiate with companies other than ComEd for their electricity supply.
Bartlett voters were decisively against the proposal, with 61 percent voting down the measure. The question was closer in Barrington Hills, where 468 voters opposed the proposal and 443 backed it.
To read the full Daily Herald story, click here.
Barrington Hills hopefuls debate spending, police pension – 2013
While agreeing that protecting the environmental character of Barrington Hills is of paramount importance, the five candidates vying for three village trustee seats have different perspectives on the village budget and the extent to which spending and taxes can or should be reduced.
Read the Daily Herald story here.
– The Observer
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