$1.013 Million in Cash -- Why Residents Cannot Afford for Township High School District 113 to Go Back for the Future

Township High School District 113 is in turmoil, again. Superintendent Christopher Dignam was ousted, taking with him a $300,000 severance payment after two years of service. Shortly afterward, long-term School Board member, David Small, resigned, reportedly because he found his views "at odds with the majority of board." This created the second vacancy on the School Board since November 2017 when Julie Gordon resigned, later replaced by the appointment of Gayle Byck. More recently, the School Board replaced Small with Ken Fishbain, who was on the school board from 2003 to 2011 and served as its president during 2009-2010. At this time, two of the seven School Board members were not elected by residents but were selected by the School Board based on unspecified criteria.

If the residents of Highland Park and Deerfield think the current School Board is going to right the ship, they are sadly mistaken. It's time to recognize that the single biggest threat to the success of Highland Park High School (HPHS) and Deerfield High School (DHS) is the School Board. The second biggest threat is resident apathy. Based on the current status of our school district, it appears that the School Board simply lacks the ability to move forward as it clings to its past. The recent appointment of Ken Fishbain as a member of the School Board confirms this. Déjà vu, all over again. As George Santayana said, “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

“Garbage in, garbage out” -- incorrect or poor-quality input and procedures results in predictable faulty output. Consider the process for selecting Small's replacement. While the School Board accepted online applications from interested residents, it invited only one applicant for an interview, Fishbain. The interview was held in closed session (and the frequent use of closed session school board meetings is worthy of another report). Residents don't know how many applicants there were from two communities known for having many talented, educated, smart, civic-minded people. Yet, the School Board chose to ramrod a former board member and president as the appointee. The purported benefit of this selection was there would be a “quick transition to the board.” This is a euphemism for onboarding someone who will not rock the boat, someone who will not be critical of the existing board, and someone who will vote with the pack. Unfortunately, as seen too often in local politics, unanimity is treated as a virtue, when the community can benefit more from people challenging the status quo and presenting new ideas.

To be sure, I don’t know Ken Fishbain personally or professionally. Based on a cursory online search, he appears to be a talented, educated, smart, civic-minded person. However, while the School Board perceived his previous service to District 113 as an asset, some may consider it a liability. Residents of District 113 cannot afford to allow the School Board to go back for the future.

In at least one material regard, during Fishbain's tenure and leadership, the School Board of District 113 was not paying much attention to financial management and governance from 2009-2011. At the least, it appears it was not paying enough attention to finances. These years were also a time when David Small and Debra Hymen were on the School Board -- Hymen remains on the board. It's time residents take a critical look financial management in that era. 

Between the years 2009-2011, more than $1,013,000 dollars was handled in cash by the District 113 administration. Cash – paper bills – the stuff you used to take out of your wallet to pay for things before credit cards and Apple Pay. Cash, the paper money that leaves no record as it circulates from hand to hand.

In June 2009, Barry Bolek, District 113’s Assistant Superintendent for Finance, signed a “petty cash” check for $349,000. It was endorsed by a District 113 staff member who reported to Bolek.

Ostensibly a finance expert, Bolek should have known that a petty cash check is usually under $50 or, perhaps, even as much as $2,000, depending on the size and purpose of a company. However, $349,000 is not “petty cash” in anyone’s lexicon. Further, the $349,000 check had only Bolek’s signature authorization. There was no countersignature – meaning that there was no internal control to require either the superintendent or the Chairman of the School Board to countersign the check as an internal control on finances. The treasurer or controller of any reasonably sized company would know to have countersigned checks for any payments above a certain level.

Similarly, in June 2010, Bolek signed another “petty cash” check, this one for $343,000. This check wasn’t countersigned, either.

Finally, in 2011, Bolek signed two more large “petty cash” checks. One for $136,000 and the other for $185,000.  The aggregate for those two “petty cash” checks in 2011 was $321,000.

Why $321,000 was split into two checks in 2011 is unknown. Perhaps someone would like to investigate this, or a member of the School Board at the time would like to provide the answer to our communities. 

Worth noting, most suburban banks do not have this much cash on hand. District 113 needed to advise the Chase Bank in Deerfield to be prepared in advance for each of these transactions. Here is an example of the request in 2009.

We don’t know when this process of obtaining hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash started, it could have been going on for decades.

What is known is that in 2011, Chase Bank handed over $321,000 in cash to someone at District 113 for the two "petty cash" checks. These two checks carried the single authorized signature of Barry Bolek, as well as his endorsement on the back of each check for endorsement (see, images of 2011 checks above with signature on front and back of check). It might be assumed, based on the endorsement, that Bolek himself picked up the cash.

To be clear, the School Board allowed Barry Bolek, and most likely his predecessor in the financial role, to have unlimited, unfettered, and uncontrolled access to School District funds. Even if the School Board was unaware of this untenable lack of control, it was also Bolek's responsibility as the person in charge of finance to ensure that standard accounting practices and proper controls were in place. 

In a light most favorable to Bolek, he did not know enough about internal control standards to ensure that checks for amounts over a certain established minimum level would need to be countersigned. Also, the only check that Bolek should have personally endorsed when District 113 was the payor was his own routine paycheck. Residents should also question the standards used by the public accounting firms who audited our public funds during this era and determine whether the accounting firm(s) was held accountable. The same questions are relevant today.

Cash is really not a good way to store or transport money. Who can forget the Unsinkable Molly Brown who hid her fortune in a stove, only to have her husband set it aflame? What if there had been a car accident on the way back to administrative offices? Cash is also not traceable. Yet, it appears likely that the cash – or most of it -- was delivered directly from the Chase Bank back to District 113 administrative offices. Who was responsible for it there? Where was the cash stored there? A large cash drawer, perhaps. Maybe the Assistant Superintendent’s locked file drawer or desk. Maybe a safe. Maybe in the trunk of a car. Who knew or cared? Likely not the School Board.

To be sure, all or part of the cash was intended and used for a yearly book buy-back program at DHS and HPHS. However, based on the lack of records, there is no one at District 113 who can provide an acceptable accounting to residents for the use of $1.013 million of cash during 2009-2011. Also, during 2009-2011 there were many other checks made out to “petty cash” in large amounts of $2,000-$37,000. 

No one can say how much or little of the cash was used in the manner for which it was intended. District 113 had, at best, a very rudimentary accounting for the book buyback program. We do know that lots of people were handling lots of cash. The few existing reports consist of cash received from the bank, cash paid to the students, and the difference to be re-deposited at the bank. The number of books claimed to have been bought back is provided but there are no receipts or credit slips for the books, no inventory records of the books purchased per title, nor is there a signature to hold anyone accountable for the reports. Here is a sample accounting for use of $195,000 in cash in 2009 from Deerfield High School, called "Fiscal Report."

 

Without inventory and detailed cash records, it is challenging to determine if all the cash was used for the benefit of the school district. A basic review of the shoddy “Fiscal Reports” for the book buy-back programs in 2009-2011 reveals something strange. On average, and inexplicably, the books were always significantly more expensive at Deerfield High School. Same school district, different books? For instance, in 2009, the average alleged cash payment to a student was $35.25 per book at HPHS, while the average alleged cash payment to a student at DHS was $44.71. Compare the following "HPHS 2009 Book Buy Back Ending Cash Report" with the "Fiscal Report" above to see the difference in average price per book. This also shows the lackadaiscal and inconsistent manner in which cash reports were prepared. 

 

This strange discrepancy was equivalent in 2010 and 2011. The submitted “Fiscal Reports” confirm that the average HPHS book was worth $32.45, while the average DHS book was $46.14.  In 2011, HPHS books averaged $32.72 while DHS books averaged $41.82. Why the consistent disparity? There are several possibilities.

Also, why were there no receipts for the books, or if there were, why were they discarded? Parents like to account for how their children spend money. They might have desired a receipt. Does anyone remember receiving one for the book buy-back? Also, while there was a mention in one document that claimed there was an inventory list for the (approx.) 6,000 books a year District 113 acquired, this list was not made available in the FOIA research done by some interested residents. Were these books purchased the next year by seniors? For cash? So many unanswered, serious monetary questions. Where was the School Board, and president Ken Fishbain during this time?

How is it that these issues at District 113 first came to my attention? In 2014, several concerned residents contacted me, seeking assistance, about financial issues in the district and, in particular, the ginormous "petty cash" checks. (While I am an attorney, I am not representing anyone in any of these issues, but I am a concerned resident.) Like most of us in this District, this was the first I had heard of hundreds of thousands of dollars being handled in cash. As a former bank teller in my college days, I found this of great concern and worth further inquiry. Frankly, I found it unbelievable until these residents provided me with documentation. Some residents had already complained to no avail to the School Board, as well as prominent local politicians at City Hall in Highland Park and with the Village of Deerfield. After reviewing the supporting documentation, it seemed best to reach out to Mike Nerheim, the Lake County State's Attorney. Perhaps the State's Attorney's office could provide some light on the subject or would be interested in inquiring further about the use of large cash sums in the management of public funds.

In January 2015, a concerned Highland Park resident and I met with Kenneth W. LaRue, the Chief of the Special Investigations Unit. Much to my surprise, we were informed that there had been a previous investigation of the book buy-back program's use of cash and "petty cash." (I don't know who reported the matter but would like to thank him/her/them.) The original investigator assigned to the matter also attended this meeting. LaRue later informed me that “the information discovered [in the previous investigation] by our office resulted in the conclusion that while the book buyback program was a terribly disorganized and poorly regulated operation with no oversight, there was no provable criminal conduct.”  He further added, “Although the sloppiness may have been intentionally constructed to disguise criminal behavior, based upon the evidence that we have reviewed, we cannot prove criminal intent due to the lack of documentation, poor accounting and use of cash.” 
Unfortunately, there was no second investigation into the new information I provided the State’s Attorney. LaRue said that the statute of limitations for fraud and other criminal actions had passed. LaRue and the investigator also confirmed in our meeting that they had not noted the disparity between the value in books between the HPHS and DHS book buy-back program sales in their previous investigation, though it was clearly evident in the reports I submitted for their review.

There is a record of emails between Bolek and the Lake County State’s Attorney’s office. It may be reasonably inferred that the School Board was aware of the previous investigation -- this would include Small, Hymen and Fishbain. Were Deerfield and Highland Park residents advised of the State’s Attorney’s investigation? In what manner did the School Board step up in response to this investigation? Did the Chicago Tribune, Highland Park News or other local papers or media ever report on this investigation?

Perhaps the only thing that the School Board did right was to put an end to the cash buy-back program in 2012. Yet, a School Board that claims transparency and holds itself accountable to residents should have advised the residents about the State's Attorney's investigation. Also, it should have initiated an independent, third party review and audit to account for the use of cash in 2009-2011, as well as the preceding years.

Did the School Board hold anyone accountable for this monumental lack of control over district finances? We don’t know. There were were two people – one was a CPA – who reported to Bolek and who endorsed various "petty cash" checks for cash. It remains astonishing to me that anyone was willing to accept the assignment of picking up more than a third of a million dollars in cash. That is something many of us would have declined because of the obvious risks. In any event, both of them are no longer with District 113. We do not know if they were terminated or if they just left the district for their own personal reasons, but it is reasonable to assume that they were not held accountable for this cash practice.

On the other hand, Barry Bolek, whose primary responsibility was to manage and protect the District’s finances, does not appear to have been held accountable in any way for the cavalier use of of the "petty cash" and its account. To the contrary, Bolek went on to enjoy a very long career with District 113. The Board rewarded him with substantial pay increases every year until he retired in 2018. His online bio refers to his position as “Assistant Superintendent for Finance, Facilities, Operations, and Transportation.” In other words, he was entrusted with even more responsibility, including the supervision of $120.4 million of improvements as the result of the divisive referendums in 2011 and 2013. In 2017, Bolek was listed as the 6^th highest paid public servant in education in Lake County per the Lake County Gazette.

Neither Bolek nor the School Board, individually or as a board, has ever been held accountable for what took place in 2009-2011. Without a thorough, independent, third-party investigation, into the administration's practices, as well as the School Board's conduct, it is impossible to tell whether the use of "petty cash" was caused by incompetence or design. 

Is the current School Better better than the one in place during 2009-2011? Draw your own conclusions. In August 2017, I requested a meeting that was held in the office of the new superintendent, Dignam. The president of the School Board, Michele Culver, was there, as well. Also participating in the discussion was Gerald Meister, a concerned Highland Park resident who has been rebuffed and insulted many times by the School Board over the years for complaining about the misuse of School District finances.

Culver and Dignam listened politely to my detailed report about Bolek’s financial management during 2009-2011 and the failure of the Board to address the problem. They were given all the documentation included with this article and more. I requested that all the information be delivered to the full School Board and offered to meet with them. While Culver and Dignam thanked me for sharing the information, they never provided any follow up whatsoever. Not even a "thank you." To this day, I don't know what they did with all this information. This meeting took place many months before Bolek retired with his substantial retirement package. 

The same School Board that was given the information, and who failed to even respond to me based on the facts, just appointed Ken Fishbain to join them. 

District 113 will be doomed to a "do-nothing” effete board unless and until Deerfield and Highland Park residents rise up and demand transparency and accountability. As a District, we cannot allow the School Board to go on like this forever, underperforming and playing musical chairs, recycling board members when convenient. We must demand better and hold School Board members, administrators and staff accountable. We will have the School Board we deserve.

We simply cannot afford to elect people who are not up to the challenge, who do not represent the residents. We cannot ignore the importance of our votes for School Board, and the necessity for monitoring the board, without reaping the repercussions. We cannot allow our School Board to go back for the future with decisions made in closed sessions. More than two-thirds of your real estate tax dollars is devoted to our school districts. Mismanagement of funds not only puts our children’s education in peril, it impacts our personal and community finances.

We need a School Board comprised of different people. It's time to step up and find new candidates who will take on these responsibilities with integrity and vigor, preferably not from the insular political groups of who usually put forth and endorse candidates in our communities, preferably  comprised of diverse people who understand the importance of financial controls and governance, and who have a better compass for the future of our communities and schools.

© Debra Rade
All Rights Reserved

Ravinia Festival’s Cash Cow – Crown Castle – Has Escaped to a Greener Pasture

You probably haven’t read in the Chicago Tribune, or any of the other local newspapers, about the outcome of the residents’ battle at City Hall over the Ravinia Festival Association’s (RFA’s) attempt to build a 1500 sq. ft. structure to house a “head-in” cellular hub for Crown Castle International Corp. – smack dab in the middle of a residential neighborhood. The structure was to provide connectivity for a proposed Distributed Antenna System (DAS) comprised of node antennae to be placed throughout Ravinia Park during concerts – which is still on the table and likely to be passed at the Plan and Design Commission meeting March 15, 2016.  Yet, the cellular hub would be used all year long to provide distribution services to all the major cellular phone providers, such as Verizon, AT&T and Sprint.  Both the RFA and the City of Highland Park asserted that the cellular hub structure was essential for public safety, while the residents in opposition denied this.

Frankly, some of our local newspapers seem determined to prevent residents from accessing news, unless the news has been issued directly from City Hall.  Consider that the Chicago Tribune published an article articulating the City’s support of Ravinia with their headline article, Fixing Ravinia Cell Logjam A Matter of Public Safety, Highland Park Mayor Says the very same day as the October 20, 2015 hearing at the Plan and Design Commission. Published before the meeting, not after. Not a single resident was interviewed for that article.  Yet when residents directly requested that the Tribune investigate and report on the issues further, the response was that this was too complex for the newspaper.  If our small city politics is too complex for the Chicago Tribune, heaven knows how they handle Chicago! 

To be fair, I waited a few weeks since City Hall notified Ravinia’s neighbors by letter about a crucial decision concerning the Ravinia’s proposed cellular hub to see if would be reported in the local press. Their report is simply not happening – likely because the City of Highland Park didn’t furnish the information as a press release – so here is all the news about the Ravinia Festival/Crown Castle Proposal that is fit to print but our local newspapers won’t deliver to you.

*******

In a surprise move, Crown Castle decided to take the “head-in” function – its cellular hub – out of Highland Park. It will lease space at an undisclosed location, according to reports, no new structure is planned. The Ravinia neighbors who fought the Ravinia Festival Assocation (RFA) and the City of Highland Park may claim this as a victory, as surely their tireless work at least resulted in several delays before the HP Plan and Design Commission, extending the process to nearly one full year.  

This is very good news for the Ravinia neighborhood (not to be confused with the Ravinia Neighbors Association that refused to assist the 60+ active Ravinia neighbors who opposed the RFA proposal). This is also a positive outcome for any Highland Parkers who care about Ravinia’s cultural and historic importance, as well as the environment and preserving open spaces.  Yet, overall, this is a monetary loss for Highland Park, and it didn’t have to be that way.  It could have been a win-win resolution if Highland Park had been more sophisticated and strategic. Ultimately, Crown Castle made its own decision without Highland Park.  Who can blame them? After all, providing cellular connectivity to Verizon, Spring, and AT&T is a very lucrative business and every day that cellular hub wasn’t up and running was costing them money – no matter how good the deal was that they struck with the RFA.  

 

The cellular hub never belonged on RFA property for several reasons, not the least of which was the moral, ethical, environmental and, perhaps, legal obligation to support the legacy of the RFA’s major benefactor, Mrs. Elsie Eckstein, who donated all the property subject to certain legal covenants. Without Mrs. Eckstein’s brilliant foresight and generosity, the RFA would likely have ceased to exist long ago.

When Elsie Eckstein gifted this prime and valuable land to the RFA, she prohibited the building of commercial property on it, requiring the new owner to maintain its natural open space as a park. She gave the property a distinct not for profit purpose. She didn’t give the land away so other people could make a profit on it. If that were her intent, the she could have sold the property to developers for residential or commercial purposes.  When Crown Castle abandoned Ravinia, the legacy of Elsie Eckstein was upheld, not by the Ravinia Festival Association, not by City Council, and not by the Ravinia Neighbors Association, but by the neighbors who live around the property.  They actively set out to preserve the unique history of our community, and were vigilant and tireless in defense of Ravinia as it should be.

The departure of Crown Castle is also good news for the neighbors, some of whom live as close as 230 feet (that’s less than a football field away) from where the cellular hub would have been built. Serious noise would have emanated from six five-ton HVAC units in the building, at least half of them running 7/24/365. There was another large noisy generator to be put into place on an outside cement block whenever power would go out.  The City never required Crown Castle to disclose the decibel levels for that generator that could run as long as several days based on past power outages in Highland Park.  It could have been deafening, yet no one protected those residents. Records indicated that neither the City nor the Plan and Design Commission was concerned that the nearest residents would have been subject to, at least, a decibel level equivalent to a living room conversation at all times, night and day. With Crown Castle out of Ravinia, these neighbors will now be able to continue enjoy their backyards and bedrooms without an incessant hum, and their property values will remain intact. They also so not have to worry about being bombarded with additional radiofrequency radiation, although the cellular hub would certainly have been installed according to federal standards. Still, who wants to live next to cellular hub?

What about our public safety problem?  Again good news – the absence of this cellular hub has no impact on safety whatsoever, even though Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering said the DAS structure had to be built as a matter of public safety (see, News from Nancy and Chicago Tribune). Her public safety argument was that on busy RFA nights, later established to be 8-12 nights per year, the cell phone activity of Ravinia’s patrons overwhelms the nearby cell towers, compromising the ability for ambulances to communicate with the Hospital’s emergency room.  (We should note that city’s Fire and Police chiefs were unable to provide any documentation of this at the October 20 hearing, and, if it is so, the residents should be asking them to keep records to support public safety.)  Mayor Rotering reported that she personally approached Ravinia, along with the City Manager and the HP Fire and Police Chiefs, to address these safety concerns. In her press releases, she stated that the DAS system was simply the best solution and “to install the DAS, Ravinia will need to build a new building on its property.”  Not so.

As stated in my report on October 20, 2015, and as I testified at City Hall later that day, it was always clear the “head-in” cellular hub did not need to be on RFA property.  While the cellular hub needs to communicate with the DAS antennae nodes proposed to be placed throughout the entertainment section of Ravinia Park, the cellular hub could be off-site. It’s all about RF – Radio Frequency.  No cords, no cables, just RF. That’s why they call it wireless.

Exactly how far away can a cellular hub be from DAS nodes?  Frankly, I can’t answer that technical question because the City of Highland, the RFA and Crown Castle would never answer that simple question.  I wrote to the City of Highland Park on October 27, 2015 with several important questions, including:

“Technically speaking, how far away can a “head-in building” be from the nodes intended to be placed on Ravinia Festival rooftops and other places at the Park?...What is the farthest from Ravinia that it can be placed and still effectively serve the nodes?”

Months later, with that question and others unanswered, I met with the City Manager and staff on January 4, 2016.  How far away could the cellular hub be? Staff replied that this was unknown but it was asserted that it could not be too far, because it would be difficult to “lay the fiber optic cables.” My reply, “There are none. It’s all about RF – Radio Frequency.”  As I explained to another city leader on October 20, “there are no cables, take a look at your cell phone, it’s the same principle.” After nearly a year of review at the City, no one could answer a very simple question – how far away could the cellular hub be?  

The answer, if given to me in October 2015, would have enabled me to provide assistance to Highland Park in resolving this contentious matter. We could have located other suitable local sites to propose to Crown Castle.  Sites that would not have been on land owned by not for profits who pay no real estate or revenue taxes, such as the RFA.  Sites that might have been on City of Highland Park, District School or Park District property – open real estate that could have been monetized for the betterment of Highland Park.  Or, sites in Highland Park’s commercial buildings where the income earned by Crown Castle from Verizon, AT&T, Sprint could be taxed. Highland Park’s commercial properties need lessees. Whatever the other location, it would be intended to help reduce our tax burden in Highland Park. Crown Castle doesn’t just provide DAS services, it is a Real Estate Investment Trust that monetizes land, and the City of Highland Park should have recognized this.

It seems Crown Castle was the only one who knew how far away from the Ravinia Festival the cellular hub could be built. According to HP City Staff, they don’t know where Crown Castle will be. It wouldn’t be surprising to find it in Glencoe, just south of Lake Cook Road. There is a fine golf course there with a corner for mechanics there.

Unfortunately, City Hall did its utmost to ensure that the RFA, a not for profit organization that pays no real estate or income taxes to the community, would reap the significant financial benefits of the cellular hub. Crown Castle is a substantial REIT, publicly traded on the NYSE:CCI, yet the City of Highland (including its lawyers), along with the RFA, continued to represent at public hearings that a cellular hub providing services to Verizon, AT&T and Sprint was not a commercial endeavor, and that there were no significant zoning issues for placing the cellular hub on property zoned residential.  Indeed, the Highland Park lawyer in attendance on October 20 specified that the Plan and Design Commission could not consider the legal covenants on the land while several other resident lawyers there would argue with that position. Neighbors have been left to wonder what the underlying motivations were in this scenario.  So, another unfortunate outcome from the Ravinia/Crown Castle Proposal is that there are more Ravinia neighbors who have gained a healthy cynicism about the City and Ravinia Festival Association.

To some it appears the leadership of Highland Park was so focused on assisting the Ravinia Festival Association that they neglected to understand either the relevant technology or the commercial opportunity associated with the Crown Castle/RFA proposal.  Crown Castle, the cash cow, has now escaped the barn or, another metaphor, Highland Park failed to see the forest for the trees.  Another community will enjoy the taxes benefits.

The good news, the bad news, and an opportunity lost.

The huge financial burden unfairly placed on Highland Park's older residents...

This blog isn't just about the Master Plan for Storm and Sanitary Sewers. We're talking about real people here -- the residents of Highland Park, adversely impacted by it.  It's about our neighbors, friends, parents, our greater family.  It is about about doing the right thing, and making changes in Highland Park that are good for everyone -- fair for everyone. It's about achieving equitable solutions for the community.  So, let's look at the 46-50 families targeted by the City as the first victims of the Sewer Program (merely on “hiatus”).  If you're new to this blog, this is an inequitable program that put the economic burden on individual residents to pay for improvements to the City of Highland Park's infrastructure -- while other communities, like Downers Grove and Naperville paid for similar programs from their city's coffers (see the AECOM report).

As you may recall, the City of Highland Park (in response to a FOIA request) provided us with an Invoice List of all the residents who were charged and paid HP for “repairs” to their sanitary lateral line in 2008 (the only year that the City actively implemented the Sewer Program). In trying to contact these people and confirm their addresses, we turned to www.whitepages.com.  This site delivers more information than most of us would like – it provided an age range for each search.  So, some informal demographics were gathered in this process, based on limited available information.

Approximately 50% of the people who have paid to date are or were 60 years of age or older.  Indeed, nearly 25% of them were over 70, and, we're sad to report at least two of them, aged 85+ years of age, have died since, leaving widows. 81% of them are older than 50 years of age.  So, let's just say that the targeted residents are in, or are rapidly approaching, their retirement years.  Everyone really needs the money they were forced to part with...and it remains insensitive for Mayor Belsky to claim that the program was put "on hiatus" because the economy took a bad turn.  Talk to any of the people who paid in 2008 and they will tell you the economy was bad when when they paid -- and nobody at City Hall cared.

It further appears that more than 15% of the people moved since paying the City, with two of them formal foreclosures, perhaps precipitated by being forced to pay the City of HP for “repairs” on their private property that they did not need. 

Several people called to thank me for my efforts, the stories they told painted a sad portrait of residents dealing with an unresponsive City Hall that refused to listen to the residents and demanded payments, claiming that the City Code required them to pay for this.  As reported in this blog previously, one of the residents told me distinctly, “They had my back up against a wall, what could I do, but pay?  But I didn’t think it was right.” 

 

A woman called and said she was a "late-in-life" mother, sending two children to college.  The $5000+ she paid is much needed.

Of course, there is the one individual (and you have to read through all the comments on the linked page to identify him) who believes the program is good, thinks he should have paid, thinks you should pay in the future, but (oh, by the way) wants his money back if the City agrees to reimbursement.  To him, we say, if you like paying for repairs to City infrastructure in the thousands of dollars, as opposed to paying a few dollars a year on your taxes, we should just let you remain happy! 

For the everyone else, the face of HP’s City Hall is that of a bully pushing around senior citizen residents, forcing them to pay for something they don’t need, and with money they do need in their retirement years.  “The Code requires you pay, or we will file an enforceable lien against your property.” What can the average resident do when City Hall is telling them this?

I've news for Ctiy Hall.   “The Code” does not require that residents use proprietary technology.  “The Code” does not require residents to use the contractor you select (and we’ll probably never know how Mr. Limardi’s office selected a single source provider, Performance Pipelining, over every other plumbing company in Highland Park, nor why this very same contractor ceased to do the work...).  Further, “the Code” does not require residents to sign an indemnification to protect the City's contractor or the City for the work done at your direction, or your neighbor for the work done by the City's contractor, and it doesn’t require you to fix a sanitary lateral line that isn’t broken and is functioning.  Of course, if City Hall would care to post on this blog "The Code" that requires this, go right ahead...go on record and try to justify the poor decisions of the past.

These residents were bullied and pushed around by City Hall.  City Hall needs to pays them back now, and if they don’t do it soon, with interest.   And, for those of you who haven’t faced this treatment yet, don't assume it isn't your problem. It’s in your personal interest to ensure that the program is taken off of “hiatus” immediately and put down.  If revived, don’t think they passed you by, just because you weren’t in the first wave.  Every house in HP has its sanitary lateral lines rodded from time to time.  They will be waiving “the Code” at you soon enough…

The Big, Dirty, Open Secret

It's the big, dirty, and open secret in Highland Park that our City Hall has flown under the radar. Yes, the topic has been on agendas. Yes, the City's plan has been published. Yet, you just didn't know to pay attention because it was never presented to you with the most salient information. And, you can’t afford not to know about it, unless, of course, you have a spare $10,000 or more and you're eager to contribute it to the City’s infrastructure.

It's the "Master Plan for Storm and Sanitary Sewers" and if you didn't know about it until now, you'd surely find out much later -- and, unfortunately, when it may be too late to right the wrong, when you'll need to write a check, get a loan or have a lien placed against your home by the City of Highland Park. Sadly for some, they may need to sell their homes as a result of being forced out of Highland Park by the Master Plan.

Still, the issue remains under the radar, even though there was a big meeting about it on December 3, 2008, and, again, on December 4, at the Public Works Building, with about 100+ upset residents there. You haven't heard about it in the Highland Park News, dedicated to publishing all news that City Hall provides. Yet, on one day in mid-November, it made a brief appearance in the Chicago Tribune. We send our thanks to Janice McLeran for "raising a stink" about this.

Among those of us who are now in the know, we were introduced to the Master Plan scheme by opening a shocking letter from the City demanding we write a check and make undefined and unnecessary repairs to our lateral sanitary sewers. We're the people in the Highlands, Sunset Park, and Ravinia neighorhoods. Each neighborhood was hit separately at different times. Divide and conquer. You're next...

Yes, the big surprise of the “Master Plan for Storm and Sanitary Sewers” is that you get the bill – a direct invoice to your home. That’s right -- we’re not talking about your taxes paying for improvements to the City of Highland Park’s sewer system. We’re talking about you, personally. You get to open your checkbook twice -- your tax dollars will pay for 20% of the expense of repairing the lateral sanitary lines on your home. You then open the checkbook again to pay the remaining 80% from your savings, the proceeds of a loan, or the City places a lien on your home which could cause the sale of your home, along with your future. City Hall doesn't care where the payment comes from, as long as you're responsible for it.

If you’re thinking there isn't anything wrong with your lateral sanitary line, you're probably wrong. If you ever have your line rodded, the mere existence of those tree roots confirms that your sanitary lateral needs to be lined by a City of HP designated contractor. At least that is what our Public Works Department told us. Like most HP residents living in the Tree City, our home's sanitary line is rodded routinely. The result: we were coerced into paying nearly $5000 after being threatened with the placement of a lien on our home, possibly for 100% of the cost (far more than $5000) unless we agreed to sign various City documents which, at the time, included a requirement to indemnify the contractor and the City for any harm to our property arising from the construction (and we were unable at that time to get requested information about interest or possible foreclosure terms on that lien).

It seems that our City Manager, David Limardi, our Mayor and a majority of City Council came to the conclusion that the City isn’t responsible for its own infrastructure. The fact that the City has grown in density while the storm sewers haven’t been appropriately sized and improved seems to be your personal problem as a homeowner. Clearly, these expenses have not been paid by the developers who have reaped a mighty profit by replacing single family homes with extensive multiple family housing in our fair City.

These expenses fall on you even though your lateral sanitary line may be working fine. City Hall would tell you that your lateral is flooding the City's storm sewers and harming your neighbor. Yet, you know that your lateral isn't flooding anyone. It works fine and services your home. In reality, the perpetrator is the City's storm sewers and the City hasn't even made a dent on its own work in upgrading the storm sewers first.

We know there is a problem with storm sewer management. And, it may be possible that if all of our lateral sanitary lines were repaired there would be less flooding or, at least, less flooding impacted by the sanitary lines (although this assertion remains unclear and unproven by the City). The primary assertion of this blog is that the City should be paying for any infrastructure improvements through the taxes we pay, and from grants, bonds and/or other public funds -- not your checkbook. After all, this is a community-wide issue and the community as a whole needs to be responsible for it. That's why we pay taxes.

It seems that our City leadership is so removed from the realities of living on the North Shore that, not only do they mistakenly think you are supposed to pay for these infrastructure improvements, they think you have this money stashed in your checkbook and are ready to deliver it on demand. The Mayor is proud that, if you can't pay for this from your savings, he has arranged for you take another loan on your property. Consider the effect of taking out another loan on your credit ratings in this rocky or any other economy. Consider what you will not be able to buy for your family. And, for those who can't take on another loan, the Mayor offers another untenable solution -- the City can place a lien on your property. He seems to assume that your mortgage holder won’t mind, that the City won’t charge you interest, and that no foreclosure will ever take place, that you can keep that lien on your property for 50 years. Let's ask Corporation Counsel to share a copy of the City's lien and its terms.

We're working on gathering examples of letters shared between HP residents and the City with regard to the Master Plan.

This first blog entry is to provide some notice of the issues. The Master Plan deserves critical examination in a constructive manner. We hope you will share it with your neighbors. We hope the City will take advantage of the blog to present their point of you. The blog can be a place to start the dialogue. Free and open discourse is an important part of our City's values and our sense of community.

We need to remember that City's Organization Chart places the Citizens of Highland Park at the top of the chart, with Mayor and City Council reporting to us, and the City Manager reporting to the Mayor. As we know with all businesses, it is important to set the proper tone at the top.

To be continued...