City of DeKalb has been paying compensation to at least two of its advisory commissions without proper authorization. Members of the Planning & Zoning Commission (P&Z) and the Board of Fire and Police Commissioners both receive what look like meeting per diems in the expenditure records. But it turns out the payments aren’t properly authorized…
Tag: city council
We could strengthen open meetings laws by plugging the ‘walking quorum’ loophole
I decided to find out more about Sycamore’s new city manager (who comes to us from Wisconsin) and ended up adding to my vocabulary. A ‘walking quorum’ is a series of gatherings among separate groups of members of a governmental body, each less than quorum size, who agree, tacitly or explicitly, to act uniformly in…
Addressing DeKalb Public Library’s proposed 14%-plus levy increase
During DeKalb’s public hearing on its property tax levy, which includes the library’s levy, several people spoke out about the library’s plan to increase its take by more than 14%. They requested the city council hold library trustees accountable for the request, which they view as irresponsible. DeKalb claims that it must approve any levy…
DeKalb planning to ignore existing policies to sideline the clerk’s office once again
City council will take up a proposal tomorrow to appoint the executive assistant as permanent recorder of the meeting minutes. They can’t bar the city clerk from attending meetings and taking minutes, so here’s what they’ve come up with: The follow-on ordinance…will not prevent the Clerk from taking minutes and presenting them, but the Council…
Public officials’ ill-advised campaign contributions
We’ve talked about ethics issues and Bill Nicklas before, in the context of his outside employment, which — shamefully — the city council has so far failed to address. Now we see Mr. Nicklas, DeKalb city manager since the beginning of 2019, has been making political contributions to Illinois Representative Jeff Keicher. (“Report Received Date”…
A case for redistricting DeKalb from scratch
DeKalb’s recipe for seven wards and seven aldermen is not written in stone, and it hasn’t always looked like this. For example, the city used to have at-large aldermen. We can change it again if we assemble the political will. My aim here is to provoke thoughts about alternatives as DeKalb discusses redistricting work post-Census.…
Nicklas Consulting, LLC
Bill Nicklas, city manager of DeKalb, owns Nicklas Consulting, LLC. I did not know this until I read a complaint in which he is named a defendant. At the time of the discovery, I was the city clerk so I hesitated to address it publicly, especially when thinking of him as an abuser guarantees bias…
How to “lose” TIF documents
***UPDATE 4/8/2021: After writing the original post, I decided to phone the Public Access Counselor (PAC) of the Attorney General’s Office to discuss possible Open Meetings Act implications of the incident described in it. Following the discussion, I filed a Request for Review and today I was notified that the PAC has accepted the request.…
DeKalb city council voted to allow me to participate remotely in order to exclude you
As DeKalb’s city clerk, I’ve been participating in council meetings via teleconferencing since April. Then, during the July 13 committee-of-the-whole meeting, the city council, somewhat bizarrely, took a vote to allow me to teleconference. This post will explain why. Here’s the clip of part of the mayor’s introduction to the topic. (The first 4-1/2 minutes…
How red do the flags have to be?
The DeKalb city council recently received and filed its fiscal 2019 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) along with the auditor’s letters and communications to council and management. Although the audit was problematic, the council did not talk about the issues, so we will do it here. First, to summarize: The auditor detected material misstatements in…