By: Diane Benjamin
I wrote this story about the Rules Committee meeting, but there is more to the story: https://blnnews.com/2024/02/09/what-happened-at-the-county-rules-committee-meeting/
Besides Democrats attempting to weaponize the County Board against Republicans, numerous other changes were presented. Most were discarded because Republicans objected to their nonsense.
Now we know why this meeting is not on video! Democrats don’t want you to see the dirty trick they played about around 1 hour and 42 minutes into the meeting. The audio can’t be scrolled like a video can. If you listen on a cell phone it’s slightly easier to scroll: https://mcleancountyil.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/10027
For most of the meeting 3 Democrats and 3 Republicans were present. Right before 1:42:00 George Wendt left the meeting. Democrat Val Laymon then made an illegal motion to reconsider the earlier failed rule changes. Of course Democrats voted for them 3-2. (Keep reading for why the motion was illegal)
Next the Executive Committee considered what the Rules Committee illegally passed including changes to the Public Comment Policy which does comply with the law. (Still needs revised if the Board actually cares – keep reading)
Since the only option available to the Executive Committee was to approve or discard all the proposed changes, they were discarded. I don’t know why a motion couldn’t have been made to separate to proposed changes.
The Rules Committee will have to meet again – this time the Republicans need to make sure it is on video!
Meanwhile, the County Public Comment policy remains illegal. Thank the Democrats.
The Executive Committee meeting is on YouTube with audio only. The screen claims technical difficulties.🙄
Jackie Beyer makes a Public Comment at the beginning. She’s not happy with some items presented by the Rules Committee, particularly Public Comment and remote participation by Board members. At 6:47 she states why the Laymon motion to reconsider was illegal!
Listen starting at 16:00 for the vote on the proposed rules. It was a tie therefore failed.
Republicans could have proposed an amendment to just keep one rule change. Don’t know why they didn’t.
Me either
So could have the Democrats. Rules Subcommittee chair Johnston presented each rule amendment separately for vote at Rules. The public comment rule amendments received a unanimous vote at Rules, even after Member Cline made additional changes. Then at Exec, Johnston presented the packet as a whole. Erickson specifically said that he supported the public comment rule changes, but if he had to vote on the packet as a whole, then he would have to say “no”. No one said it could be voted on in pieces. Obviously, the Republicans were not going to vote on a packet that included changes that the Democrats undid by their illegal motion to reconsider. If the Democrats really cared, the public comment rule amendments should have been presented to Rules as a sole amendment. Instead they chose to hijack the public comments rule changes in order to push their own agenda. The other items could have been brought forward another day. As it is, now everything is delayed.
So the reason Erickson didn’t propose an amendment is because Democrats didn’t first? Come on. Look. We want to win. We can’t be lazy.
The point was neither side did.
Yeah, that’s fishy. Erickson has been saying he didn’t want this change. And now, instead of taking a piece of whatever rules (which is an option), he sits on his hands and says “not my fault”! And instead of holding his feet to the fire, you blame Democrats only. As in your title.
Everyone agreed to the public comment changes at the rules committee
Not what I am saying. I’m just saying it goes both ways.
If there was a motion by a Rep to amend the packet, the entire packet would have failed anyway because the Dems would not be willing to change the remote attendance rules that they won by cheating.
The Dems wouldn’t make a motion to amend because the packet was how they wanted it.
An option to vote on each amendment separately, which Chuck tried to get clarification, was not offered. I believe Chair Johnston could have presented the amendments to be voted on separately like she did in Rules, but she didn’t. And she didn’t ask for a motion to do so.
If the Dems never attached any partisan crap, the public comment amendments should have passed, as there was unanimous bipartisan support at Rules.
I am not sure how it all works, but Johnston has moved it forward to go back to Rules.
What was the partisan crap that was attached? If I remember correctly, last year Chuck Erickson voted against amendments to changing the public comment rules.
County was forced before to change it, republicans did make the changes illegal
What did the democraps attach to the rules?
It’s in the linked document. The worst was attending remotely.
Daffy libtard demonrat (D)women screwing with the rules to gain partisan advantage – so disingenuous , so self serving , so typical.
This is exactly why the board did not entrust her with the chairmanship.
All 3 of these toxic socialist womyn are little more than drama queens.
…extraneous rule changes … just because.
They hate you.