By: Diane Benjamin The approval of a Liquor License was left off the agenda last night. Since the recipient has a Father’s Day event planned, he can’t wait until the next meeting for approval. Therefore the Council is planning a quick meeting whenever they can get 5 aldermen together to approve it. Who dropped the […]
A special 3 minute meeting was just called for later this week. Put approval on that agenda Tari! By: Diane Benjamin The last time the City Council looked at their Secret Meeting minutes, as required by law, they refused to release the old City Manager Tom Hamilton’s performance reviews. In other words, people still […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Pantagraph needs to explain why an alleged Open Meetings Act violation against the McLean County Health Department is so much more important than the one they also reported this week against the City of Bloomington. That story was quickly buried on their website – comments were NEVER allowed. Comments ARE allowed […]
By: Diane Benjamin Today’s edition has a story on the Attorney General’s ruling about the Bloomington City Council violating the Open Meetings Act: http://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/government-and-politics/ill-ag-city-council-violated-open-meetings-law/article_5dfb7bef-4515-52af-96a9-e8fb37c8abb0.html See this story from June 4th: https://blnnews.com/2016/06/04/renner-is-guilty/ Of course the paper’s version contains errors. The AG ruled the “verbatim recording” must be released in addition to the closed session minutes […]
Re-posted only to change how it was originally posted. By: Diane Benjamin The Attorney General finally ruled on the Open Meetings Act Violation filed in 2013 by then Alderwoman Judy Stearns! A couple of weeks I wrote about Madigan’s failure to rule and asked readers to call. https://blnnews.com/2016/05/19/madigan-too-busy/ I know at least a few of […]
By: Diane Benjamin Some points of law are never settled because government refused to act. Lisa Madigan’s Public Access office is doing just that. Remember many years ago when Judy Stearns filed a complaint against Tari Renner for violating the Open Meetings Act? It was right after he got elected. He decided winning an election […]
By: Diane Benjamin The next meeting of the CIRA (Central Illinois Regional Airport) Board of Commissioners is May 10th. Since the April meeting, Minutes for January-March have been posted on their website: http://www.cira.com/ See the bottom of “About CIRA” If you missed previous stories, CIRA was violating the Open Meetings Act by not posting meeting […]
By: Diane Benjamin I wonder why nobody ever noticed CIRA was violating the Open Meetings Act? Illinois has a HUGE problem with too many units of government, the Central Illinois Regional Airport being just one. Since I didn’t want to FOIA them every month for information or just be on their email list, I filed […]
By: Diane Benjamin Even though the Open Meetings Act calls for approving and posting minutes within 30 days, Bloomington finally has approving the minutes from 9/21/2015 on Monday’s agenda. Law: Why was the law not followed? Maybe because this is the meeting where the 1% Sales tax increase was rushed through. Maybe they don’t want […]
By: Diane Benjamin According to this Pantagraph article: http://www.pantagraph.com/business/local/olson-gets-contract-extension/article_c3a51735-c4ad-5cda-853b-7704ebcffb8a.html – the Executive Director of the airport (Carl Olson) just got a 2.5% raise. It also states he was earning $172,365 per year. The article is a glowing endorsement of the great job he is doing. Funny, because in January the Pantagraph also reported traffic was down […]
By: Diane Benjamin On November 12th I wrote about the illegal time change for the Allin Township Fire Protection District meeting: http://blnnews.com/2015/11/12/illegal-meeting-allin-tfpd/ The minutes from the meeting show people did show up late. Were they expecting the meeting to be at the regular time of 7:00 pm? See the minutes below. The time wasn’t the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Last night the trustees for the Allin Township Fire Protection District held a meeting at the fire station. It started at 6:00pm. The problem is the meetings always start at 7:00. The Open meetings Act requires 10 days notice of a meeting change. Starting an hour earlier than normal is a […]
By: Diane Benjamin Don’t miss the update: http://blnnews.com/2015/11/04/more-on-the-illegal-meeting/ Today an illegal meeting was held at City Hall. David Hales has divided the Council into groups of three to meet on various issues. Instead of being open and transparent by discussing City business at City Council meetings, they are meeting with no public notification as required […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Open Meetings Act is law to prevent government officials from colluding among themselves where citizens can’t see the process of reaching decisions. Here is the opening text of the law: http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs3.asp?ActID=84&ChapterID=2 (5 ILCS 120/1) (from Ch. 102, par. 41) Sec. 1. Policy. It is the public policy of this State that […]
Tomorrow’s meeting doesn’t say cancelled but the agenda for the other meeting got changed! “Assoc” used to be a shorter abbreviation. Use your imagination. By: Diane Benjamin On the City of Bloomington calendar for tomorrow is a Property Maintenance Board of Review meeting. Since no agenda has been posted 48 hours in advance – […]
By: Diane Benjamin Action can’t be taken on any items not publicized 48 hours prior to a meeting. You could decide to double salaries in Executive Session, then vote in open session without anybody knowing it until it’s done. That’s why the OMA exists. I see you finally got the “Any Other New Business” right! […]
By: Diane Benjamin I’ve heard for years that Executive Sessions are secret. Council members have been threatened with censure if they talk about anything said behind closed doors. The threats are illegal! Local government has used threats because either they don’t know the law or they want to keep information from the public. Read what the […]
by: Diane Benjamin Laws are only for us little people, not the guys sucking your tax money. In another episode of releasing Executive Session (Secret Meetings) minutes, this gem was obtaining under the Freedom of Information Act: h/t JS From October 10, 2011 The Executive Session was called to order at 5:02 p.m. Mayor Stockton cited […]
Saturday has now been cancelled. Who is going to show up at Mondays Council meeting or the Mayor’s open house tomorrow and ask how much money he wasted? Is he going to apologize for wasting money? by: Diane Benjamin Laws matter to you, not to government. See this previous post with Mayor Renner’s certificate for […]
Make sure you read the comments to this story at Blnnews.com (Especially McLean County!) by: Diane Benjamin McLean County has forgotten they work for us. Taxpayers are merely their piggy bank. On September 30, the Attorney General’s Public Access Office issued a BINDING opinion against the County public comment policy. Normally the AG just writes […]
This event received NATIONAL coverage on Breitbart.com http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/05/16/Exclusive-Citizens-Arrest-Park-District-Board-for-Breaking-Law On Tuesday, around 30 citizens attended a meeting of the Clark County, IL Park District Board. Most wished to address the board over several recent controversies and allegations of corruption. In the face of this, the board said a public comment period wasn’t on the agenda and quickly […]
Really. The Most Transparent Governor Ever? 81% Failure Rate- State Executives Ignore Open Meeting Law Leaders of state agencies, Gov. Quinn’s appointed executives failed to comply with mandatory Open Meeting Act training or blatantly ignored our request to review their certifications. 100% Failure Rate at 17 top Agencies Freedom of Information Officer Certification […]
by: Diane Benjamin All of the following information was obtained under the Freedom of Information Act from the Attorney General’s Public Access Office. In November, when Alderwoman Stearns walked out of an Executive Session because she thought the discussion violated the Open Meetings Act, Mayor Renner all but called her accusations a joke. Let’s review. […]
by: Diane Benjamin Springfield had severe problems with Open Meeting Act violations and failure to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests before Todd Greenburg became the City Corporate Council. I think they called the latest Shred-Gate after some local officials decided to destroy evidence. In case you forgot, Greenburg formerly worked for the City […]
by: Diane Benjamin The Illinois Open Meetings Act isn’t very long. At times it repeats itself, which makes it even shorter. No matter how many times complaints are filed against the City of Bloomington for violating it, City staff and elected officials evidently have never read it or they make no effort to comply with […]
by: Diane Benjamin Violating the Open Meetings Act is serious. There wasn’t a “dust-up” as Steve Vogel called it in the Pantagraph. If the Attorney General finds the Executive Session didn’t comply with the law, the entire Council will be blamed-minus Alderwoman Stearns who walked out. The Illinois Open Meetings Act (OMA) is designed to […]
See this update: http://blnnews.com/2013/12/20/mayor-formerly-transparent-renner-sinks-himself/ by: Diane Benjamin Surprise! This time I didn’t file it – Alderwoman Judy Stearns did. About a month ago the Bloomington City Council had a 2 day retreat. As part of the retreat the Council met in executive session. Executive session means in secret, the public isn’t allowed to […]
by Diane Benjamin From Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s website: http://foia.ilattorneygeneral.net/default.aspx Attorney General Lisa Madigan believes that an open, honest and accountable government, the cornerstone of a democracy, can be achieved only through the free and open exchange of information between government and the public. In Illinois, our most important transparency laws – the Freedom of Information […]
The State’s Attorney has sent a letter to the Library Board asking them to explain the allegations of the September 4th meeting that violated the Open Meetings Act. See this story for details: http://blnnews.com/2013/09/05/the-illegal-library-board-meeting/
A Pantagraph reporter stopped a Dewitt County Board meeting because the board failed to post the agenda 48 hours before the meeting as required by the Open Meetings Act. Good for them. The meeting was illegal. The question is when did the Pantagraph decide laws matter? A reporter attended an illegal board meeting at the […]
by Diane Benjamin When I filed the latest Open Meetings Act violation against the Library Board (http://blnnews.com/2013/09/05/the-illegal-library-board-meeting/), I made it clear to the Attorney General’s Office that 2 previous Open Meetings Act violations were still outstanding – one from over a year ago. What good does having a State Office charged with protecting the citizens […]
by: Diane Benjamin Yesterday at 4:30pm around 7 members of the Bloomington Library Board met illegally. The Open Meetings Act requires all meetings to be posted in advance and open to the public. The agenda must also be posted. The only reason the Pantagraph and WJBC attended was because they were tipped off to the […]
A third Open Meetings Act violation is now being investigated by the Attorney General’s Office. The first 2 are being handled by the Chicago Office, this one is being handled by Springfield. I spoke to Matthew Sebek. Bloomington admitted guilt in emails, so they have no defense. He plans to issue a ruling before the April 9th election. […]
by Diane Benjamin This is the 2nd investigation, even though the State’s Attorney’s Office hasn’t made a decision on the first investigation. Here is a link to the first investigation: http://blnnews.com/2012/07/18/city-of-bloomington-investigated-for-violation-of-the-open-meetings-act/ The only response available for why it is taking them so long is: Thank you for contacting the Public Access Bureau. You requested an […]
Byline: Stanley Wonder Would it be too much to ask why some of our Bloomington aldermen are taking “road trips” to observe other City Councils? The Pantagraph recently reported on a possible Open Meetings Act violation when four of them plus the Mayor trucked off to the Peoria meeting and met privately to talk city […]
