If it’s one thing River Forest’s April 1 term limits referendum has generated, it’s talk.
Talk about where the issue currently stands, and what may be the ultimate outcome. There appears to be plenty of uncertainty in both cases.
River Forest resident Phyllis Rubin spoke during the public comment portion of the village board’s July 14 meeting about the issue. Where does she think the issue finally lands?
“Like I have a crystal ball,” she said with a laugh.
The exact wording used in a citizen group’s petition that placed the referendum for the matter on the election ballot has caused confusion about whether that referendum is binding or advisory.
That has led to speculation about motive and both immediate and long-term steps to resolve the issue. For example, when the village board will discuss the matter formally has been part of that speculation.
As of Monday, the matter has not been placed on a regular meeting agenda. A special committee of the whole meeting proved too challenging to schedule in late July or early August.
“Due to scheduling conflicts, we will not have the entire village board present on Aug. 25,” Matt Walsh, village administrator, said Monday. “Accordingly, we will not have term limits on the agenda for that meeting. We want to make sure all board members are present and are working toward finding a date that works.
The matter did not make the July 14 meeting due to a packed agenda.
“I think the board would love to get this back to court,” Rubin said. “Citizens have spent our own money twice to keep this on the referendum. Some citizen challenged the first petition. All of us chipped in to pay the lawyer to help us with this. It was thousands of dollars. We had to defend the position.
“Then we ran out and got the petition signed again. Now they are saying we’re going to ignore it and do nothing. How many times do we have to say we want term limits?”
Another resident, Cary McLean, also spoke during the public comment session July 14. Where does she think the issue is headed?
“I don’t know what they are going to decide,” she said. “I have the feeling it will be on the ballot again. I think it’s a lot on the citizens because they’ve already done that.”
Is the eight-year resident frustrated?
“I guess kind of,” McLean said. “It felt like they put it up for vote, the people who wanted this talked about it, and now it’s, dare I even say, delay, delay, delay.
“The biggest takeaway from my point of view is its volunteer and it’s a lot of time to run the village. I respect volunteer time, but the cavalier attitude about this vote is what frustrated me more.”
Yet another resident, Patty Henek, a former village trustee who ran for board president in 2021 and lost to current president Cathy Adduci, said “we had a free and fair election (and) the majority of River Forest voters voted.”
That should make the issue unambiguous, in her mind. Adduci has said the issue isn’t time-sensitive and that time should be taken to ensure the ultimate decision will stand up under legal scrutiny, not only now but well into the future.
“All that needs to happen now is the village administration update the code,” Henek said. “The question appeared as binding. At this point, I don’t understand what there is to debate. The election results are the election results.”
But where does she see the issue going, in both the near and long term?
“I have no way of answering that,” she said. “I’m not in the heads of board members or the village attorney. I just know from my perspective it was a free and fair election, the voters responded, and this is the result.”
Twenty-one-year resident Ed McDevitt said he thinks there could be another referendum in the future “if this does not get resolved as the will of the people.”
“The general tenor of people who are against the referendum (is), they are stealing our vote away,” he said. “It’s kind of a silly argument. The people I’ve heard against the whole idea didn’t vote. People who didn’t vote and people who didn’t know about it and still don’t know about it.
“If you want term limits, vote the people out. In this village, that’s not going to happen. Things are stacked against that.”