CC Agenda-5/8/2012

[Ted]

  Looks like the most interesting items on the city council agenda are $93K in TIF money for Riddles Comedy Club in the Depot District; $79K loan to Benny's Pizza on 26th street to pay off its mortgage and an Agreement with Morton College to allow the Morton College Baseball team to use Janura Park.

Also, Shrugger resigned from the Berwyn Historical Preservation Commission. Appointments of Michael Plummer and Michael De Rouin to the BHPC and appointment of Steve Brantley to the Library Board.



                 BERWYN CITY COUNCIL MEETING
                         MAY 8, 2012

DEAR ATTENDEE.....THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL WELCOME YOU. PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT THIS IS A MEETING OF THE MAYOR AND COUNCIL MEMBERS AS OPPOSED TO A PUBLIC HEARING WHERE ATTENDEES ARE ENCOURAGED TO PARTICIPATE. UNLESS INVITED BY THE MAYOR TO SPEAK, YOU ARE REQUESTED NOT TO INTERRUPT. IF YOU ARE RECOGNIZED BY THE MAYOR, PLEASE PREFACE YOUR REMARKS BY STATING YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS FOR THE RECORD. THANK YOU.
ROBERT J. LOVERO                          THOMAS J. PAVLIK
MAYOR                                                   CITY CLERK
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AGENDA
ROLL CALL
(A) PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE - MOMENT OF SILENCE

(B) OPEN FORUM - (TOPIC MUST NOT BE ON THE AGENDA)

(C) PRESENTATION OF PREVIOUS MEETINGS MINUTES FOR APPROVAL
1. REGULAR MEETING 4/10/12-COW-4/10/12

(D) BID OPENING–TABULATIONS

(E) BERWYN DEVELOPMENT CORP.-BERWYN TOWNSHIP/HEALTH DISTRICT
1. BDC-TIP APPLICATION-RIDDLES COMEDY CLUB, 6910 WINDSOR AVE.
2. BDC-BENNY'S PIZZA LOAN APPLICATION-6800/6810 W. 26TH STREET
3. BDC-ROUTE 66 CAR SHOW AND RESOLUTION-CLOSURE OF OGDEN AND MUSIC & ART IN THE STREET-CLOSURE OF STREETS IN DEPOT DISTRICT

(F) REPORTS AND COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE MAYOR
1. PROCLAMATION-JASON ROSADO AND JENNIFER CHHATLANI DAY
2. PROCLAMATION-NATIONAL PRESERVATION MONTH
3. LIBRARY BOARD APPOINTMENT
4. BHPC APPOINTMENTS AND REAPPOINTMENTS

(G) REPORTS AND COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE CITY CLERK

(H) COMMUNICATIONS FROM (ZONING) BOARD OF APPEALS

(I) REPORTS AND COMMUNICATIONS FROM ALDERMEN, COMMITTEES OTHER BOARDS AND COMMISSIONS

(J) STAFF REPORTS
1. FIRE CHIEF O'HALLORAN-APPOINTMENT OF BATTALION CHIEF FOR THE FIRE PREVENTION-LT. MARIO MANFREDINI
2. FIRE CHIEF O'HALLORAN-PERMISSION TO BEGIN THE PROCESS OF PROMOTION FOR THE CAPTAIN'S FOR THE TRAINING OFFICE
3. FIRE CHIEF O'HALLORAN-PERMISSION TO BEGIN THE PROCESS OF PROMOTION FOR THE VACATED POSITION OF LIEUTENANT
4. FIRE CHIEF O HALLORAN-PERMISSION TO BEGIN THE PROCESS FOR A REPLACEMENT FIREFIGHTER/PARAMEDIC DUE TO THE SENIORITY PROMOTION
5. FIRE CHIEF-FIRE PUP PROGRAM 2012
6. CITY ATTORNEY-SETTLEMENT OF CASE NO.11-CV-2167
7. CITY ATTORNEY-INTERGOVERNMENTAL AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE MORTON
COLLEGE, COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT NO. 527 AND THE CITY OF BERWYN

(K) CONSENT AGENDA: ALL ITEMS ON THE CONSENT AGENDA ARE CONSIDERED TO BE ROUTINE IN NATURE AND WILL BE ENACTED IN ONE MOTION. THERE WILL BE NO SEPARATE DISCUSSION OF THESE ITEMS UNLESS A COUNCIL MEMBER SO REQUESTS, IN WHICH EVENT THE ITEM WILL BE REMOVED FROM THE CONSENT AGENDA AND CONSIDERED AS THE FIRST ITEM AFTER APPROVAL OF THE CONSENT AGENDA
1. BUDGET CHAIR-PAYROLL-4/25/12-$953,318.16
2. BUDGET CHAIR-PAYABLES-5/8/12-$676,361.51
3. MAYOR-CONCLUSION OF A LIQUOR HEARING PROCEEDING, WINGS FIRE HOUSE, INC., 6535 CERMAK ROAD.
4. COLLECTIONS AND LICENSING PERMITS-APRIL, 2012
5. SKRYD-HANDICAP SIGN-Z. BONILLA-2227 RIDGELAND AVE.-APPROVE
6. SKRYD-HANDICAP SIGN-J. SPROVIERI-2429 EAST AVE.-APPROVE
7. SKRYD-HANDICAP SIGN-J. SCOTELLA-6549 W. 28TH ST.-APPROVE
8. SANTOY-HANDICAP SIGN-N. ALVA-2129 HIGHLAND AVE.-APPROVE
9. POLASHEK-HANDICAP SIGN-D. KOENING-1518 EUCLID AVE.-APPROVE
10. ILLINOIS YOUTH CLUB, INC.-FUND-RAISING-5/11, 5/12/12
ITEMS SUBMITTED ON TIME 25

______________________________
THOMAS J. PAVLIK - CITY CLERK
In accordance with the provisions of the Americans with disabilities Act, any individual who is in the need of a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in or benefit from attendance at a public meeting of the City of Berwyn should contact Thomas J. Pavlik, City Clerk at 708/788-2660 as soon as possible before the meeting date.

[buzz]

6. CITY ATTORNEY-SETTLEMENT OF CASE NO.11-CV-2167

I always wonder about these.  They just pop up, then mysteriously disappear.

Anyone know, are we still in litigation with those meth people ?

[HKay]

Does Meshell Taylor ring any bells? If this is the case it seems like the city lawyers just cost us some of our hard earned money...

http://www.abisoft.org/opinions/2011/1_11-cv-02167_20110518.pdf

But what City's counsel has done now is really impermissible--instead of counsel conformingto the clear Rule 8(b)(5) roadmap, she has replaced all of thedisclaimers contained in the original Answer by flat-out denialsof Taylor's allegations. Just how, pray tell, can City claim tohave derived knowledge as to the asserted lack of truth ofTaylor's allegations in the short time that has intervened
between the original Answer and the current filing?

Pleading in the federal system should be regarded as serious business, not as a pro forma exercise. That is why Rule 11 imposes an obligation of both subjective and objective good faith on every federal filer. Here it is abundantly clear that some of the matters that Taylor alleges are beyond City's ken, so that no good-faith outright denial can be advanced.

[HKay]

http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/04/01/35440.htm

Mother Complains Over Treatment on 'COPS'
By IULIA FILIP

     CHICAGO (CN) - A mother says police officers in a Chicago suburb arrested her while she was half dressed, with "reality TV" cameras rolling, jailed her for a day and tried to make her sign a release to show her arrest on the TV show "COPS" - after her son was accused of driving without a license.
     Meshell Taylor sued the City of Berwyn, five Berwyn police officers and "COPS" producers Langley Productions.
     Taylor says Berwyn police and members of the Great Lakes Fugitive Task Force surrounded her home at 6 a.m. on Aug. 31, 2009, TV cameras rolling, to arrest her and her older son, Kentrell Taylor.
     This was 3 months after Taylor's older son had been pulled over for driving without a license, valid registration or proof of insurance.
     During the May 2009 arrest, Kentrell Taylor had used his younger brother's name. The charges against Taylor's younger son, who is not named in the complaint, were dropped after the police realized he was not the person they had arrested.
     In her federal complaint, Taylor says that on Aug. 31, "Unknown officers entered plaintiff's neighbor's yards, damaging fencing and even threatening to shoot her neighbor's dog."
     She says her children, who were outside, "were surrounded by Berwyn [police] and unknown officers pointing guns at them. They were also surrounded by camera crews with lights and operational video equipment actively filming Kentrell Taylor's arrest."
     The officers "told plaintiff's children they had a warrant for plaintiff's arrest and threatened to break down the door to their home if plaintiff did not come outside," Taylor says.
     "Plaintiff, who was in bed asleep inside her home received a frantic call on her cell phone from her daughter informing her that the police were pointing guns at Kentrell and that they were threatening to break down their front door, claiming to have a warrant," the complaint states.
     "Panicked, plaintiff ran outside barefoot and wearing only a T-shirt and transparent pajama pants." She saw "multiple police officers yelling and running around her son with bright lights and cameras filming the scene."
     She says: "An unknown officer approached plaintiff and asked if she was Meshell Taylor, as the camera crews filmed her, without her permission. When she answered, she was placed in handcuffs. This unknown officer searched plaintiff's person and handled plaintiff with unnecessary force, jerking her arms and back and forth for the benefit of the television audience. Plaintiff told him she had a back injury and asked him to stop treating her so roughly, and he told her that she was a criminal and that she should have thought of that before she committed her crimes. Plaintiff asked what crimes he was talking about, but he did not reply."
     The officers refused her requests to let her get dressed, Taylor says.
     Police took her to a parking lot in Berwyn, where an "unknown agent approached plaintiff, who was seated in the back of the police car, and attempted to convince her to sign a release form for both herself and her son John Doe, which would allow Defendant Langley to use the footage of Kentrell and Plaintiff's arrests on the television show 'COPS.' Plaintiff refused.
     "Plaintiff, still barefoot and in her pajamas, was then taken to the Berwyn Police station, where she was to remain for the next twenty-four hours."
     Taylor says she spent the next day "shivering and cold, and embarrassed by being half dressed in a public place. Plaintiff was not allowed to get dressed or cover herself until sometime the following day."
     "While in custody, Berwyn officers interrogated plaintiff and her older son Kentrell Taylor, attempting to extract a statement showing that plaintiff knew it was her older son Kentrell Taylor, and not her younger son John Doe, who had been arrested on May 20, 2009. Plaintiff refused to admit this, since it was not true," Taylor says.
     Taylor says the police continued to pressure her to sign the "COPS" release form and that "one or more Berwyn officers indicated that the criminal case would go easier for her if she signed the release."
     She was finally released after more than 30 hours in custody. She says police falsely charged her with felony obstruction of justice, of which she was cleared in an October 2010 trial.
     Taylor says that after she was freed from jail, officers showed up repeatedly at her house, and attended some of her court appearances, pressuring her to sign the release form.
     She says she refused every time, but her older son did sign the release.
     "It is unknown at this time if any portion of plaintiff's arrest has been broadcast during an episode of the 'COPS' television show," she says.
     Taylor says the police arrested and searched her with excessive force, without a warrant and without probable cause. She seeks damages for false arrest, conspiracy, malicious prosecution and infliction of emotional distress.
     She is represented by Torreya Hamilton of Chicago.

[Ted]

 The proposed settlement is for $27,000.  I think the meth owners were asking for more than that, so I don't think it is that case.

  Hkay, the middle letters are "CV", which I believe would mean it is a case in the Cook County court system.  The case you refer to in your post is a federal court case (although, it may be the case that the federal court system has the same numbering system.)

  FYI, if you go to the Clerk of the Circuit Court website and search on defendent Berwyn, you will see numerous cases involving the city of Berwyn or people in Berwyn (including a recent case involving a Berwyn alderman).

  You can also search on individual case numbers.  The "11" in the case on the agenda is year 2011. CV is the type of case (I think CV means civil) and the last digits represent the individual case number.  Sometimes, you have to put zeros before or after the number.

[buzz]

After I posted here I did some unsuccessful searches using combos of "Berwyn" and "CV" and it looks like the CV indeed means civil but it is used in othere States as well.
I found 1 bummer reference to the meth people (on Eriksen's Brick) from Oct. 2011 about poor behavior by the city's attorneys while in court.  That poster claims one attorney was asleep while another was texting.  That web-site does give an excellent recap/timeline of all the events and people involved in the hoax.

[SimplyBerwyn]

After I posted here I did some unsuccessful searches using combos of "Berwyn" and "CV" and it looks like the CV indeed means civil but it is used in othere States as well.
I found 1 bummer reference to the meth people (on Eriksen's Brick) from Oct. 2011 about poor behavior by the city's attorneys while in court.  That poster claims one attorney was asleep while another was texting.  That web-site does give an excellent recap/timeline of all the events and people involved in the hoax.

Does former Ald. Erickson really have any credibility?

[buzz]

Although most of what I read was clearly driven by vendetta, his accounting of the events leading up to the demonstration and the lawsuit, including the involvement of Skyrd, Lovero, and Chapman was pretty factual.  Judge for yourself.
 
http://www.berwynbrick.com

[Cathy]

From Berwyn Life today:  (just a clip from the article)

Berwyn, IL —

A federal judge in Chicago's U.S. District Court ordered the city of Berwyn to allow a controversial methadone clinic to open at 6201 Cermak Road in a ruling today.

Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman ruled on the case, filed in 2008, in which Berwyn residents Elizabeth Buonauro and her husband, Sal Sotille, sued the city after it denied a zoning permit for a methadone clinic in 2008 and denied the clinic a business license in April 2011.

[SimplyBerwyn]

The complete article....

A federal judge in Chicago's U.S. District Court ordered the city of Berwyn to allow a controversial methadone clinic to open at 6201 Cermak Road in a ruling today.

Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman ruled on the case, filed in 2008, in which Berwyn residents Elizabeth Buonauro and her husband, Sal Sotille, sued the city after it denied a zoning permit for a methadone clinic in 2008 and denied the clinic a business license in April 2011.

The Berwyn City Council initially voted to allow the clinic to open on July 8, 2008, by a 4-2 vote, but after a public outcry at a rally led by then-mayor Michael O'Connor, the city unanimously reversed that decision on July 22.


Buonauro and her husband had intended to open the clinic at 3245 Grove Ave., but lost that lease shortly after the City Council denied their zoning permits.

The city later created a new zoning area for such clinics in limited parcels along Harlem Avenue and Cermak Road. In April 2011, Buonauro entered into a lease for a property at 6201 Cermak Road, which was outside the city's new zoning permits for "transitional clinics."

Judge Coleman upheld Buonauro's complaint that the city violated the Americans with Disabilities Act and cited "the city's ongoing discriminatory intent in the zoning decisions at issue," she said in today's ruling.

"Federal courts have consistently held that a municipality violates the (Americans with Disabilities Act) by subjecting a substance abuse clinic to differential zoning treatment because of its association with individuals recovering from an addiction. ... There is ample evidence that Berwyn's zoning decisions regarding the plaintiffs' clinic were motivated by an intent to treat its clients differently from other medical patients," Coleman's ruling read.

Coleman specifically looked at a video tape of a 2008 rally in which several city aldermen told residents that they would vote against the zoning permit and noted that voting for the clinic would cause voter backlash.

"The reactions of (Fourth Ward Alderman Michele) Skryd, (then-Seventh Ward Alderman and now Mayor Robert) Lovero and (First Ward Alderman Nona) Chapman to the community's hostility towards the clinic in 2008 are evidence of a perceived voter animus so strong that it could only be ignored at the council's political peril in later years," Coleman wrote.

Her ruling also will become law in much of northern Illinois. Her ruling also added that municipalities are not able to say where a rehabilitation clinic can or cannot be opened.

"A zoning provision that discriminates against methadone clinics violates the ADA even if it merely provides a location restriction rather than an outright ban, and even if the provisions offer a process for relief from that restriction," the ruling stated.

The city could appeal the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit — just one step below the U.S. Supreme Court — however, two attorneys working on the case for Berwyn did not immediately respond to phone calls requesting comment.


Just asking....So, if the Buonuaro's had not been denied the zoning permit (that had been recommended by the site inspector and then City Collector, with full knowledge of former Mayor O'Connor) in the first place, the reason the 4 alderpersons voted for it,there would have been no lawsuit and they would now, not be located on CERMAK ROAD? 

[NYWREB]

Just asking....So, if the Buonuaro's had not been denied the zoning permit (that had been recommended by the site inspector and then City Collector, with full knowledge of former Mayor O'Connor) in the first place, the reason the 4 alderpersons voted for it,there would have been no lawsuit and they would now, not be located on CERMAK ROAD?

If the scenario you state about had not happened, the Buonuaro's clinic would be in the depot district. 

[Ted]

Just asking....So, if the Buonuaro's had not been denied the zoning permit (that had been recommended by the site inspector and then City Collector, with full knowledge of former Mayor O'Connor) in the first place, the reason the 4 alderpersons voted for it,there would have been no lawsuit and they would now, not be located on CERMAK ROAD?

If the scenario you state about had not happened, the Buonuaro's clinic would be in the depot district. 

I think FG was posing a rhetorical question to get one last zing at O'Connor.

That's the way the thug-o-crats operate.