The ‘ayes’ prevailed as the Lincolnwood mayor sought trustee consensus recently on appointing a new village treasurer, but several officials expressed concern over the need for such a role and even said they didn’t know the previous financial leader had resigned.
Mayor Barry Bass tapped local actuary Eric Biljetina to be the village’s new treasurer, and his appointment was approved at the Village Board meeting Tuesday.
“[Biljetina had] been given very heavy thought and consideration for the replacement. We’ve got a very well-qualified individual to fill the role. We found a very good volunteer from our resident pool,” Bass said of his pick.
The previous village treasurer, Charles Greenstein, resigned as of Nov. 9, according to a village news release put out two days after the Village Board meeting. Several trustees said at the meeting they weren’t previously aware that Greenstein had quit.
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Some trustees at Tuesday’s Village Board meeting appeared just as baffled by this latest action by Bass as they were at the Dec. 9 special meeting where the mayor sought to preempt the automatic June 2018 renewal of the village manager’s employment contract.
This time, the elected representatives seemed perplexed as to whether Bass, who is serving his first term as mayor after defeating longtime village president Jerry Turry in the April election, has the authority to appoint a new treasurer.
Further, some trustees questioned why a more in-depth process to appoint a new treasurer was not followed.
Village attorney Steven Elrod clarified that the appointment of the village treasurer was something the mayor – whose official title is village president – gets to make.
“The mayor does not need to go through any process if he chooses not to and he can simply bring it to the board as he did and then seek consensus,” Elrod said.
Trustees Renan Sugarman and Jennifer Spino made the motions to approve the appointment. All in favor only had to say aye or nay.
Trustee Jesal Patel voted against the motion, but there were enough votes in favor for the appointment to be approved.
Trustee Jean Ikezoe-Halevi said she was unaware that Greenstein had left the post.
“I did not know the former village treasurer had retired until I got a notice saying, ‘As you know, he has retired,’ and it was like ‘wait, what did I miss here?'” Ikezoe-Halevi explained.
Bass acknowledged Ikezoe-Halevi’s confusion, and clarified that an email had gone out regarding his resignation and that Greenstein had been in the hospital.
“He’s been very ill and I’m not sure if he’s out of rehabilitation yet,” Bass said.
Both Jesal and Ikezoe-Halevi said they didn’t oppose the person the mayor picked, but rather didn’t favor having anyone serve in the role.
Trustee Ikezoe-Halevi also explained her concerns about the appointment being a paid position.
“He is getting paid more than any of the trustees if I’m correct, so I would think that you would have to have more than one applicant for this job,” she said. “This is to say nothing against the man, but I would have thought we would have a more in-depth process.”
Patel said that Biljetina is expected to be paid $3,000 per year as treasurer.
Information publicly available Tuesday about the appointment did not confirm the salary, tell a start date for Biljetina or detail what he would do as treasurer.
Kyra Senese is a freelancer.