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Dolton Mayor Tiffany Henyard’s first full week as Thornton Township supervisor got off to a rocky start.
Henyard plans to keep her job as mayor while also collecting about $250,000 a year as supervisor. Township trustees late Thursday picked Henyard to replace the late Frank Zuccarelli to run the state’s largest township.
It’s a big job overseeing 170 full- and part-time township employees and an annual budget of about $35 million. If one thinks of Thornton Township as a house that Zuccarelli built, Henyard’s critics say her management style could quickly collapse the government organization like a house of cards.
Five Dolton village trustees called Henyard uncompromising, stubborn and ineffective during an hourlong board meeting Monday night.
“This administration is operating in a dictator position,” Trustee Edward Steave said. “That’s not how government works.”
Five of the six trustees constituted a quorum and met via videoconference with Village Clerk Alison Key and attorney Michael McGrath, legislative counsel for trustees. A defiant Henyard simultaneously held a separate meeting via videoconference with Trustee Andrew Holmes and department heads.
“It saddens my heart to see that nobody wants to give,” Henyard said. “Nobody wants to amend anything. Everybody wants everything to stay broken.”
Henyard was clearly in the wrong. The board majority held a legal public meeting. Henyard described her informal session as a town hall. Why didn’t Henyard, Holmes and administrators join the legal meeting in progress?
The answer involves egos and a selfish desire for attention, power and control. In Dolton, the situation has deteriorated since Henyard defeated former mayor Riley Rogers last April.
Henyard is a shrewd politician who branded her slate of Dolton candidates as reformers. But within six months of taking office last year, her “dream team” had devolved into a nightmare.
The board majority and Henyard have tussled over requiring background checks for village employees after Henyard hired a registered sex offender as a code enforcement officer.
It’s as if a headstrong Henyard refuses to concede the board majority’s legislative capacity to act as a check on her executive power. For example, the board Monday rejected a Henyard proposal to change the time of board meetings to 5:30 p.m. from 6:30 p.m.
Trustees said changing the time of meetings would create hardships for working residents and inconvenience trustees who have jobs of their own.
“It’s not going to pass,” Steave said. “If the administration would have discussed this with trustees they would have known that we wouldn’t vote for this. This is a pointless thing to put up when they don’t have the votes.”
Trustees and the clerk said they were frustrated that Henyard’s administrators did not provide board members with copies of corporate bills that were scheduled for approval. Board members have not seen receipts for credit card expenses in two months, they said.
“We’re here reporting for duty to do our jobs but we need some information,” Trustee Jason House said.
Henyard and the board majority both posted similar agendas with identical start times, but only the board’s session was an official public meeting. The board’s agenda, however, included discussion about pursuing a lawsuit over Henyard’s use of taxpayer resources for personal security.
Dolton citizens are paying police officers overtime to work as Henyard’s security detail, House said.
“As a community we are short staffed. We’re approaching 200% of our overtime budget with two more months left in the fiscal year,” House said. “This has cost the village in excess of $100,000 in additional manpower for an item we’ve been given no justification for.”
“Every mayor does not have a security detail,” Steave said.
Diverting police resources in the community of 22,500 residents for personal security seems like an act of selfishness and vanity.
Another reason trustees called a special meeting was to discuss how Henyard’s administration restricts residents from participating in social media channels operated by the village with publicly funded resources.
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Henyard is trying to silence critics and stifle dissent, trustees said.
“I have received several complaints from people blocked from commenting on social media,” Trustee Brittney Norwood said.
Trustees said now that the worst effects of the pandemic have abated, they want the Village Board to resume meeting in person to give citizens more of an opportunity to voice their opinions and participate in government.
Adding to the turmoil, trustees in December approved a measure to place a referendum on the ballot June 28 asking Dolton voters whether to recall Henyard as mayor. Her term is scheduled to run through April 2025.
Henyard, however, filed a petition with three referendum questions of her own before trustees passed their measure. No more than three questions may appear on any ballot. A legal challenge disputes Henyard’s petitions, the Cook County clerk’s office said.
“The clerk’s office is awaiting further action in court to determine which set of referendum will be on the June ballot,” a representative said.
Henyard did not respond to a message left at the township office requesting comment.
I reached out to the offices of Illinois attorney general and Cook County state’s attorney and asked whether a supervisor could simultaneously be mayor of a municipality within the township. It would seem the potential for conflict exists, since townships make decisions about deploying public resources in communities within their jurisdictions.
Both offices were closed Monday for the Pulaski Day holiday, and neither office provided a response by mid-afternoon Tuesday.
Henyard said publicly she could legally hold both posts and has no intention of resigning as mayor. Even if she is legally cleared to hold both jobs, questions will persist about her ability to successfully manage both positions.
She faces a tempest in Dolton, where she is at odds with a board majority that has the legal means to block her agenda. The supervisor role will demand much of Henyard’s time and attention. She owes it to township citizens to deliver results for a position that pays an annual salary of about $250,000, plus benefits. Plus, she has an opportunity to assume some of the regional political leadership role that Zuccarelli fulfilled.
The smart move would be for Henyard to resign as mayor. But arrogance has a way of blinding even the best public servants. In her public comments Monday night, Henyard said trustees were jealous that she was the youngest person and first woman elected mayor of Dolton.
“It bothers me that once a woman gets into a position that men, and women, too — which I don’t understand, because women are vindictive, too — will come together to try to take down someone who made history,” Henyard said.
“Most of you all wouldn’t be a trustee if it wasn’t for me backing you,” she said.
Ted Slowik is a columnist for the Daily Southtown.