02082017 - News Article - Board votes to remove mayor from utility services board

Board votes to remove mayor from utility services board
Chicago Tribune
February 08, 2017
http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/post-tribune/news/ct-ptb-portage-city-council-st-0209-20170208-story.html

The Portage City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to strip Mayor James Snyder of his position as chairman of the Portage Utility Services Board and will try again to remove the position's $30,000 salary in a special meeting Thursday.

The vote, however, leaves Snyder with several options to protect his position or to demonstrate agreement with the council.

As mayor, he can sign the ordinance into law, veto it or let it pass by "pocket veto," or letting 10 days elapse without taking any action.

The first ordinance prohibiting the mayor from holding a spot on the seven-member board passed easily after the council unanimously agreed to suspend the rules requiring a second reading and approve the ordinance. Snyder did not attend the meeting.

In a procedural move, Councilman John Cannon, R-4th, the sole Republican on the panel, forced the council to hold a special meeting to reconsider the salary ordinance that deletes the utility board chairman's salary.

An Indiana law prohibits legislative bodies from stripping an another elected official's salary or reducing that salary in the same year as such a vote may be taken.

Cannon said he is against the salary ordinance change and wants more time to determine if it conflicts with state statute, but City Council President Mark Oprisko, D-at large, scheduled a special meeting Thursday night to try to get the ordinance passed.

"I think there may be some conflict with the state statute," Cannon said of the vote to delete the salary. "Some things came about in the last few days I want to look into. Now we're going to have a meeting Thursday knowing I'm going to be out of town."

Cannon, who described himself as a longtime friend of the Republican mayor's, reiterated his support for the ordinance removing the mayor from the board, calling it "a sense of duty, of doing the right thing."

Snyder came under fire last September when a utility services board employee sent $93,000 in checks to Portage-based law firm Dogan and Dogan and Winston and Strawn, a Chicago law firm, to pay for legal expenses related to a federal investigation of Snyder.

Both firms returned the payments, indicating they represented Snyder as an individual and not the utility services board.

Oprisko led the move to block any payments from the board to the law firms and threatened to order an investigation into the moves.

In November, Snyder was indicted on federal public corruption charges unrelated to anything with the utility services board.

In a written statement delivered to media immediately after Tuesday night's meeting, Snyder accused the council of "behaving in a way of presumption of guilt," which Oprisko denied.

"I'm not saying (Snyder's) guilty, because you're innocent until proven guilty," Oprisko said. "However, when you look at the (legal expenses) situation with the utility services board, with (Snyder) as the chairman taking it upon himself to send two checks worth almost $100,000, if he was in the private sector, he'd be fired."