April 17--Robert Healy pleaded guilty last month to stealing more than $1.5 million while he held the obscure post of Lyons Township school treasurer. He was sentenced to nine years in prison.
He stole that money from students, from taxpayers. Prosecutors say he grew so bold that he wired money from the township office to his own bank account -- and once to a car dealership for a down payment on an Infiniti. He resigned in 2012.
The Lyons Township school trustees -- more obscurity -- were supposed to oversee Healy. They said they had no idea anything was amiss.
The trustees and treasurer are supposed to invest money for local school districts, including Lyons Township High School. LTHS and some of the other districts want to separate from the treasurer's office and handle their own investments.
This should breeze through the legislature. Here's a chance for lawmakers to be taxpayer heroes: rescue these schools from an obscure operation that has cost them -- cost taxpayers -- because of the failure to discover corruption.
Last month, the Illinois House voted 114-0 to pass a bill sponsored by GOP leader Jim Durkin that would allow LTHS to withdraw. It should sail through the Senate.
But there's a catch. Democratic Sen. Steve Landek -- who is also the mayor of Bridgeview and Democratic committeeman of Lyons Township -- has picked up Senate sponsorship of the bill. The bill has been assigned to the State Government and Veterans Affairs Committee, which is chaired by Landek.
Will he hold it hostage?
The Lyons Township school trustees are his political allies. President Michael Thiessen was appointed by the board two years ago to fill a vacancy. Theron Tobolski is the brother of Jeff Tobolski, a Cook County commissioner and mayor of McCook. Karen Civinelli was tapped by Landek to lead a Bridgeview zoning committee. Civinelli decided not to seek another term as trustee and will be replaced by Michael Dickman, also a Landek supporter.
Landek told us he wants LTHS to settle a legal fight over $4 million the treasurer's office says the school district owes it for service fees. He says that would protect other west suburban school districts that want to keep working with the treasurer.
It's not Landek's role, though, to play judge. He should let the courts decide what, if anything, LTHS owes.
This sounds like old-fashioned political turf protection.
Landek and Senate President John Cullerton should move this bill through the Senate and onto the governor's desk. Don't throw up obstacles.
The bigger picture: The office of township school treasurer exists only in suburban Cook County. It was eliminated long ago elsewhere in the state. Here's a prime opportunity to eliminate one unneeded layer of government and let school districts control their own money.
Why do these offices survive? Because local pols can control the trustees and treasurers, and those people control millions of dollars in investments.
And you wonder why Illinois still has nearly 7,000 units of local government, more than any other state.
Prosecutors say Healy's theft went on for many years. Yet auditors and accountants and the township school trustees say they knew nothing.
Voters abolished the Leyden Township school treasurer's office after a treasurer pleaded guilty in 1995 to embezzling $275,000. In 2002, the Calumet Township Schools treasurer pleaded guilty to stealing $390,000.
Yet elsewhere taxpayers have to keep funding these corruption-prone layers of government? Enough.
