Aug. 01--In the years leading up to her appointment as a South Holland trustee, Cindy Doorn-Nylen regularly provided interior plantscaping services to the village, records show.
She stopped, Doorn-Nylen said, because the village told her it would be "illegal" for her to do business with South Holland while serving as a trustee. The account stayed in the family, however, as Doorn-Nylen recommended her brother's company take over the work, records and interviews show.
"I gave him the (account) because I knew there was no opportunity that I could legally continue billing the village for any work," Doorn-Nylen said.
Since Doorn-Nylen became a trustee in September 2002, South Holland has paid her brother Randy DeBok's company -- Evergreen Designs and Maintenance -- at least $555,000 for various services, including work previously done by Doorn-Nylen. He has also handled holiday decorations and watering for the village, among other services, records show.
Evergreen is based in a building owned by the village trustee and shares an address with her company, Docter's Interior Plantscaping.
South Holland only recently started bidding out some of the work done by Evergreen. The village could've done more to ensure taxpayers got the best value for their money and that the deals were transparent, experts told the Daily Southtown.
"It draws suspicion when governments are granting no-bid contracts to family members," said Maryam Judar, who runs the Citizen Advocacy Center in Elmhurst. "That's a no-brainer."
DeBok said his shared roots with Doorn-Nylen had nothing to do with the projects he's been awarded by the village, pointing instead to factors such as the quality of his work. South Holland Village Administrator Jason Huisman also said clout was not a factor in business being awarded to DeBok.
Besides being a village trustee, Doorn-Nylen has been involved with South Suburban College since the 1990s and recently served as the college foundation's vice president.
Last month, the Daily Southtown reported that Doorn-Nylen's company has received $343,000 over the years in no-bid work from South Suburban College.
Sibling love
Asked if she works with her brother, Doorn-Nylen said "that's a tricky question" and called it "kind of a convoluted thing because I love my brother. My brother loves me."
Both Doorn-Nylen and DeBok acknowledged that they share equipment and space, which she said she lets him occupy rent-free.
"We've worked together for years, going back to the 1980s, and so it's very difficult for when he needs an enclosed vehicle and I own three of them, for me (to) say, 'Oh, I'm sorry, you have to rent a vehicle,' or for when I need a pickup truck, for him to say, 'No, you can't use my truck,' " Doorn-Nylen said.
But, Doorn-Nylen said, Evergreen and Docter's are financially separate companies.
"There is no money that exchanges hands between my company and Randy's company, ever," Doorn-Nylen said. "It just is something that we determined we did not want to mix our businesses. We wanted to make sure it was always clean."
DeBok said South Holland is his main government account and acknowledged that most of the work he's received from the village has come without formal bidding. But, DeBok said, there's no conflict of interest.
"They've always been happy with my work; that's the direction I look at it as," DeBok said. "If they weren't happy with the work or the price, then they could look elsewhere."
Huisman, the village administrator, said South Holland doesn't do business with DeBok because of his sister.
"It wasn't a situation where we felt we needed to use Evergreen because of a trustee who has a relation to the owner," Huisman said.
'Good old boy network'
Before becoming a trustee, Doorn-Nylen regularly billed South Holland for business described on records as "plant rental/maintenance."
Her business last charged South Holland for "plant rental/maintenance" in August 2002, the month before she became a trustee, records show.
The next month, a new line appears on Evergreen's payment history with the village: "September plant rental/maintenance."
At the time, Doorn-Nylen said, she asked village officials how they wanted to handle the account, and they responded, "You decide." She asked if they wanted to find someone else, Doorn-Nylen said, and the village replied, "Not really."
"I said, 'OK, well, what if I just give these accounts to Randy?"' Doorn-Nylen recalled.
Huisman, the village manager, said he couldn't confirm or dispute that account.
David Melton, executive director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, said he was not surprised by Doorn-Nylen's explanation of events, except for the candor.
"It's an illustration of essentially how the good old boy network works, generally," Melton said.
In addition to renting plants to the village and maintaining them, DeBok has also provided watering services and holiday decoration to South Holland, among other services, records show.
In 2014, South Holland bid out a contract to maintain the village's pots, garden walls and welcome signs. Evergreen came in as the second-lowest bidder, at $70,622, but the low bid was disqualified because it did not adequately detail "the required colors, numbers, sizes and spacing per pot and container" for the types of plants it would install, records show.
Evergreen was then awarded the contract. Earlier this year, Evergreen won the contract again without any bidding competition.
gpratt@tribpub.com
