East Central Reporter

Unapproved donations and meeting misinformation are the focus of online videos posted by a public advocacy group that argues that the Shelbyville Township Board hasn’t been following the law.

 “…This is a township that has given away $93,000 of taxpayer money to whatever groups that ask, as best we can tell,” Kirk Allen, co-founder of the Edgar County Watchdogs (ECW), said on the group’s Illinois Leaks website.

Fellow co-founder John Kraft had argued in February that the board does not have statutory authority to make the kinds of donations it had proposed in a motion. He further said that the board later misrepresented what happened during that meeting.

“The meeting minutes that they approved … for the previous meeting are incorrect,” Kraft said. “They said they did a motion, a second and voted, and the motion passed to make all these donation, and then I interjected. That’s not what happened. They made a motion and a second, that’s when I interjected. No motion was ever passed and no vote was taken on that subject.”

The ECW said township attorney Elizabeth Nohren informed the board that it could make donations if the funds were accounted for in the township budget and were not necessary for any other expenditures at the time.

“That’s not what the law says; that’s not even remotely close to what the law says,” Allen said.

Allen argued that the board has statutory authority to provide funds for ordinary and necessary maintenance and operating costs for services the township provides.

The board said at the last meeting that it will not make any more donations, though Kraft pointed out that it sent out a letter saying it was proud of the ones it had made.