Burr Ridge Spends More On Lawyers Per Capita Than Elmhurst

BURR RIDGE, IL — This week, the Burr Ridge Village Board approved spending $37,000 on legal bills, which one trustee questioned.

At the current rate, Burr Ridge is set to spend more money per resident on lawyers than Elmhurst, where legal spending has come under scrutiny.

Of the $37,000, about three-quarters went to the village's main law firm, Storino, Ramello & Durkin, with the rest going to Clark Baird Smith. Both are based in Rosemont.

At Monday's board meeting, Trustee Zach Mottl said the legal expenditures on the vendor list lacked details. For instance, $26,000 went to Storino for "legal services" in October. No specifics were provided.

In November, the board approved $25,000 in spending for Storino, but the village's vendor list divided the expenditures into categories such as Sterigenics, public records requests, investigation of complaints and property condemnations, among others.

"This is a lot of money in undocumented legal fees," Mottl said.

Mayor Gary Grasso said he didn't know about Mottl's characterization about "undocumented" fees.

"But in any event, these are the types of questions that ... if you had raised the questions ahead of time, we might be able to answer them with more specificity," Grasso said.

Interim Village Administrator Evan Walter said he wasn't sure what the legal bills were for.

The mayor said Mottl was entitled to an answer and said the village should get documentation to the trustee.

When the board voted on the vendor list, Mottl protested.

"How can you approve this without understanding what you're voting on, trustees?" Mottl said. "It's malfeasance, nonfeasance."

Mottl was the lone dissenting vote.

For the next year, Elmhurst has budgeted nearly $900,000 for legal services. That has prompted several aldermen to call for an examination of the spending.

If the last two bills from Storino are customary, then the village is set to spend more than $300,000 on lawyers in the next year, and that doesn't include the money spent with the other law firm, whose work appears project-based and thus less predictable.

If current rates continue, Burr Ridge is set to spend $27 per resident on legal spending in the next year, compared with $19 in Elmhurst.

Asked Friday about the village's legal spending, Grasso said in a text to Patch, "Mottl's usual unsupported accusations, as I stated at the meeting, would be looked into nonetheless. I've asked for an explanation from staff by the next board meeting."

Among the possible causes of recent legal spending in Burr Ridge are the separation agreement with former Village Administrator Doug Pollock and the decision to put Finance Director Jerry Sapp on leave.