Elmhurst 'Paper' Fire District Unveils Contract

ELMHURST, IL — For years, the "paper" fire district in the unincorporated area between Elmhurst and Bensenville has hired a consultant who handles its paperwork. But he went without a written contract until last year.

Through a public records request, Patch obtained the Bensenville Fire District No. 1's agreement with Paul DeMichele, who is referred to as the controller.

Bensenville's village manager, Evan Summers, sought the document through a public records request in 2019. He said he never got a response. When a document does not exist, state law requires an entity to state that fact in reply to a records request.

According to the contract, the agreement took effect Nov. 18, 2020, and lasts until Jan. 31, 2023. The contract was signed last July.

Under its terms, DeMichele gets $250 a month for services that are ordinary and reoccurring. For any additional or "extraordinary" services, DeMichele is paid $60 an hour.

DeMichele's responsibilities do not include handling Freedom of Information Act requests such as Patch's. Pat Bond, a Wheaton lawyer, takes care of them. It's unclear why an attorney must handle such a request, given that contracts are indisputably public records. Fire District No. 1 is not alone: Many other government entities also pay lawyers to handle records requests.

Since 1988, the fire district has not had any trucks or a station. Its sole responsibility is to send annual checks to the city of Elmhurst and Bensenville Fire District No. 2. Elmhurst handles fire and ambulance calls in the unincorporated area south of Grand Avenue, while District No. 2 is responsible for north of Grand.

Last week, DeMichele spoke out against a state lawmaker's bill to merge District No. 1 into District No. 2, which the village of Bensenville supports. DeMichele warns that unincorporated residents would see their property taxes for fire services triple if such a consolidation happened. The bill allows unincorporated residents' taxes to increase over two years.

One of the District No. 1 trustees, Paul Guerino, calls the bill a "money grab" for District No. 2.

"If the state representative that introduced this legislation was serious about improving the governing of the state, she would have made it for all the paper districts, not just District #1," Guerino said in an online comment on one of Patch's recent stories.

Last week, Summers told Patch Illinois has too many local government entities. He said it was unnecessary to keep an "unaccountable" fire district that provides no actual services other than the distribution of checks.

Here are the other two recent stories about the "paper" fire district:

Tax Hike For Residents Next To Elmhurst?

'Story Of Illinois' Told In Elmhurst-Area Dispute: Official