Geneva Township Highway Commissioner Buying $5,000 Laptop?

As I have previously shared, our current Geneva Township Highway Commissioner has done everything in his power not to share the public records of his department with the public. He has ignored FOIA requests, dismissed the Highway Department’s FOIA officer, replacing with his own attorney, and has attracted the attention of the Illinois Attorney General who is investigating.

Just when you think Mr. Wissing’s man-made drama was coming to an end, I was informed that he has now replaced his attorney as FOIA officer. When I asked the name and contact information for the new FOIA officer, I was informed Mr. Wissing couldn’t remember her name, but she’s an employee at the County. This makes it extremely difficult to access taxpayer records, don’t you think.

I’m not sure what is in the records that are being withheld, but I can tell you what is in the few records I was able to obtain. Any local editor that wants copies of the receipts I will be mentioning below are more than welcome to them. They are, after all, public records.

Mr. Wissing has spent over $20,000, without going to bid, on retrofitting a storage garage to store vehicles that are not needed. He claims the vehicles are needed for snow emergencies, but they were not used in last year’s 20” snow storm. Currently, even after almost $2,000 in repairs, the equipment is never used; and one vehicle did not pass its last inspection. Adding in rent, $100,000 was spent to shelter a 15-year-old used truck that hasn’t started in almost four years!

None of the above was done with the knowledge or even consulting the Township Board.

With his vacating the Township Office, Mr. Wissing decided he needed a Township laptop in order to do work outside the office, so he paid $5,100 for an Apple laptop with Adobe professional graphic artist design software. Really? A top of the line laptop with a professional design firm package which included a drawing and illustration program, Photoshop, a desktop publishing program and other programs. The Highway Department had no use for these programs.

None of the above was done with the knowledge or even consulting the Township Board.

Mr. Wissing also paid $530 to have a separate Highway Department logo designed (even though he has the $1,700 graphic artist design software). He then paid over $1,500 for high end shirts, ball caps, etc., embroidered with his new “logo”. The Highway department has one commissioner and no employees. He gave these out as “gifts”.

None of the above was done with the knowledge or even consulting the Township Board.

In his campaign literature Mr. Wissing states that his record speaks for itself. It sure does! This is one point that we both agree on.

On April 9, vote for change.
VOTE MIKE ABTS as your new Highway Commissioner.
I’m dedicated to serving the public rather than serving myself!

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