District 86's Costly Fight With Critic Over Records

HINSDALE, IL — Hinsdale High School District 86 officials last month decried how much taxpayer money was going toward fighting public records battles.

One of the biggest fights was with a resident who the district's lawyers contended was pursuing a personal agenda in the lead-up to the 2015 school board election. They also said the records were being sought in a contentious environment involving union negotiations.

Over a decade's time, the district spent $138,000 fighting challenges to its decisions to deny release of records.

That pot of money includes nearly $50,000 spent in a lawsuit settlement last year over the district's decision to bar three critics from speaking at a board meeting in late 2019, a dispute that Patch has covered.

In the district's rundown of expenses on records battles, one of the eye-catching ones was the district's dispute with Yvonne Mayer, a longtime critic of the board and a lawyer who said she hasn't practiced since the 1990s. The district deployed two law firms in this instance.

On Monday, Patch obtained public records associated with Mayer's complaints. The fight was over complaints in 2014 and 2015 related to her requests for information that District 86 denied. The complaints never reached a court, but were taken to the attorney general's office, which decided on Mayer's complaints last spring, more than five years after she submitted them.

In her complaints, Mayer said the district violated the Freedom of Information Act by blacking out parents' and residents' names on documents.

In particular, Mayer requested that the district not black out the names and email addresses of residents who wrote board members about teacher union negotiations. She said the then-board president, Richard Skoda, repeatedly contended the majority of emails to the board supported the board's negotiating position.

Mayer said a significant public interest existed to determine whether the president's assertion was true. The president, she said, waived the residents' right to privacy by publicly citing the emails.

'Severe' invasion of privacy

In other contexts, local governments reveal the names of citizens in emails. For instance, DuPage County did not redact the names of residents who emailed their opinions about a proposed sports complex near Darien.

But in District 86's case, its lawyers, Terry Hodges and Vincent Mancini, said Mayer was seeking a "severe" invasion of residents' privacy and a list of "potential enemies."

"The names of these parents and other private citizens are linked to their impassioned support or criticism of the board's position during the teacher contract negotiations," the attorneys wrote. "The exercise of private citizens' First Amendment rights is at stake, and there is a reasonable probability that the compelled disclosure will subject these citizens or their children to threats, harassment or reprisal."

The lawyers noted Mayer's contention that opponents of the board's position had been subjected to harassment.

"Likewise," Hodges and Mancini said, "individuals in the pro-board camp could have feared retaliation by the teachers' union for their opinions. In fact, board members did fear and suffer repercussions from the community that led to police involvement."

The lawyers questioned Mayer's stated motive of testing whether the board president's assessment of emails about union negotiations was correct.

"Ms. Mayer has no genuine interest in the disclosure of these names," they wrote. "This is nothing more than a thinly-veiled pretext to allow Ms. Mayer to execute her personal agenda by obtaining the names and identities of her opponents and their supporters in advance of an election."

"My 'personal agenda'?"

Mayer sent a response to the attorney general days after the district's, noting that the district hired two law firms to fight her complaints.

"My 'personal agenda'? A pretext by me to obtain the names and identities of my "opponents"? My creating a tally of my 'potential enemies? What are the two law firms talking about?" Mayer said. "I am not running for political office."

In her complaints, Mayer also requested documents related to the school board president's email to members asking whether they supported the idea of having a lawyer at a meeting in relation to Mayer's threat to initiate litigation.

The attorney general's office ruled in favor of the district on the blacking out of the resident's names. But it said the district should have revealed Skoda's emailed request for input from members and a board member's response that Skoda publicly cited.

The two law firms used by the district were Arlington Heights-based Hodges, Loizzi, Eisenhammer, Rodick and Kohn and Lisle-based Ekl, Williams & Provenzale.

Skoda, the board president, lost his re-election bid in April 2015.