Wheaton mayor boots library trustees over budget flap

Wheaton Mayor Mike Gresk will not reappoint two library trustees who last year were involved in a flap with the city over the library’s budget.

Board President Colleen McLaughlin confirmed Gresk told her and Carol Honeywell they will not be reappointed and the reasons all stemmed from that conflict.

“I was led to believe the hatchet had been buried and I am extremely disappointed it apparently has not,” said McLaughlin, who had been on the board since 1999.

A third trustee up for reappointment on the nine-member board, Don Armstrong, withdrew his name from consideration.

Gresk said he made the changes because of the “confrontational nature” of budget talks last summer. After the city council cut $300,000 from the library’s budget, reducing it to $3.1 million, library officials pushed a plan that would have closed the library on Fridays to make up for the reductions.

But the city council stepped in and threatened to force the library to stay open Fridays while also reducing trustee terms from three to two years.

The council backed off, however, when the library restored four hours of business on Fridays.

Gresk said the fiery conflict was more confrontational than it should have been.

“To me, it was a situation where perhaps there were personality clashes (between the board and the council),” he said.

Gresk voted against reducing the terms and forcing the library to remain open Friday. However, he also did not reappoint a library trustee last summer who voted to close Fridays, saying at the time “there is a message there.”

Gresk stressed that appointing library board members is the responsibility of the mayor, with council approval.

“That is exactly what I am doing,” he said. “I think it’s good to have new people there ... the library board is not an elected post.”

McLaughlin said she enjoyed her time on the board and the move allows her to focus on other aspects of her life. But she acknowledged the way the situation was handled left something to be desired.

“I’m accepting of it but the pure politics of it leaves a bad taste in my mouth,” she said. “(Gresk’s) position was always, ‘The way you control the board is through reappointments.’ In one sense, I have to admire him that he sticks to his convictions and he did what he said he was going to do. But he has done it to the detriment of the library as a whole because the board is going to be affected by the lack of veteran board members.”

Honeywell takes with her four years of experience and Armstrong has been on the board for 12 years.

The dispute stems from a deep disagreement over the role of the library board. While most city council members viewed the library board during the dispute as beholden to the city, McLaughlin said that was not the case.

“Once we are appointed, our fiduciary duty is to the library, not to answer strictly to the city council,” she said. “We are an independent board. We are not a bunch of political lackeys. We are a bunch of volunteers who love the library.”

Gresk said the board does indeed answer to the city because that is who holds the purse strings on its $3.1 million budget, which will be increased to $3.3 million next fiscal year.

“I think it’s important to realize \ the budget comes through city hall, it’s not a separate taxing body,” he said. “It’s important \ we have independent thinkers on all of our commissions, but I also think there is a need to work within the system.”

Honeywell said she was sad she would not be able to serve longer than the four years she has been on the board. She also voted to close on Fridays last year.

“I thought I would be on there for a long time,” she said. “I thought it was a good place for me. It’s the kind of thing that should not be political and should be outside of that.”