McHenry County Board votes to clarify ordinance

The McHenry County Board voted on Tuesday to change the language of the ordinance that spells out the county administrator’s duties, partly in hopes of preventing any future repeats of a 2008 controversy over a department head’s firing.

Under the new ordinance, the county administrator can fire any department head without having to seek approval from the appropriate liaison committee. The changes mirror what is already established by the county employee policy and procedure manual, County Administrator Peter Austin said. In the manual, every county employee can be disciplined, up to being terminated, by his or her supervisor, Austin said.

The original ordinance stated that any dismissals of department heads had to be approved by committee. It was that “loophole” that lawyers representing former planning and development Director Suzanne Ehardt used to contest Austin’s decision to fire Ehardt in 2008, Austin said. The decision was upheld by an arbitrator.

Ehardt filed a federal lawsuit that was dismissed in 2010. The board wants to pre-empt any such situations from arising in the future, board member Ersel Schuster said before the meeting.

“It’s simply for clarification, basically,” Schuster said. “We are working systematically to try to undo the things that have caused us trouble and we need to update.”

County board member Barbara Wheeler said county administrators in both Kane and Lake counties have the same authority given to the McHenry County administrator. However, if a department head were to be fired, the board should be well aware of the situation ahead of time, Wheeler pointed out. “These things don’t happen in a vacuum,” she said.

County board member John Hammerand wanted to add language stating that any new hiring by the county administrator should be approved by committee first, but the motion didn’t pass.