Trustees seethe over mayor's e-mails

E-mails sent out by Carpentersville Village President Bill Sarto have sparked a call for censure by some village board members.

Sarto recently sent e-mails disparaging trustees to Glen Zemla, president of the Silverstone Lakes subdivision homeowners association.

Trustee Judy Sigwalt at Tuesday's village board meeting read passages from about a half-dozen e-mails in which Sarto blamed Sigwalt and Trustee Paul Humpfer for "slowing down" the progress of the village. He also accused the pair and Trustee Keith Hinz of "lying" to get elected.

"I point out the names of the trustees who brought this up, so that you will be able to remember who lied to you in the last election, just to get elected," Sarto wrote. "Now, these same trustees, don't even want to discuss the topic that they ran on in the last election."

Board members attempted to censure Sarto at Tuesday's meeting, but the village attorney said the village's rules of decorum do not apply to e-mails.

Sarto also criticized trustees Hinz, Humpfer and Ed Ritter for skipping the Autumn Fest Parade that the village's park committee held earlier this month.

"Hinz, Ritter and Humpfer didn't participate," Sarto wrote. "Hinz and Ritter were at the Festival. Ritter worked the booth for the Lion's Club and Hinz was there for a little while and left. My point is that they are negative and don't want to see things get better in this town."

In response, Ritter erupted during his trustee report, calling Sarto's e-mails "pathetic."

"You used the (Autumn Fest) as a political tool to tell people how bad I am as a trustee," said Ritter, who said he missed the parade to set up the Lion's Club food stall at the festival. "You turned a good event into a political football."

Sarto stood by his comments Wednesday and called the proposed amendment ridiculous.

"I don't see anything wrong with what I did. I was expressing my own personal opinion to a resident as a resident, not as the village president," Sarto said. "I didn't violate any rules."

Trustees asked Village Manager Craig Anderson to draft revisions to the village's rules of decorum to include e-mail messages. The board would then have to formally approve the changes.