Carpentersville meetings are out of control

If Carpentersville village trustees were paid by the hour to conduct village business at board meetings, I am pretty sure some board members would be fired.

More often than not, board meetings - where village trustees are supposed to discuss important village business and issues - are derailed by personal jabs, attacks, name-calling and bickering.

Enough is enough. Board meetings should not take three hours.

A breakdown of last Tuesday night's board meeting shows that while the presentation of awards to area children took about 40 minutes, it took the board more than 90 minutes to get to the first order of new business.

That means, if the actual meeting started at 8:10 p.m., it wasn't until about 9:45 p.m. that the board began discussions on new business.

After roughly 30 minutes of public comments, which included decorum-breaking discussions on a number of items brought forth by audience members, the board moved on to the consent agenda.

After passing several consent agenda items without delay, as usual the village board's train went hurtling off the tracks when it came time for commission reports and trustee reports.

At just about every board meeting, a select few on the board use the comments portion as an invitation to hurl abuse at one another, either at the amusement of those in attendance or the annoyance. Usually, the latter is achieved.

So, at about 8:55 p.m., the bitterness took flight.

Enough is enough. When trustees are arguing just for the sake of getting the last word in, it doesn't prove who is more right.

Nothing gets accomplished when one particular member reiterates and repeats his position eight different times.

It doesn't help to have trustees yell and argue back.

Nothing gets accomplished when the board spends more time arguing about who is doing what on their weekends than the time spent on making a decision that affects the entire village.

There are a few who would prefer to sit back and watch the rest of the board get nasty. There's no need for everyone to get involved in an argument that doesn't benefit the village.

Such was the case several times on Tuesday night. Some comments were outright offensive and completely insensitive, particularly those concerning a resident who volunteers to clean up the village.

Board members, check the personal differences at the board room door and get to work once you sit in those big, cushy board seats. You guys might be comfortable up there, but for the rest of us in the audience, the yellow seating is a posture killer.

On another note, while you're reading this, I and a few thousand other people are running the Chicago Marathon. Pray for water, GU and Gatorade.