Kane County Chairman grilled on board budget

Given the inability of many Kane County departments to find another 4.5 percent to cut in their 2010 budget proposals so far, Chairman Karen McConnaughay might have expected a warmer welcome for her proposal to trim 5.46 percent from the county board budget.

Instead, county board members grilled McConnaughay on Wednesday over a familiar sore spot: the contractual services category in the county board budget.

McConnaughay directly oversees that portion of the budget, which in the past was used to hire outside consultants for activities some county board members have questioned.

In particular, some complained about the use of Brad Hahn and Burnham Strategies for public relations efforts during the construction of the new county jail. Hahn and his company have multiple ties to former U.S. Speaker of the House J. Dennis Hastert.

"I just want to know where the money is going," County Board Member Jim Mitchell said after seeing $170,000 in McConnaughay's budget for contractual/consulting services.

McConnaughay told Mitchell it is impossible to answer his request because she is presenting a budget request, not a list of transactions already made.

Most of the money, she said, will fund unexpected events such as needing to hire a paralegal for a meeting to take minutes. McConnaughay said she's never spent more than $168,000 in contractual/consulting services, even in years more money was budgeted for such expenses. She also reminded the board that her budget returns a fair amount of unspent money to the general fund at the end of every year.

Board Member Bonnie Kunkel said she thought McConnaughay's request for consultants was unreasonable.

"It should be lower now that we don't need consultants for the jail," Kunkel said. "That $170,000 is still a lot of money."

McConnaughay told the board it was free to cut the line item as they saw fit.

The Kane County Health Department is the most recent employer of Burnham Strategies, contracting the firm to help with swine flu prevention marketing efforts. McConnaughay was not involved in the process that led to the health department hiring the agency.