New rule for this story: no comments allowed until you pass a quiz on each section plus a final exam. (At least the first 40 pages or so are in Real English.)

This is why we need more transparency in our Village government, as Sandy Bury stated.

Thank you Lorraine and Patch for being the first to get this online.

Lorraine please stop giving candidate Bury credit for the freedom of imf act. I'm sure you have been trying to relay this information to us. I know patch worked as hard ,probably harder than candidate Bury. We now have accsess to this information. Patch is becoming candidate Bury's political platform. You know the people at that board table supporting her. They are always victims, the other person is always Judas . Keep patch neutral during this election season.

Thanks for your comments, Barney. And I will keep Patch neutral. Other candidates are also welcome to comment anytime or submit an op-ed. The door to communication is always open. And I was working on getting the report. I will post Part 2 tomorrow.

Ok. So, the report tells us nothing! We already knew all this didn't we?

If you read the report G&K states that The Mayor interfered with the investigation by going behind the backs of the investigators and talking to a potential witness in the case. on page 91 the report quotes.. on tues evening, aug 30 g&K appeared before the village board in exec. session This was the first time we explained the theory regarding the insurance broker to village officials, and the importance of Gail Paul's testimony to the ultimate success of that theory. during the session,G&K discussed with the board the importance of what Gail Paul would say about her discussions with the insurance broker in 2003. The following day on Aug.31st G&K attorney Eric Wilson received a call from mayor who said early tuesday morning( BEFORE THE MEETING LATER THAT NIGHT ) of He had already called MS. Paul who told him she had no knowledge of asking the broker for insurance in a sexual harassment case. Her inability to recall events from 2003 was hardly surprising given that Ms. Paul did not have the benefit of reviewing any documents that might refresh her recollection.

on the monday when Mayor Heilmann called Gail Paul,the only people who knew about the importance of her testimony were attorney's from G&K and Tressler's outside council.It is REASONABLE to infer that sometime between friday ( when G&K spoke with tressler's outside council ) and Monday, Mayor Heilmann learned about the friday conversation regarding Gail Paul. No one from G&K talked to the Mayor during that time.

Andy & Sandy...Sandy & Andy....maybe these two need to meet for drinks.

A REASONABLE INFERENCE is that Tressler's attorney spoke to someone at Tressler about this conversation and that, in turn, someone at Tressler spoke to the Mayor.

On page 92 The report states although the Mayor knew that the village was in an adversarial relationship with Tressler, it appears the Mayor intentionally communicated with that adversary about a potential claim against the adversary-- a claim that also happened to be the LARGEST DAMAGES THEORY AGAINST THE ADVERSARY. Then, apparently based on his communication with the adversary,the Mayor decided that he would ( without consulting the villages attorney ) contact the most important witness about the claim to ask her questions directly related to the claim. The information the mayor learned by talking to Ms. Paul ( without our involvement ) that she had no recollection of the events in question did not help the villages cause.we do not know if the Mayor told that info to the attorney's at tressler. If so, that certainly affected the Villages leverage in settlement discussions. We will never know due to Tresslers refusal to turn over e-mail 's between the Mayor and tressler.

The Mayor should never have been involved in the G&K investigation in the first place!! He certainly had a conflict of interest and should have recused himself from the executive session meetings regarding the investigation. He had friends at Tressler and another friend that was being investigated by G&K. Is that not an opening to sabotage

Andy, I truly feel very very sorry for you.

Andy is right. You should feel sorry for the people of Oak Lawn since they have a mayor that puts friends before his job of representing the people. If he didn't tamper with the witness and let the hired guns do their job the village would have probably had a seven figure settlement. Thanks for screwing us Dave. You owe us an apology and your resignation.

My suggestion for a quiz was tongue-in-cheek, but it's clear from reading just this first part that one will need to digest the whole thing before firing off on individuals. It's a game of connections. It appears just from part 1 that there will be a lot of blame to go around, if blame is what you're looking for.

So, in keeping with the strong, moral belief in an open, honest and transparent government, when do we get the $450,000 legal investigation into the hiring of the lawyers that replaced Tressler? That whole deal was strange. The board majority and the manager just decided they going to fire Tressler and hire Querrey and Harrow. Anybody ever care to ask why?

Maybe it was right, maybe it wasn't, but, as Mr. Streit so righteously said at the time, "This is about the process." Where's the "process" in this case? No bids, no proposals, no review of qualifications from anyone else, no presentations to the board (like Tressler and Chimenti did, which you will see in the report). Not even phone calls by the manager to talk to other law firms? Seriously?

What about the farcical Odelson "investigation"? What about hiring Godfrey & Kahn? Any bids? Any RFP's? Shouldn't the taxpayers get the real story on that, too. Think Ms. Bury, or anyone else for that matter, will stand up for total transparency on those decisions, or will people, including Ms. Bury, be silent on that because they may now be connected to those trustees? Transparent is as transparent does.

Can't have it both ways, folks. But, what do you hear? Crickets. All you hear is crickets chirping as they listen to the b.s. and this entire line of sophistry about open and honest government from people whose actions under cover of darkness can't stand the scrutiny of the light of day.

Favorite parts of the meeting.... Mr Duhigs shopping list... The Quote "Call us Oak Park one more time" ....
Oh and o yea the haha payback... I can confirm i had a similar incident as the homeless woman. I was victim of a dubious accident in the same parking lot.. I boasted around town i was going to fight it. So when i appeared in court the judge was primed a ready having been consulted... To everyones laugh i paid the overpriced 121 dollar property damage before court and the tickets were waived.. Just my story...

Mr. Wilson what Public Official first had comments about what was in the Godfrey and Kahn report,in fact a whole story on patch 3 weeks before the B.O.T. received it?? Your best buddy Mayor Dave Heilmann!!! He is the one who should be sued Once again do as I say not as I do Dave's new nickname should be MR. Interference...

Mayoral candidate Sandra Bury, I must congradulate you on a brilliant campaign move. The release of this report is basically a $500,00.00 campaign contribution to you, paid for by the Oak Lawn taxpayers. Oh yea, I know...people have the right to know, people need to know...transparency .....bla bla bla, but at the end of the day nothing changes for the taxpayer while you on the other hand have a beautiful platform to run on paid for by the Oak Lawn taxpayers. I just can't believe no one else caught on to this. And Andy before you run your mouth about me being Dave I want to tell you I HATE THEM ALL. I think it is embarrassing they way they fight and I don't trust any of them, yes Andy Including Dave. But once again Mayoral candidate Sandra Bury nicely played my friend nicely played

Sandy and Andy probaly think that the mayor made the movie that the muslims are going nuts over.Maybe we will get a letter about that to.

Um Andy, she is part of "them all", hence the rip. Seems pretty credibll and simple to me. Oh and I heard your not working, somethings in life must be free then.

I find it very ironic that Heilmann would contact Gail Paul after what he and Phelan did to her when she was employed at the Village. Gail Paul is a woman with great integrity and experience who Dave, and at that time buddy, Tommy Boy, tried to make Gail miserable until she left Oak Lawn. Heilmann has the audacity and arrogance to contact her after he tried to ruin her life. She is then replaced with a Phelan friend, Brian Hannigan, who obviously doesn’t know what he is doing. It is time for both the power hungry Heilmann, Phelan and all their supporters/hired friends to go. They are more interested in getting their inexperienced friends and family jobs and reaping the benefits with their positions than making Oak Lawn a better place to live. Have they accomplished any of their initial goals that they stood for from their original campaign, except for wasting millions of our taxpayer dollars? I will do a write in vote, Gail Paul for Mayor! She stands by what she believes in.

In retrospect with my previous comments, that is no joke, Gail Paul would be a perfect mayor. She has appropriate experience, intelligent, honest, knows and loves Oak Lawn. How about it Mrs. Paul?

Disagreement within the ranks of Joseph and his technicolor dreamcoat??

Just like the disagreements in your group or have you split from FOB?