Trustee Trautsch Uses 'A' Word

Trustee Cindy Trautsch (Dist. 1) brought up the “A” word during Tuesday’s meeting—“assistant village manager”—when she asked for a status update on the possibility of bringing in help for the village manager.

The District 1 trustee has complained in the past of Village Manager Larry Deetjen’s “slow response time” to her emails and phone calls.

TAKE THE POLL: Should Oak Lawn create a new position of assistant village manager?

“Is that something we’re still discussing?” Trautsch asked.

Mayor Dave Heilmann said such a matter of creating a position for an assistant village manager that it needed to be put on the board agenda.

Trustee Alex Olejniczak (Dist. 2) expressed confusion “because I felt we budgeted for that position.”

Deetjen informed village board members that they had not budgeted for the position of assistant village manager.

“The board as they do every year in budget session talked about several positions,” Deetjen explained. “In the there were no amendments made by the board of trustees to add or delete positions to the budget as presented to you.”

Reminding the village manager that he had spoke of seeking help from the International City/County Management Association, a professional association for municipal managers, Olejniczak said creating an assistant village manager’s position was part of the budget discussion last November.

“Everybody that deals with you Larry, whether it’s [legal] counsel, engineers, even ourselves, can apparently see that you need help,” Olejniczak said. “We discussed it last year. It was part of the budget process. I’m a little confused. Do you not feel you need help?”

Defending his communication with the village board, Deetjen said he keeps board members updated in weekly communiqués on matters they bring to his attention.

“Several of you have expressed a desire to see a position created,” the village manager added. “You and I have had discussions and I’ve had discussion with other trustees. I might add they’re different opinions. They’re not consistent.”

Deetjen said he needed “board direction” before he reached out to his association to participate in its fellowship program. The job would pay $35,000 or less to an applicant, but he could not present to them an “unbudgeted position.”

“I think it would be a desirous placement under a seasoned manager like myself,” he said. “I can’t even get to that point. My association is waiting to hear collectively if that is something the board wants to pursue.”

The process for creating a new position would be to put it on the board agenda and subsequently a budget amendment to be voted on by the full village board.

“Whether it be an assistant village manager or fellowship, either way that would be the process if it’s not budgeted,” Heilmann said.

Trautsch asked if it could be put on the next village board agenda for April 10.

On a side note, curbside yard waste collection by the Veolia Environmental Services begins the first week of April.