Guest Column: Ted Biondo: Who does the ‘law’ apply to?
By Mona Marcinkowski, Kathy Johnson and Nichole Larison Sammon
Fox Ridge Subdivision residents
As Thomas Jefferson once wrote, “The concentrating of powers in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government,” or in other words, tyrannical or repressive government. This is why the State of Illinois has a law stating one individual cannot hold two elected positions in the same community of more than 40,000 people at the same time. This is to protect our community from too much power in the hands of a few.
Right now, this law, which is designed to protect us all from king-makers, is now being challenged in the Illinois State Senate. To help you understand the background, this all started with local Winnebago County Board member Ted Biondo. Mr. Biondo currently holds two elected positions, Winnebago County Board member and Rock Valley College trustee.
Mr. Biondo was alerted of this law’s existence and was asked to step down from one of his positions. Mr. Biondo chose not to step down, and the Winnebago State’s Attorney, Joe Bruscato, was asked to get involved. Skirting his responsibilities, Mr. Bruscato chose to not make a decision regarding the law in our county and chose to send the decision up the food chain to the Illinois Attorney General, Lisa Madigan.
Ms. Madigan’s office responded to the request stating Mr. Biondo resigned his Rock Valley College trustee position by accepting the Winnebago County Board position. The decision upholding the law of this state was evidently not the answer our local leaders were expecting or are willing to accept.
Apparently, Winnebago County Board Chairman Scott Christiansen has asked state Sen. Dave Syverson (R-34) to amend the Election Code, for our entire state, for Ted Biondo to hold two concurrent positions. Syverson was quoted as saying, “So all we are trying to do is take out the 40,000 threshold and allow the local public, if they choose to vote for one person to be in two difference offices as long as they don’t conflict with each other, then they should be allowed to do that.”
With the Illinois Attorney General’s ruling currently standing you might ask, what is our Winnebago County State’s Attorney doing on this matter? Joe Bruscato’s only comments so far state he will let Ted Biondo decide what he wants to do, even though he is currently breaking the law. Mr. Biondo can decide to step down from one of his posts or just wait for the Illinois State Legislature to act, either way for Winnebago County.
Why is our state’s attorney not upholding the law? Joe Bruscato asked for a determination to be done by the attorney general. This request was honored, and now Joe Bruscato is refusing to do his job. Since when did the individual breaking the law get to decide whether to continue to break the law? A bank robber is not allowed to decide whether he wants to continue to rob banks or stop, depending on the agenda of the state legislature.
Why is it so important to have Ted Biondo continue to hold both positions? Do we as a community not have other qualified community members? Or is the Good Ol’ Boy list running out of names for the local elected positions? Senator Syverson’s suggestion to change our Election Code could alter our local community government, not to mention our state government evermore. By changing this law, it allows one individual to hold multiple elected positions in our community, the ability to become ruler, dictator, chief, commander, all in one.
As a community, let us heed the warning from one of our founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, and ask our Illinois Legislature to uphold this law. This is not a clerical change to the Election Code. This type of change should not be taken passively and should not be considered for such a feeble reason. Protect our community from king-makers.
From the April 11-17, 2012, issue
Print This Article
13 Comments
I hate to have to say this but, as someone who has worked with Ted, I can assure you Ted does not care about the law. Ted cares about Ted. Mr. Biondo has been completely consumed with letting as many people as possible know how smart he thinks he is and that he knows more about everything than anyone else in his presence. While he has had some good things to say over the years, his ego has made him nothing more than a grade-A, A-hole. And to that I have to say, “Ted, step down so the people of Winnebago County don’t have to listen to you any longer and have to fall prey to your fascist style of government. Enough is a enough, Ted. Go drive a wedge into some other organization and leave our community college and Winnebago County board alone.”
As long as they don’t conflict with each other? What a joke! Sen. Syverson, please consult page 5 of Board of Trustees Report for November 29, 2011, which reads, in part, “”Trustee Ted Bionod retracted his yes vote and abstained in reference to item C, Refund to Winnebago County.”
Of course, there is another possibility. Maybe nobody cares? Maybe Joe Bruscato has enough work that her deems far more important then this to pursue. As the States Attorney, I would imagine that Mr. Bruscato has any number of high-visibility crimes to prosecute. Maybe Ted Biondo holding two elected positions, when, in fact, there are other elected officials to prevent Mr. Biondo from seizing “power” and becoming a “despot”.
It’s laughable to even think about a member of the RVC Board of Trustees becoming a “despot”.
Then again, why is this so important to Mona Marcinkowski, Kathy Johnson and Nichole Larison Sammon????
Ted Biondo is soley responsible for causing a manufactured crisis among the RVC administrators and the faculty. Biondo doesn’t belong in political office. And it’s funny that has resorted to being “appointed” to serve in elected positions and has to claw his way to stay. If Biondo had to run a campaign, he’d lose. Ted Biondo represents the past— a corrupt establishment who cares nothing about the people of Rockford. Kick him off both boards!
John hit it on the head, no one cares. We don’t have enough individuals in our community who care. Who care about who are leaders might be, who they work for, who they might owe a favor to.
As a group we continue to fight this complacency. We continue to watch and dig for unreported facts. At the very least it will be printed. It will be on record. Back room deals and violations of the law will be known whether the people responsible for upholding the law act or not.
Ted Biondo is violating the law. It is simple. He must step down from one of his positions. This stunt, put forward by Syverson in our State Legislature, is short sighted and narrow minded.
Ted should care. He has written about conflicts of interest on school Boards. In April of 2011, he wrote two articles about a 205 School Board member having a conflict of interest because her husband is a 205 teacher. In the two articles, Ted wrote (in the comments section while responding to another comment) “Don’t you think the facts ought to be brought out, so informed decisions can be made on the issues? I wanted to emphasize the situation so that future actions by that board member and others on the board would be looked at with all information available.” So, I think Ted would want everyone to know about his situation. I think he would want all the facts out there. I think he would write a blog about this if it were not about him. So, I agree with Ted on this one, the people have a right to know everything. He is ignoring the law as affirmed in the legal opinion of the Illinois State Attorney. Anyone doing business with Rock Valley College ought to be concerned. If I am bidding for a contract, do Ted’s votes count? If I have bid on a contract, do they count? Where are the other members of the Rock Valley College Board of Trustees? Olson was mentioned. What are Mike Olson and Mike Dunn going to do? Are they going to continue to support an action that could result in a class 4 felony? Are they going to open the college up to costly legal challenges if people start to question Ted’s votes? Where are Olson and Dunn?
John makes a good point, violations of the law are only serious and worthy of consideration when they are committed by people he disagrees with. It is the whole “government of laws not men” thing. Duh!
I can’t wait to cast my ballot for David Soll for Winnebago County Board, then this law change won’t have to take place and jeopardize ALL future elections. Anyone know who will be taking over the RVC Trustee position that Mr. Biondo has ipso facto already resigned. YES, by accepting the County Board position, he has ALREADY resigned the RVC board position.
John states that there are other elected officials to prevent Ted Biondo from seizing power, no these “elected officials” were forging ahead to try and get this law changed.
We will continue to fight this and bring to everyone’s attention what is going on. We do care.
It is time to put an end to all the backroom deals going on.
Ted Biondo is breaking the law and it is time to step down as determined by the Attorney General.
So yes John this is important to us as is everything that goes on in Winnebago County that is not being followed by the law.
I think it is high time for Ted Biondo to step down. I don’t understand why it is being left up to Mr. Biondo. Do the right thing, Mr. Biondo, you are breaking the law.
Yes, John, this is important to us. We are residents of Winnebago County and we are so tired of the law being broken and exceptions being made for the Good Old Boys.
We will continue our pursuit because we care.
I applaud these ladies for their perseverence and attention to detail. Perhaps Mr. Buscato does have bigger fish to fry. But is this a violation not worthy of his attention? Ignoring a minor violation is a slippery slope…how flagrant must the violation be before “his majesty” pays attention? Ted may have stamped Joe’s membership into the “Good Ol’Boys” club.
The Rule of Law is an instrument created by the rich to legitimize their crimes against the poor.
– John M. Stassi
Why cant you just simply vote him out and stop crying like little girls.