The resignation of David DeLeshe from the Brookfield-Lyons School District 103 Board of Education in December might have been a result of a complaint filed against him for concurrently holding elected office as village trustee in Stickney.
A complaint was filed against DeLeshe by Kenneth Getty, father of Lyons Village President Christopher Getty, who argued that holding the dual offices poses a conflict of interest.
DeLeshe, a Lyons police officer, had served on the District 103 school board since April 2011 and was elected Stickney village trustee in April 2013.
Getty, who did not return calls requesting an interview, wrote a letter to Attorney General Lisa Madigan on July 25, 2013. In the letter, he stated that holding both offices was “problematic” and that the “two offices are incompatible.”
Getty, who is a former Lyons village president and owner of Getty Insurance in Lyons, said in the letter to Madigan that he also sent a letter of complaint to District 103 Superintendent Mary Jo Vladika in June but did not receive a reply. Calls to Vladika were not returned. School Board President Sharon Anderson also could not be reached for comment.
“I was visited by a District 103 school board member who told me that every [District] 103 board member received a copy of my letter, but the president of the board would not qbring the issue up for a vote,” Getty said in his letter to Madigan.
DeLeshe, who did not return calls requesting an interview, said in December that there was “no particular reason” for his departure other than scheduling conflicts with the two positions and his full-time job with the police department.
“Nobody forced me out or pushed me out, no matter what somebody believes,” he told the Landmark in December.
Madigan responded to Getty in August, noting that the attorney general is not authorized to advise private citizens in such an inquiry, but did provide Attorney General Neil Hartigan’s opinion from 1985, showing a conflict between holding the offices of school board and city council member concurrently.
The 1985 decision states that a person serving on both a school board and on city council could find themselves in conflict when determining how to distribute funds.
“A conflict could arise, therefore, between a dual officeholder’s duty as a city council member to determine how municipal revenue sharing funds should be spent to best serve the needs of the citizens of the municipality and his or her duty as a school board member to provide for the revenue necessary to maintain the district’s schools,” the decision states.
The District 103 school board accepted applications for the vacant school board seat through Jan. 10 and is expected to fill the position at its board meeting scheduled for Jan. 27.
