Waukegan City Hall Update: Residents Call out Alderpersons; Mayor Taylor’s Veto Stands

The Waukegan City Council met on November 6, and as usual, it was full of highlights, or some might even call them “low lights.” In this article, we’ll cover them.

Public Comment

The meeting started as usual, with comments from the public on various topics. Two prominent community members brought up one issue: the Alderpersons’ lack of preparation, professionalism, and disrespect toward experienced professional Waukegan staff. See the video below.

While these community members were focused on multiple members of the City Council, it seemed that the most anger and disappointment was focused on Alderperson Jose Guzman of the 2nd Ward, who, after not even serving for six months on the Waukegan City Council, announced he was launching a campaign against well respected Lake County Board Member Mary Ross Cunningham.

Salary Ordinance Veto

In September, the Waukegan City Council voted to remove the mayor’s ability to hire staff at market-rate wages. This vote was made after the City’s Director of Human Resources informed the Alderpersons that a vote of this type would damage the city’s ability to recruit new employees and retain the ones they currently have. At the September 27 City Council meeting, Mayor Ann Taylor said, “The city and residents of Waukegan deserve the best public servants our budgets will allow, and constraints placed on my authority by this ordinance will impose unnecessary delays, politicize the recruiting process, and drive away strong candidates.”

After having the veto override vote held over for an additional two weeks by Alderman Guzman, the sponsor of the legislation, the veto override vote occurred on November 6 with the seven votes taking the side of Mayor Taylor and only one additional no vote besides Alderperson Guzman coming from Alderperson Michael Donnenwirth. Notably, Alderperson Victor Felix, an ally of Guzman, did not support his veto override. The video of the vote is below.

After having his legislation fail, Guzman tried an even more extreme motion to freeze the salaries of all non-union employees in Waukegan. In his comments, Guzman even said, “I don’t understand—I don’t know the process” when speaking about city employee salaries. The video below shows this exchange, which ended with Waukegan Chief of Staff George Bridges Jr. pleading with Guzman to have a discussion regarding this harmful idea and Guzman agreeing and saying it was “because he was more than responsible” and yelling, “smirk again and I won’t be (reasonable).”

Coming Up

The next meeting of the Waukegan City Council is on Monday, November 20, at 7 PM.