Free – Foreclosure Prevention Workshop In Carpentersville

Kane County and Neighborhood Housing Services of the Fox Valley (NHSFV) will cosponsor a free Foreclosure Prevention Workshop in Carpentersville on Febrary 25, 2009, from 6-8 pm. Two class-room style workshops will be held simultaneously – one in English, one in Spanish. Both will explain to homeowners what they can do to prevent losing their home through forclosure. Homeowners that have recently received a “Notice of Foreclosure” from their lender, as well as those with adjustable-rate mortgages, will receive a direct-mail flyer regarding this workshop in the next week or so. Here are the details:

FREE Foreclosure Prevention Workshop

February 25, 2009, 6-8 pm

Dundee Township Park District Senior Center

665 Barrington Avenue, Carpentersville

RSVP by calling (847) 695-0399

(Seating is limited)

Ed Ritter’s Part In Humpfer’s Reappointment

As Paul Harvey, the famous news commentator says, “Stay Tuned For The Rest Of The Story.”

After the election of 2005, I invited the trustees-elect to my house to discuss our upcoming swaring in and get a chance to meet them before we had been sworn in. I invited all of them, but only Linda Ramirez Sliwinski and Ed Ritter took me up on my invitation. Kay Teeter did not participate in the meet and greet invitation. We did get a chance to talk freely and it was a good meeting in my opinion.

The purpose of the meeting was an attempt on my part to forge some sort of working relationship prior to us taking our places on the Village board. I felt that as the newly elected Village President it was my place and appropriate for me to reach out to the new trustees. I was disappointed that Kay Teeter declined my offer.

A day or two after this get together with Trustees-elect Ramirez Sliwinski and Ritter, I received a phone call from Ed Ritter. He wanted to know if he could stop by to chat with me about something. I told him sure. He said that he would be over in a few minutes. I recall that he rode his motorcycle. I believe it was a Saturday, late morning.

I invited him into my home and he told me that he wanted to talk to me about Paul Humpfer. I said, “What’s on your mind?” He told me that he was there to ask me not to make any “public comments” when Humpfer was reappointed to the board by Mark Boettger. I told Ritter that Humpfer had called me and told me that he wasn’t sure that he was going to accept the position. Humpfer told me that the position was his for the taking if he wanted it. In fact, when I had gotten off the phone with Humpfer he had indicated that he agreed with me, that it wasn’t the “right thing to do”.  You can imagine my surprise by Ritter telling me that Humpfer was indeed going to be reappointed back to the board after just losing the election for Village President. What truly shocked me was that Ritter had come to my home to cut a deal with me to not make any public comments regarding this unethical political move. Ritter went on to tell me that if I “played along” that when the next position came up that “they” would support my choice to fill the next vacancy.

I told Ritter that I didn’t appreciate him coming to my house to try to cut some backroom political deal. I also told Ritter that I would be making a statement if asked by the media concerning the reappointment of Humpfer.

This meeting with Ed Ritter was reported in the Daily Herald. What the public needs to know is the type of individual that Ed Ritter truly is. He fancies himself as some sort of “deal maker”. After the last election he came into my office before a board meeting to “let me know”, that if I stepped down as Village President that the board would “appoint” me to a trustee position. What a deal! I told him to get out of my office. This type of backroom politics has been the way things have been done in Carpentersville for far too long. It’s what has given our Village the negative reputation that it has. The truth is that Ed Ritter is not a leader. He has been carrying water for the wrong team during his entire time in Carpentersville politics. He has demonstrated no leadership qualities. He offers no ideas. He has only proven to me time and time again, that he is a good “errand boy” for the political insiders. Now you know the rest of the story.