The Sabonjian Smidgin

Readers of this blog may recall sighting the sulli-mander, a fabulous creature defined as a map gerrymandered to the mutual benefit of adjacent office-holders:

Madigan ♥s Sullivan

Another beastie to emerge from the terra incognita of reapportionment is the sabonjian-smidgin, and one can be found meandering the canyons of the Lake County Board's new, downsized, economy, 21-district map:

Lake County's District 8 is represented by Bill Durkin. A previous & noteworthy representative of District 8, Bob Sabonjian, is now Waukegan's Mayor. The new District 8 encompasses much of central Waukegan -- well give or take a city block or two. Sharpeyed operatives will notice that one block was cut out of the district's northern border:

That single block -- known in cartographic circles as a sabonjian-smidgin -- is the street where Mayor Sabonjian lives. Did your LakeCountyEye mention that Sabonjian had been a District 8 Commissioner? Well, ok, your LakeCountyEye did. But your LakeCountyEye hasn't mentioned that Bill Durkin is a member of the 2011 County Reapportionment committee.

Anyhow, Bob Sabonjian has been on-the-record saying that he will not run for a second term as Waukegan Mayor. And this has the chattering nabobs whispering that Sabonjian was exiled out of District 8 for, well, the obvious reasons. But your LakeCountyEye knows better than belabor the obvious, no matter how obvious it may be. Your LakeCountyEye has it on the highest authority that Sabonjian's block was excluded because that is where they plan to dig the Route 53 Extension.

You heard it here first!

As the World Turns

It was incorrectly reported on this blog here and here that Bill Durkin is a previous Mayor of Waukegan. Durkin is Waukegan Park Commissioner. It is Durkin's father who had been the mayor of Waukegan in the 1990s. The two have the same name. Your LakeCountyEye's sharp-eyed fact checker has been on assignment running criminal background checks on some new volunteer bloggers (they come highly recommended) and flubbed the mistake. Your LakeCountyEye regrets the error. Your LakeCountyEye regrets even more having missed an opportunity to insert another nepotism joke here.

In a related matter, and as predicted by your LakeCountyEye here, Lake County Board Chair Suzi Schmidt has been backpedaling furiously over the Keith Turner embarrassment. Turner had helped Bob Sabonjian get elected Waukegan Mayor. Returning a favor, Sabonjian recommended Turner to replace him on the County Board. Suzi Schmidt has the final sayso on who gets nominated, and over the objections of many, fast-tracked Turner's nomination last week. Turner then withdrew his nomination a short time after accepting the nomination and under what can be best described as murky circumstances.

Schmidt is now telling the Daily Herald that Turner withdrew because he did not have the support of the Democratic Board members. Your LakeCountyEye is naturally skeptical. Schmidt knew that Lake County Democratic boss Terry Link, along with some Democratic Board members, were on record as opposed to Turner's nomination. And if Schmidt in fact was unaware of this opposition, then how is it that someone that disengaged could become County Board Chair in the first place?

Now the goal of political backpedaling is to cya. Anything beyond that is political backfilling, which is cover your tracks. Schmidt tells the Daily Herald how the decision was made:

During a meeting in her office Friday, however, Schmidt said she and Turner agreed he wasn't right for the job. The expected lack of support from some of the board's Democrats contributed to the decision.

Your LakeCountyEye has heard that anyone who knows Keith Turner knows that more likely Turner withdrew because he was shown the door. And if Schmidt did indeed drop the hammer in that meeting, it wasn't because all the players conceded that it was not likely an Obama-style consensus with the Democrats could be built.

Which leaves your LakeCountyEye wondering. If Turner is radioactive, why didn't Sabonjian know -- and, even worse, go as far as hand-pick him as his replacement? And what really came down at that Friday afternoon meeting?

Turned Out

This is probably a Lake County Board revolving-door record of some sort. Friday morning, Keith Turner was nominated by County Board Chair Suzi Schmidt to replace outgoing Board Commissioner Bob Sabonjian. Turner accepted the nomination. And Turner withdrew his name from nomination. All within the span of an 8 hour work day.

Schmidt had fast-tracked the appointment of the newest County Board Commissioner, with Turner issuing a statement reported by the NewsSun:

It is very humbling to have been selected for appointment to fill Bob's seat to represent and (serve) the residents of the 8th County Board District.

Turner had been reported saying he was "overwhelmed" to have Sabonjian's endorsement. According to the Daily Herald story, Sabonjian praised Turner as "the kind of guy who thinks for himself". Reportedly a party was scheduled the same weekend to celebrate the nomination.

Now, less than a day later, Turner is no longer the nominee, telling the NewsSun, "At this time, it's not something that I can take on." Elaborating on this sudden one-eighty Turner said:

I decided to withdraw my name for personal reasons. It's time for me to focus on my family and my health ... There's been some recent developments of a personal nature and a family nature, and I don't see myself being able to devote the time or attention that the office deserves.

Need to focus on family and health? No time to devote to the office? Hmm. These are familiar sounding cliches, at least within the tightly scripted sphere of political discourse -- and a sure-fire indicator that there is more to this story than meets the eye.

Turner has been a long standing fixture in (Democrato-centric) Waukegan politics. But as reported by the TeamAmerica's blog, Turner broke with the Democratic Party last year to endorse Republican Keith Gray's unsuccessful 2008 State Senate challenge against Terry Link.

Turner had also helped State Representative Eddie Washington fend off party-backed challenger Angelo Kyle in the 2008 Democratic primary. And Turner, as self-proclaimed campaign manager, helped Bob Sabonjian defeat Dick Hyde for Waukegan Mayor this past April. It was this role that landed Turner his nomination to the County Board.

Sabonjian's promotion to Waukegan Mayor necessitated his resignation from the County Board. Suzi Schmidt, as County Board Chair, has the responsibility to nominate a replacement. Terry Link, as Lake County Party boss, was on record saying he wanted to see Waukegan ex-mayor Bill Durkin in the job. Sabonjian meanwhile had other ideas. This comes as no surprise because, as reported in this blog, it was Link's political ally Dick Hyde that Sabonjian successfully drove out of office. It is not known whether Sabonjian was motivated out of a desire to see good government flourish, or out of an instinct to stick it to Terry Link -- but in any event, Suzi Schmidt ended up nominating Turner on Sabonjian's sayso.

According to your LakeCountyEye's magic crystal ball, the fact that the nomination fell apart as abruptly as it did is a strong indication that information had surfaced in the interim serious enough to kill the deal. What that information might be and who might've leaked it, the crystal ball does not say. However what you hear coming from the direction of Waukegan is not the sound of cars being impounded. It is the sound of Suzi Schmidt & Bob Sabonjian backpedaling to beat the band.

Pardon Me!

The new year 2009 is fast approaching. That means two things to watch out for:

1. Federal indictments.
   
2. Lame end-of-year-roundup blog posts.

Your LakeCountyEye is no exception to this tradition and takes its lede from a Dec 20 news item. Our Governor, bleepin' Rod Blagojevich, issued 22 pardons on that day.

"While facing his own legal cloud, Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich decided to pardon 22 other people. The Democratic governor rarely acted on pardon applications during his six years in office. The backlog of requests at one point topped 1,600. But Blagojevich has acted more often in recent months. His office says he issued 22 pardons Friday, the same day Blagojevich vowed to fight the federal corruption charges he faces."


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2008/12/19/blagojevich-pardons-people/

We won't speculate on the motives behind our Gov's sudden gesture of beneficence. But we will say if the Governor is in a pardoning mood, then keep them coming! Here's a list of our recommendations for Lake County:

1. Terry Link, State Senator & Lake County Democratic Party Chair
   A pardon for each deceased person on Link's 2008 nomination petition.
   


2. Pete Couvall, former Democratic Party Vice-Chair
   The same pardon granted to Link plus an up-to-date 2009 phone book.
   


3. Bill Gentes, former State Senate candidate
   A pardon for "misrepresenting" an easily checked fact. Which the Daily Herald proceeded to do.
   


4. Dan Seals, Congressional Candidate
   A pardon for flooding the street with below-cost gasoline.
   


5. Robert Sabonjian, Lake County Board Commissioner
   A pardon for making crank calls.
   


6. Tom Adams, former Green Oaks Mayor
   A pardon? LOL
   


7. Scott Gifford, Deer Park President
   A pardon for hiring R&W Clark to renovate the Vehe Barn, and failing to Google their bonding company. (Just Google Individual Surety Ltd. to find out what we mean.) Good luck, Scott, on recovering any of that $972,924!
   


8. Sally Coffelt, Lake County Recorder of Deeds
   A pardon for each relative drawing a County paycheck.
   


9. Melissa Bean, Congresswoman
   A pardon for living in Mark Kirk's district.
   


10. Ed Sullivan Jr, State Representative
    A pardon for all incidents where too much alcohol was consumed by at least one participant. Bonus: pardon jurisdiction to include Sangamon County.
    


11. Willard Helander, Lake County Clerk
    A pardon for each moving violation.
    


12. William Cellini, Springfield Power Broker
    A pardon for whatever it was he did. Now about that casino in Waukegan ...
    


13. George Bridges, Lake County Judge
    (Despite losing his judicial election, Judge Bridges immediately got reappointed to the bench.) A pardon for ignoring the wishes of the people.
    


14. Mark Curran, Lake County Sheriff
    The Sheriff is pardoned ... that is until he switches to the Bull Moose Party.
    


15. Bob Wargaski, Island Lake Agribusinessman
    A pardon for living high off the hog.
    


16. Lucy Prouty, Ela Township Supervisor
    A pardon for the Rte 22 chainsaw massacre. Who wanted those 112 old trees anyways?

Lake County board member latest to flee Democrats

Latest defection from the Lake County Democrats is County Board member Bob Sabonjian son of the former Democratic Mayor of Waukegan. The most interesting part of the article below is his quote that he left the Democratic party because and this is the quote "Since the election, however, Sabonjian has become dissatisfied with partisan politics, particularly when it came to leadership posts and committee assignments." The odd thing is that the Republicans were the ones who were the ones handing out those assignments not the Democrats.

From the Daily Herald-- Just a month after the presidential election of Barack Obama put Illinois Democrats on top of the political world, the party is taking hit after hit after hit.

First came the arrest of Gov. Rod Blagojevich on corruption charges. Then came the defection of Lake County Sheriff Mark Curran to the Republican Party.

The latest shot was fired in Waukegan, where veteran Lake County Board member Bob Sabonjian on Tuesday confirmed he has left the party and will serve the rest of his term as an independent.

Sabonjian said he was driven to defect by growing political partisanship on the board, which doubles as the county's forest preserve district board, and infighting within the local Democratic organization.

"This is something I'm doing because this is something my conscience is telling me to do," said Sabonjian, 53, who last month was re-elected to a four-year term.

Democratic board member Angelo Kyle, one of the panel's senior members, hopes to persuade Sabonjian to reconsider.

"I certainly want him to carry out the balance of his term under the banner of the party (with which) he was elected," said Kyle, also of Waukegan.

Sabonjian's victory in November - and four upset wins by Democratic newcomers - helped close the Republican majority on the county board to 13-10.

Since the election, however, Sabonjian has become dissatisfied with partisan politics, particularly when it came to leadership posts and committee assignments.

He feels Democrats deliberately were kept from top posts. County Board Chairwoman Suzi Schmidt, a Lake Villa Republican who assigned members to committees and chose leaders, rejected the accusation.

Sabonjian's Democratic roots run deep. He is the son of the late Democratic Waukegan Mayor Robert Sabonjian, who led the city in the 1980s.

The younger Sabonjian, a county board member since 1999, had been considering running for mayor in 2009 but recently backed off that bid, saying infighting in the local party soured him on the idea.

"These guys can play pretty ugly," Sabonjian said. "And I don't want to submit my wife or (myself) to that ugliness."

On a separate note, Bob should smile during his official portrait more often, what a depressing picture.