We have a new development regarding the corrupt contract the Niles-Maine District Library Board railroaded in.
As you may know, recently we launched a letter-writing campaign to send 50 emails to the board of trustees and the Mayor of Niles to “reject the corrupt contract” the new trustees awarded to their campaign videographer Stephen Yasell of “Yissilmissil Productions”. We’re glad to report that we exceeded that and extended the goal to 100. Despite the public outcry, and staunch objections from 3 of the 7 trustees, the board appears to be proceeding with the corrupt contract.
In our last blog entry we spoke about the way the board has been mangling the budget process. Journal & Topics also recently wrote a piece outlining the various cuts: Deep Niles-Maine District Library Budget Cuts. While this process and proposed cuts are alarming we are still wondering what happened with the Yasell contract. It was never mentioned in the budget meetings so we were compelled to request this information using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to obtain the proposal.
Turns out there were two proposals. One was, as expected, from Stephen Yasell, Film Director at Yissilmissil Productions on May 18th, a day before the new trustees were sworn in. The other was received on May 26th from a Business Architecture Transformation Specialist with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Security and Forensic Investigation, a qualified expert!
The Yissilmissil Production proposal was open-ended with no estimation of time (“as needed”) with a service rate of $100 per hour. When challenged regarding that, library Trustee Carolyn Drblik flippantly mentioned capping the contract at $1000. But on what data was that determined?
The Business Architecture Transformation Specialist actually specced out an estimated 32 hours with a total of $960.
For anybody who has been watching some of these recent meetings you’ll know how the trustees have been scrutinizing bids and micromanaging the library to shave money off the budget. Somehow this suddenly escapes their purview.
After all we learned from the library staff during the budget workshops is this contract even necessary? If so, shouldn’t we go with a qualified professional at a fraction of the cost?
Let it be known that this is not acceptable in our community! (see below)