Kane County free speech zone questioned by board members, public

Kane County Board Chairman Corinne Pierog said Wednesday that a First Amendment zone was created at the Kane County Government Center to ensure people had a place to speak — not to prohibit them from doing so anywhere else on the campus.

But people who have been handing out leaflets at the county campus in Geneva say Pierog established the zone last week because the materials criticized her.

Pierog was “trying to hide our dissent and silence our voices. No chairman has the right to dictate when and where we can exercise our rights,” Geneva resident Brad Raschke told the county board Executive Committee on Wednesday.

And committee members questioned how it came up in the first place, who decided, and why the county board was not involved.

“As a Democrat and an American, I do not agree with restricting free speech at all,” board member Michelle Gumz said. “We are in a situation that we should not have been put in. I think we should hash out how we got here.”

Last week, the county installed signage — based on ones used by the National Park Service — in the front and rear of Building A, which houses the treasurer’s office and county board offices.

But people who were handing out flyers at the main entrance say they were told by county workers they could not do so. The leaflets, paid for by Kane County Speaks, urged people to vote for Republican Lance Bell for chairman in November. Pierog, who is a Democrat, is seeking her second term.

Sugar Grove resident Brian Anderson, a frequent critic of Pierog and the board, complained to Kane County State’s Attorney Jamie Mosser.

Mosser advised Pierog to remove the signs because the county board had not voted to put them up. “Notice should have been given to the community,” Mosser said Wednesday.

Mosser said she was first consulted by Pierog and building management in May after reports protesters were blocking a door and a drive-up tax payment box. She said research determined that governing bodies can designate zones for speaking and handing out leaflets as long as the rules are neutral about the content.

The committee referred the matter to the board’s ad hoc security assessment research committee. That committee met in 2023 to discuss security for the government center.

Roger Fahnestock, executive director of information technology and building management, showed photos of people passing out flyers.

One photograph was of a person sitting in a lawn chair on the edge of the drive near the tax box. In another, a car tried to pull around a car stopped to talk to a distributor. In a third, a man walked in a mulched area to pass by people passing out flyers on a short sidewalk in the small area leading to the main entrance.

Fahnestock said his employees politely asked people to leave the driveway and not block the door. It is the only handicapped-accessible entrance to the building, he said. Several public speakers said they did not block anybody.

https://www.dailyherald.com/20240904/news/kane-county-free-speech-zone-questioned-by-board-members-public/