DuPage County clerk sued in dispute over how her bills are paid

The DuPage County State’s Attorney’s Office has asked a judge to order DuPage County Clerk Jean Kaczmarek to comply with county regulations regarding the payment of her bills so vendors can be paid in a timely manner.

The lawsuit, called a writ of mandamus, was filed Sept. 4. It claims the clerk is breaking state law when she refuses to indicate from where in her budget a bill should be paid when the budget line item for the expense does not have enough money for the payment.

As a result, the county has been unable to verify the amounts due to vendors or pay vendors on time, according to the lawsuit.

That means the county has violated the state’s Local Government Prompt Payment Act, according to the lawsuit. If the county pays a bill late, it must pay interest on it.

“The clerk and the deputy clerk have made it very clear that their intention is to go to court and we don’t have any other choice at this point,” DuPage County Board Chair Deborah Conroy said Sept. 4. “This will now be decided in the court.”

She said the lawsuit is “unfortunate.” She added the county “needs to have resolution” and the county board must get back to the work of the county.

Deputy Clerk Adam Johnson, speaking on behalf of Kaczmarek, said they won’t comment on the lawsuit until they read it. As of late on the afternoon of Sept. 4, nobody had told them about the lawsuit and they had not been served a copy, Johnson said.

The lawsuit says that because Kaczmarek is not complying with the county’s financial and accounting policies, some bills have not been paid.

Jeffrey Martynowicz, the county’s chief financial officer, said in an affidavit attached to the suit that it takes elected officials about five minutes to complete and send a budget transfer request to the finance office. Kaczmarek needs to make that designation because if somebody else outside her office does it, that would be interfering with her state-given authority to control how she runs her office.

The county board and the clerk have been tussling over bill payments and budgets for more than a year. In August, the county auditor reported $142,823 in unpaid bills.

Johnson previously has said an opinion from the state attorney general said that once a county board approves the annual appropriation for a county office, the county can’t stop payment on bills. He also said the same opinion indicated a county treasurer can refuse payment, but only if there is a lack of appropriated funds.

• Daily Herald writer Alicia Fabbre contributed to this report.

https://www.dailyherald.com/20240904/news/dupage-county-clerk-sued-in-dispute-over-how-her-bills-are-paid/