Huntley Trustee Mary Holzkopf resigns, says was ‘forced’ off village board over lack of economic interest form

Huntley Trustee Mary Holzkopf has resigned from the village board after McHenry County officials said she didn’t turn in a mandatory form outlining her economic interests.

In statements at a village board meeting and on Facebook, Holzkopf said her departure was “not by choice” but was “forced by the State’s Attorney’s office due to an accidental and unintentional issue with the submittal of my statement of economic interest form.”

“While I have done absolutely everything in my power to rectify the situation and resubmit the form, I have been told that the only option I have is to resign,” she said.

Officials in the state’s attorney and county clerk’s office said Holzkopf missed the May deadline for submitting the economic interest form, which virtually all governmental elected officials in Illinois are required to fill out as part of the Illinois Governmental Ethics Act. The document has about a half-dozen questions about an office holder’s financial assets.

Holzkopf announced at the end of Thursday’s Village Board meeting that she was resigning effective 12:01 a.m. Friday. Holzkopf said she didn’t want to allow “a false narrative to be formed about my resignation.”

Holzkopf told the Northwest Herald Monday that she thought she had properly submitted this year’s form but that officials came back and said she had not.

State’s Attorney Patrick Kenneally and the head of his office’s civil division, Norman Vinton, said Holzkopf was notified 11 times that the document’s due date was coming up. The county clerk’s office emailed “reminders” to Holzkopf on Feb 1, 15 and 29; March 14 and 28; April 11 and 25, officials said. Emails also were sent to Huntley Village Hall on March 21 and 22 and April 18. A certified letter was sent on May 2 to Holzkopf’s home. It was signed for by Richard Holzkopf on May 6 and informed her of the law requiring her to submit the document, the officials said.

Holzkopf is among seven people in the county who did not submit this form, according to the state’s attorney’s office. Of those, three have resigned from their public offices, including Holzkopf. The identity of the others was not immediately clear.

Kenneally said his office has a “duty” under the law to enforce the submission of the document.

“Every year, the county clerk sends us a list of those who are supposed to file the statement and those of who have not,” Kenneally said. “It is our [legal] duty to inform them that the stricture of the law is they resign or be removed.”

Even is she decided to turn in the document now it would be too late, Kenneally said.

Besides elected officials, some in non-political roles are required to submit this document. They are required for anyone who deals with budgets, and there are hundreds of people in the county required to file this disclosure, Vinton said.

“It is required so people can have a sense of people’s financial involvements and entanglements to ensure they don’t have any conflicts of interests and ensure they are not exploiting their position as an elected official in order to acquire financial gain,” Vinton said.

He said every year there are a few who do not turn this document in. It is not for nefarious reasons, but sometimes people just forget, he said, adding he feels sorry for those who don’t get it in on time. Vinton said there “are lots of good public officials out there” and sometimes they miss the deadline.

Holzkopf said she had done all she could to try to correct the issue and resubmit the form but was told she had to resign. Holzkopf said in her statement that she had replied “N/A” to all the form’s questions since she doesn’t benefit financially from her position. In prior filings, she had marked answers as N/A, which can be common on such forms. She added she donated her village board stipend to her church.

Holzkopf could have faced a civil court action by the state’s attorney’s office had she sought to remain in her elected post.

McHenry County Clerk Joe Tirio also confirmed Holzkopf didn’t file the form in time; he said the last time she logged into the filing system was March 2023, when she filed last year’s form. Tirio said his office gets a list from each agency of who needs to fill out the form each year, then reaches out to them by via multiple emails and a certified letter before the deadline.

Holzkopf’s seat is scheduled to be up for election next year. She said in her Facebook post that she’s been asked if she’ll run again. She wrote she hasn’t decided.

At Thursday’s meeting, Huntley Village President Tim Hoeft thanked Holzkopf for her service and told her “you did put your heart and soul into everything.”

Holzkopf said she didn’t agree with the consequences, but takes “full responsibility for the accidental and unintentional error in filing as well as the consequences that come with it.”

She thanked Village officials, constituents and her husband in her statement and ended her tenure on the village board by saying: “I know that my God works all things for the good, so I am fully trusting that this is all part of His plan and that He will turn, what I find to be an absolutely egregious consequence, into something beautiful.”