Berwyn Mayor Bobby Lovero

A “transparency” ordinance proposed Oct. 25 by a Berwyn alderman and mayoral challenger was quickly derailed and shuffled off to “legal review” by fellow aldermen.

Sixth Ward Ald. Teddy Polashek proposed amending the city’s purchasing process by adding “responsible bidder” criteria for vendors. Along with proper registration, licenses and insurance, bidders would have to provide proof they pay prevailing wages, as required by Berwyn ordinance. The ordinance aimed to stop “chain bidding” where preferred vendors billed jobs in small chunks under the $10,000 threshold for requests for bids.

But fellow elected officials were ready with a lightning response before anyone could make a motion to accept the ordinance.

“Motion to defer generally and defer to legal for investigation,” said First Ward Ald. Nona Chapman followed by a “Second!” from 8^th Ward Ald. Nora Laureto.

“Mayor I don’t know where this ordinance came from. I have no idea who wrote the ordinance, I would definitely like to defer generally and refer to legal for investigation. This is not something we generally do,” Chapman said.

“We’ve had no conversations with regard to this. We don’t know who wrote it,” agreed Laureto. “Unless Ald. Polashek has ‘attorney at law’ next to his name now, I would like legal to review.”

Polashek works as a firefighter for the Town of Cicero. He announced his candidacy this fall for Mayor along with 3^rd Ward Ald. Marge Paul, who’s running for Clerk, and a slate of newbie candidates. “[The proposed ordinance] is something that’s transparency for a better government and makes the system a little bit easier for the taxpayers,” Polashek said.

Paul, who is an attorney, had reviewed the ordinance, she said. The city needed to be clearer for vendors that they and subcontractors must follow prevailing wage rules.

Berwyn Ald. Teddy Polashek

“This motion allows us to clarify and define what the prevailing wage is,” she said. “Municipalities can be in trouble if we don’t give proper notice,” she added.

Polashek asserted the changes would keep vendors accountable. “This is pretty much transparent. If there’s nothing to hide, why should we not pass this?”

“So are you insinuating that we’ve hidden stuff?” asked Mayor Bobby Lovero. “It that it?”

Polashek responded “No I’m not insinuating at all. I’m stating a fact that …”

“No one’s disagreeing with anybody, it’s just we don’t like the way it was presented,” Laureto said. “And I take offense to that.”

“Once legal reviews it, if they see that it’s in form, then it will come back,” Lovero said. The city’s legal team includes Anthony Bertuca and the Del Galdo Law Group.

The motion to defer passed five-to-three with 4^th Ward Ald. Robert Fejt joining Polashek and Paul voting no.

Later Paul said she doubted the motion would ever return to the council floor.

“They didn’t vote against it, they tabled it indefinitely so it sits out there in never-never land and will never see the light of day,” Paul said.

Paul said in her seven years on the council, she saw vendors who avoided a formal bid process by submitting a series of smaller invoices.

“A number of companies doing work for the city in aggregation have exceeded the [$10,000] limit and should go out for [Request for Proposals],” she said. “It’s frustrating because you get the feeling the work has already started and it’s just a formality. We should adhere to the guidelines from the state and have an even playing field for bidders,” Paul added.

Berwyn City Council meeting, Oct. 25 (Chronicle Media)

Polashek said the changes to the bidding system would guarantee that qualified workers were doing the job. Concrete poured poorly in his ward provoked complaints from residents.

“The workers didn’t do a very good job,” he said.

This ordinance would improve quality of workmanship and adequately trained employees, he said.

“We need a protection plan set up for local government and taxpayers because we’ve had shoddy work done and the lowest bid is not necessarily the best quality.”

Paul observed her colleagues’ parliamentary maneuvers were not sophisticated.

“The way [Chapman and Laureto] went about it was one of the most rude ways I’ve ever seen,” she said. Chapman and Laureto did not return phone and text messages for comment.

When asked if the ordinance was proposed just to embarrass other aldermen, Paul said, “I’ve been accused of grandstanding before.”

Polashek said he would wait until the city attorneys had the wording for a while and then try to follow up.

“I’m allowed to have my opinion,” he said. “The responsible bidder ordinance really gets rid of cronyism and makes it difficult for the ‘friends and family plan.’ We need responsibly bid contracts to make sure jobs are being done right with quality contractors.”

Lovero declined to comment.

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— Berwyn alderman’s transparency proposal diverted to ‘legal review’ —