LANSING | The Village Board must declare a "surplus" before selling unneeded Youth Center equipment and instead it could give such items to a religious charity, Trustee Bob Ryan said last week.
Ryan, chairman of the board's Youth Center committee at the time, pressed fellow trustees to follow the letter of the law by approving an ordinance formally proclaiming excess equipment at the Youth Center.
He then urged the board to give the property to Catholic Charities instead of selling it -- contrary to state law, Village Attorney Dale Anderson said.
Village President Dan Podgorski said a letter from Youth Center Director Tina Weddig at the board's May 8 meeting effectively "achieved the declaration of surplus."
Out of "deference" to Ryan, Podgorski agreed to table the item until June and suggested a new committee chairman, later designated as Trustee Patty Eidam, might "move it along at that time."
Village Attorney Dale Anderson said Illinois law technically requires trustees to adopt an ordinance and bid the excess items.
However, Weddig told the lawyer the items possess little or no value and could be more easily sold at a garage sale of sorts, Anderson said.
"I was advised by the director of the Youth Center that (bids) would be overkill in this case," he said. "Based on that, I did not feel it was necessary to go that route. If board members so feel, then I'd say, 'Do it the legal way. Create an ordinance, hold a sale and go from there.'"
Nonetheless, giving the property to a particular charity would not be the proper way to dispose of it, Anderson said.
"Then we have a problem deciding which is the appropriate charity," he said. "It's either a matter of doing it the way we're going to do it or, since this is a board, I would hold back and change my opinion, based upon the fact that you feel some of these things have value.
"Then we have to dispose of them in the legal, technical way."
State law makes no reference to the value of the excess equipment, said Ryan, a former state representative.
"Once you declare something a surplus, you can do whatever you want with it," he said. "Why open ourselves up to criticism or potential liability if somebody is sitting at a garage sale and getting $100 and somebody says we need to keep receipts for $100?"
