Skokie Village Board rejects $3 ethics fine for former trustee who alleged Village corruption

A former Skokie trustee who was long vocal about corruption allegedly taking place among village officials will not have to pay a nominal fine for ethics violations that an advisory commission ruled the trustee committed in 2024.

Trustees Kimani Levy, Jim Iverson, Lissa Levy and Gail Schechter voted on Monday to reject the Skokie Ethics Commission’s recommendation to fine former Trustee James Johnson $1 for each of three ethics violations.

Trustees Keith Robinson and Alison Pure Slovin voted against rejecting the commission’s recommendation to fine Johnson, who served on the Village Board from 2021-2025.

Eight Skokie residents filed a complaint with the Skokie Ethics Commission in February 2025 that alleged Johnson violated the village’s code of ethics (Section 2-386) on at least three occasions in 2024, a report from the commission shows. 

The complaint, which was amended in March 2025, alleged that on each occasion Johnson inappropriately used Village property when Johnson stepped away from the dais during Village Board meetings to speak during each session’s public comment section.

Johnson, who was running for village clerk at the time, spoke during the sessions about “eliminating the Skokie Legal Department and restricting the hiring of outside law firms,” and the complaints allege Johnson used the Village’s microphone, projector, A-V system and YouTube account “to campaign for the Office of Village Clerk while being paid to serve as a Trustee.” 

Johnson, who uses they/them pronouns, filed a motion to dismiss the complaint, arguing the commission lacked jurisdiction because they were no longer a trustee and the complaint failed to state a proper claim, the commission’s report states. The commission rejected Johnson’s motion.

Johnson later lost the April 2025 election for village clerk and told The Record that during those public comments they neither mentioned their village-clerk candidacy nor spoke about issues that pertained to that campaign.

Ethics Commissioners Jonathan Minkus and Leonard Matanky voted on Feb. 11 to find that Johnson’s actions violated Skokie’s code of ethics, the commission’s report shows.  

Another commissioner, Habeeb Quadri, was listed in the Ethics Commission’s report as absent from the February vote. On Monday, Village Manager John Lockerby said Quadri was absent from the vote, and Mayor Ann Tennes said Quadri is no longer a member of the commission.

“Commissioners Minkus and Matanky attempted to fine me for giving public comments during public meetings about public policy; they demonstrated little understanding or respect of the right to free speech,” Johnson said in an emailed statement to The Record.  “I am not surprised that the Village Board dismissed their recommendation, and I look forward to seeing the Board reform the Ethics Commission in the months to come.”

Steven Elrod, who serves as Skokie’s corporation counsel, said the Village Board does not have the authority to relitigate the complaint, and the Ethics Commission’s determination that Johnson committed three ethics violations is the commissioners’ ruling, not the Village Board’s.

The Village Board only has the authority to review the recommendations from the commission; though, he said, individuals can appeal with the Circuit Clerk of Cook County to review the Village Board’s decision to reject the Skokie Ethics Commission’s recommendation to fine Johnson. 

Multiple ethics complaints 

Johnson filed their own complaint with Skokie’s Ethics Commission in April 2021 shortly after being elected to the Village Board as its only independent, non-Caucus Party trustee, the minutes from Ethics Commission meetings show. 

The complaint alleged that attorneys then-employed by the village had offered Johnson a position on Skokie’s Sustainable Environmental Advisory Commission on the condition Johnson not submit paperwork to run in the election and contest the dominant Skokie Caucus Party. 

While a trustee, Johnson went on to file three more complaints with Skokie’s Ethics Commission — complaints that alleged conflicts of interest between village officials and the Skokie Caucus Party, the minutes from Ethics Commission meetings show.

Notably, the Office of the Illinois Attorney General determined in April 2023 that the Skokie Village Board had violated the Open Meetings Act by discussing the overall performance and appointment process of its legal department during two January 2023 closed executive sessions, a letter from the Illinois Attorney General’s office shows.

In November 2023, then-Skokie Mayor George Van Dusen and five other trustees hired an outside lawyer to file a motion with the Ethics Commission urging the commission to dismiss Johnson’s latest “frivolous” complaint and fine Johnson $5,000, the Chicago Tribune reported.  

(Editor’s Note: The Record did not begin covering Skokie until October 2025.)

Skokie’s Ethics Commission voted to dismiss all four of Johnson’s ethics complaints, but the commission also voted 2-1 in November 2023 not to fine Johnson $5,000, minutes show.

‘Politicized and corrupted’

Recordings of past Village Board meetings show Trustee Johnson first providing public comment Jan. 16, 2024, about what they said was the village’s longstanding practice of the mayor and/or trustees appointing leaders from their own political party or campaign to “high paying positions” in Skokie’s legal department.

Johnson asked the board to update the village’s process for how it hires attorneys. Van Dusen said the Village Board considered changing its attorney-hiring process “and decided to remain with the system as is.”

“When somebody runs for office, as all of us have, you do so by making certain pledges to the public, and as part of that, you want people in office who agree with your policy, and part of that is having people in the legal department who agree with that policy,” Van Dusen said during that January 2024 meeting. 

“It’s a standing procedure going back eons in the United States; it is part of democracy. But I would caution the trustee to be very careful. We have a tradition in the village of not using Village Board meetings for campaign appearances.”

Johnson replied that they were “speaking solely as a resident” and again argued their case for “depoliticizing the legal department” during at least 20 Village Board meetings across 2024 and 2025, video recordings show.  

“All of you are very aware of how the Village Board has politicized and corrupted Skokie’s legal department, and that’s why I keep bringing this up because I sincerely believe this remains the most severe systemic problem within our village government,” Johnson said on Jan. 21, 2025. 

Van Dusen and trustees then on the board repeatedly pushed back on Johnson’s description of the village’s legal department as “politicized” during those meetings. 

A new ‘hybrid’ legal department

The February 2025 complaint against Johnson was amended in March 2025, which reportedly caused the Ethics Commission to cancel a hearing on the matter that was scheduled to take place before the April 2025 election in which Johnson was running, the Chicago Tribune reported. 

The Ethics Commission did grant a motion to dismiss six of the eight complaints against Johnson, which left only two people — Elline Eliassoff and Susie Richter — formally accusing Johnson of violating the village’s code of ethics, the commission’s report shows. 

The Illinois State Board of Elections lists Eliassoff as the chair and treasurer of an election committee for Trustee Slovin, who also served on Skokie’s Village Board during Johnson’s tenure. 

After reviewing evidence that Johnson’s public comments during Village Board meetings were recorded and broadcast on Skokie’s official Youtube channel and disseminated in Johnson’s “campaign materials through the use of social media and email,” the Ethics Commission ruled that Johnson violated Skokie’s code concerning employee ethics, its report states.

After Michael Lorge retired from his 13 years as Skokie’s corporation counsel in May 2025, the Village Board issued a formal request for qualifications and, at the direction of Mayor Tennes, created a search committee to interview potential candidates, village documents show. 

The board then voted unanimously in December 2025 to appoint Elrod and his law firm, Elrod Friedman, to serve as its new corporation counsel, implementing a “hybrid approach” with existing in-house attorneys.

On March 2, the Village Board voted unanimously to amend its village code to allow for that hybrid model and change how its corporation counsel is appointed. 

Under the previous rules, Skokie’s mayor had the authority to appoint all corporation counsel and assistant corporation counsel “with the consent of the Board of Trustees,” and those attorneys held office “until their respective successors shall be duly appointed and qualified.”

Now, Skokie’s corporation counsel must “be chosen solely on the basis of such acumen and municipal law experience without regard to such person’s political beliefs,” and the “terms of their engagement” must be approved by the Village Board, village documents show. 

Likewise, Skokie’s mayor and Village Board no longer have the authority to appoint in-house deputy and assistant corporation counsel. The amendments transferred the authority to appoint in-house attorneys, as well as the village’s personnel and labor relations, to the Village Manager. 

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