Embattled Dolton Mayor Tiffany Henyard unexpectedly turned up at a board meeting held outside the village hall on Monday evening, marking the latest drama in the southern suburbs.
Earlier, Henyard met with two administrators and several department heads at the village hall. However, the meeting was canceled due to lack of quorum.
“As you can see, the picture hasn’t presented itself, and these are things that residents are tired of. They’re tired of these kinds of games,” she said.
Meanwhile, a majority of administrators and about two dozen residents attended a meeting at a field house. The drama arose when Henyard showed up at this meeting.
“Just to be clear, just to be perfectly clear, I am here to appoint my police chief, the village administrator and my attorney,” she said.
Trustee Jason House, who is acting mayor, said the meeting was held at the grounds due to ongoing capacity issues at the village hall.
“The Attorney General gave us binding advice that meetings at the village hall were not legal – they breached the Open Meetings Act, meaning there was not enough space to residents and others,” House said. “Here there are no barricades and there is plenty of seating for residents and others.”
A Cook County Circuit Court judge recently blocked Henyard’s appointments to three key village positions. The judge sided with four directors who disagreed with Henyard.
They argued that the appointments of Ronnie Burge Sr. as police chief, Angela Lockett as village attorney, and Michael Smith as village trustee were illegal because the village board did not had not voted on these nominations and that the judge had accepted.
The trustees filed suit in Cook County Circuit Court, seeking a temporary restraining order to block the appointments.
“Those three were never presented to the board,” House said. “We never saw a resume or a background check.”
With the TRO in effect, Henyard appointees are still unable to take office.
Henyard is at the center of several investigations and prosecutions, including an ongoing federal grand jury investigation that began in November 2023. Federal investigators have requested financial records and other documents relating to Henyard in his role as mayor and also from Supervisor of Thornton Township.
