Smart Meter Opponents' Appeal Rejected

The Illinois Appellate Court Ruled Tuesday that a proposed non-binding referendum related to the Naperville Smart Grid Initiative was ineligible to be placed on the March 20 primary ballot.

Now members of the Naperville Smart Meter Awareness group are debating whether to take the issue to the Illinois State Supreme Court and whether to seek to have another question placed on the November ballot.

After Naperville’s Local Electoral Board , The Naperville Smart Meter Awareness Group , which ruled against the question being placed on the March 20 ballot. The Group then filed an appeal with the Illinois Appellate Court. 

The question asked:

“Shall the City of Naperville immediately and permanently stop the implementation of the $22 million smart meter project and dismantle all related equipment?” 

The Naperville Smart Meter Awareness group published a news release early Wednesday morning taking issue with the decision, stating that it did not address the real reasons for the appeal, including misconduct, bias and misconduct by the Electoral Board.

“… The city should not be celebrating this as a victory,” the release said.  “The outstanding investigations by the Attorney General into the city's Open Meetings Act violations and the federal lawsuit are still in process.  All this shows is that the city intentionally participated in delaying this process long enough to block the voice of the people and misused tax dollars to do so.  That is hardly something to be proud of." 

The Appellate Court dismissed the appeal as moot since early voting for the Illinois primary is already underway, the city of Naperville said in a news release. 

“What the order does not say is as important as what the order does say,” Local Election Board attorney Margo Ely said. “It is apparent that the Appellate Court did not view opponents’ allegations of misconduct, bias and improper procedure as meritorious. The Appellate Court made the right decision, as did the Circuit Court and the Electoral Board.”

The Smart Meter Awareness group on Wednesday e-mailed the city asking it to make corrections to its news release and several members took issue with the language. City Manager Doug Krieger said the city would not be making any corrections and that the parties "will just have to agree to disagree."