This is the long version: the statutes, the timeline, every dollar figure with the document it came from, the meeting transcripts, and a list of what we asked for and what came back. It exists so you can check our work, or argue with it.
If you just want to know what the ballot question means, read the plain guide instead. Nothing here contradicts it.
Three kinds of material sit behind these pages, and they are not equally strong. We label which is which throughout, using these tags.
Document A record we hold: a statute, an adopted budget, a FOIA response, a certified abstract. The strongest category.
Meeting record Something said at a public meeting, taken from the recording. Strong as to what was said, weaker as to whether it is true.
Not confirmed Something one side asserts that we have not yet matched to a document. We print these as claims, never as findings.
The meeting recordings are posted by the road district and carry automatic captions. Those captions do not label who is speaking. On a contentious night, with people talking over each other, the transcript renders several voices as one.
So we do not attach a name to a quotation unless the context makes it certain. The most important quotation on these pages, the answer about the savings figure, is attributed to a member of the township board, answering for the board, and it will stay that way until we confirm the speaker on video. We would rather publish a slightly weaker sentence than a wrong name.
If something here is wrong, tell us and we will fix it on the page, say what changed, and say why. We have already corrected ourselves in this file once: an earlier draft of our own notes said the township board could simply lower the road district levy on its own. That is wrong, and the reason it is wrong is set out in section 3.
Dates are from documents and recordings. Where a date rests only on one person’s account at a meeting, it is marked.
Four sections of Illinois law decide what this referendum does. Each is linked to the General Assembly’s own text so you can read it yourself.
Abolition takes effect on the later of ninety days after the result is certified, or the expiration of the term of the highway commissioner in office when the proposition passed. The commissioner then ceases to hold office.
Why it matters: the commissioner was elected in April 2025 to a four year term running to May 2029. Ninety days after certification would be roughly February 2027. The statute takes the later date, so the answer is May 2029.
The provision that does not apply: subsection (b) would strip a departing commissioner of his powers during the wind down, but it is written to apply only to referendums that passed at the election held November 6, 2018. It cannot reach this one.
Also worth knowing: this section contains no requirement that the transferred money stay dedicated to roads. There is no lock box clause in it. It does let the township contract with the county, a municipality or a private contractor to administer the roads.
The resolution the township posted carries a page headed “Proposed Amendment to 605 ILCS 5/6-134.” It would add a referendum passed at the November 3, 2026 election to subsection (b). If enacted, until abolition in 2029 the township board would have sole authority over the road district’s budget, its tax levy, its contracts, hiring and pay, and employee benefits, and the road district or commissioner could not “commence or maintain litigation against the township” over the powers in dispute.
Why it matters: it is the township’s own acknowledgement that under the law as written, a yes vote changes nothing about who controls the road district until 2029. The page names no author or sponsor and leaves the Public Act number blank. As of September 28, 2026 the statute posted by the General Assembly still limits (b) to 2018. Not law
The permanent road tax is itself created by referendum and remains in effect until repealed by the legal voters, with repeal requiring its own separate referendum initiated by petition.
Why it matters: the permanent road tax is roughly $1,294,000, about 78 percent of the entire road district levy. Abolishing the road district does not repeal it. It transfers the tax, and the authority to levy it, to the town board. A voter who expects this question to lower the road tax line on their bill is expecting something the statute does not do.
The township board adopts the road district budget and appropriation and levies its tax, and must consent in writing before the rate exceeds .125 percent, up to a ceiling of .165 percent.
Why it matters, and this cuts both ways. The commissioner prepares the numbers; the board adopts them. On June 15, 2026 the board adopted this road district’s budget five votes to nothing, then on August 10 described that same budgeting as a failure.
An earlier version of our own working notes said the board could simply vote the road district levy down whenever it liked, so no referendum was needed. That is not right, and the township attorney rebutted it on camera on September 21: the commissioner’s levy is his to set, the board cannot unilaterally lower it, and the board’s remedy is to refuse an unlawful one. We do not make that argument any more, and it should not be repeated.
The township supervisor, as road district treasurer, receives and has charge of all road district money, holds it subject to the order of the highway commissioner, and in township organisation counties the money is not paid out until the board has examined and audited the claims.
Why it matters: the commissioner quotes the middle of this section to say the money moves on his order. The board quotes the end of it to say nothing is paid until the board audits the claim. Both quotations are accurate and they are consecutive sentences of the same section. That is the honest shape of this dispute, and anyone telling you the statute plainly settles it has only read half of it.
A public question must be certified to the election authority not less than 68 days before the election at which it is to be submitted.
Why it matters: 68 days before November 3, 2026 is August 27, 2026. Confirmed The question was certified: it appears on page 4 of the County Clerk’s master specimen ballot (proof dated September 1, 2026) under the heading “Bourbonnais Township Proposition to Abolish Road District,” reading: “Shall the Road District of the Township of Bourbonnais be abolished, with all rights, powers, duties, assets, property, liabilities, obligations, and responsibilities being assumed by the Township of Bourbonnais?”
Two different instruments get quoted in this fight and they are not the same thing. Fund balances at April 1, 2026 come from the adopted budget. Invested cash at June 30, 2026 comes from the township’s own investment report. Both are correct. Do not swap them.
| Fund | Amount | Belongs to |
|---|---|---|
| Permanent Road | $2,950,376.19 | Road District |
| General Road | $167,983.36 | Road District |
| Road Insurance | $167,736.01 | Road District |
| IMRF Road | $291,354.61 | Road District |
| Building and Equipment | $119,706.73 | Road District |
| Road District total | $3,697,156.90 | |
| Town | $1,583,639.18 | Township |
| General Assistance | $437,012.08 | Township |
| IMRF Town | $792,535.71 | Township |
| All investments | $6,510,343.87 |
Document June 2026 Township Investment Report, distributed at a public meeting. All 27 rows were checked and both subtotals tie exactly.
The board’s own resolution says the disputed building project, which it puts at over $100,000, must be paid out of the Building and Equipment fund, which holds $119,706.73. The fund it says cannot be touched, Permanent Road, holds $2,950,376.19. Meanwhile the adopted budget for that same year appropriates zero to the Building line.
Those three facts come from the board’s own documents and they are in tension with one another. We are not saying that proves anyone acted unlawfully. We are saying the paperwork does not hang together.
| Item | Amount | What happens on a yes vote |
|---|---|---|
| Permanent Road Tax | ~$1,294,000 | Not repealed. The power to levy it moves to the town board in 2029, which then sets the amount. Repeal needs a separate referendum. |
| Commissioner pay and benefits | $126,950.96 | Eliminated. About 5.4 percent of the two levies combined. |
| Road district invested funds | $3,697,156.90 | Transfers to the town board. No statutory restriction on later use. |
| 2025 road district levy | $1,660,300 | Levying authority passes to the town board. |
| 2025 township levy | $700,980 | Unchanged. |
In the last audited year the township overspent its own capital outlay line by 948 percent, spending $42,656 against a $4,500 appropriation.
The fair counterweight, which belongs right next to it: Illinois appropriation law is tested at the fund level, not line by line. Total general fund spending came in under the fund appropriation, so the auditor recorded no overspend and no violation occurred. We are not alleging one.
The point is about the standard, not the dollars. If the board applies a line item test to the commissioner, it is applying a stricter test to him than its own auditor applies to the township.
The road district records its own meetings and posts them publicly. We transcribed the relevant ones in full. Timestamps below refer to the posted video.
An undocumented estimate is not a wrong one. The figure may prove close, and we have no basis for calling it false. What the record establishes is narrower and still significant: material published under the township board’s name carries an estimate attributed to the board, and when a resident asked to see the arithmetic, the answer was that it does not exist on paper and was shared privately with the board’s attorney.
This is the passage that corrected our own earlier error, and it sits in tension with the savings claim above. If the board cannot lower the levy on its own, the mechanism by which abolition produces half a million dollars of savings is a fair thing to ask about. Update, September 28: the information sheet now answers the mechanism: once the board holds the levying power, it would set a lower road levy. Under 6-134 as written, that power does not pass until the commissioner’s term ends in 2029.
Meeting record This matters because the abolition resolution alleges no road improvement project subject to competitive bidding was ever let. A competitively bid project, through the county, was reported in open session before that allegation reached voters. The dollar figure has not yet been matched to the county’s own award record.
R-09-26-02 was adopted five votes to nothing. Immediately before the roll call a member of the public asked the board to explain what the resolution did. No explanation was given and no trustee asked a question. That sequence is on the recording at 1:12:54.
Note also the wording. The resolution is titled around consolidating road district duties, a phrase spoken twice at the meeting including by the chair moving it, while the ballot text carried in the August resolution asks whether the district shall be abolished. Settled: the certified ballot says “abolish.” The information sheet voters are pointed to says “consolidation.”
We publish our own records requests so you can see the scope of each one. A negative answer is only as strong as the question that produced it, so the scope matters.
| Asked of | What we asked | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Kankakee County | Any record of being approached about taking over road district work, and any county engineer mileage determination | Answered No responsive records. No mileage determination exists. |
| Village of Bourbonnais | Any record of being approached about taking over the road district’s roads | Answered Nobody asked the village. |
| Bourbonnais Township | Five requests covering the abolition resolution and related records | Answered Answered in one letter on September 10, within the statutory time. A further tranche is estimated for October 29. |
| Bourbonnais Township | The adopted R-09-26-02, the information sheet in full, any record showing how the savings figure was calculated, and whether anything is being mailed and at what cost | Partly overtaken The information sheet is now posted on the township website. The savings worksheet, the executed R-09-26-02 and the mailing question remain outstanding. |
| Kankakee County Clerk | The certification of the public question and the ballot text as certified | Resolved Answered by the County Clerk’s own published master specimen ballot, which carries the question and its text. |
It asks for the arithmetic, not for who said what. If the township answers that it holds no such record, that answer is not a failure of the request. It is a written confirmation from the public body itself that the figure it published to voters has no documentary basis, which is a stronger and fairer thing to report than a quotation from a heated meeting.
These are open, and we will update this page as they close.