By HOLLY WAGNER
Herald-Whig Staff Writer
The Quincy School Board is taking a wait-and-see attitude concerning Bud Niekamp's position on the board.
The board learned last month that Niekamp's tenure is subject to legal challenge. However, unless there is a legal challenge, "it's business as usual," legal counsel Dennis Gorman said.
The School Board's bonding agent, Chapman and Cutler, says it will continue approving bonds so long as there are four "yes" votes from the seven-member board.
They are being cautious by not counting any "yes" vote from Niekamp, Regional Superintendent of Schools Ray Scheiter said. However, the point is irrelevant because Niekamp normally votes "no" on bond issues.
School Board President Glenn Bemis discounted the idea that the opinion issued by the Illinois Attorney General's Office calls into question all of Niekamp's votes. Niekamp rarely casts the deciding vote on any weighty issues, he said.
"But one caveat, and this even applies to me," Bemis said. "Anything is challengeable for anybody taking any vote on the board, regardless."
The question of Niekamp's membership will continue to hang over the board.
"It's something that's going to be there until there's a legal challenge. (But) who knows when or if that will even come?" Bemis said.
While a legal challenge would clarify the issue, it would likely prove to be an expensive and unpopular position, Scheiter said.
"If no one's willing to step forward and do it, then it won't happen," he said.
The Illinois Attorney General's Office rendered the opinion that Niekamp's position on the School Board is in violation of a longstanding statute that it is incompatible to serve on both the school board and a county board in counties of more than 40,000 population.
Adams County's State's Attorney Jon Barnard had asked for the opinion after the April 7 election. Niekamp received 6,046 votes, making him the top vote-getter of six candidates who ran for the School Board.
Barnard, whose jurisdiction is to provide legal guidance to the County Board, said he had warned that board about Niekamp's conflict of interest after an Illinois court ordered a board member to step down in a similar case in 2005.
If the Attorney General's opinion had been that Niekamp's role on the County Board was void, "I think I would be needing to take action," he said.
Barnard said he is not responsible for how county state's attorney's handled the issue before his election in 2004. But now, it's the School Board's call, he said.
Niekamp was first elected to the School Board in 1989. He was voted onto the County Board in 1992.
Niekamp said he had once considered stepping down from the School Board, but no more. Despite his reputation for fiscal conservancy, he says it would take a court battle to remove him.
"It would be different if this were the first time I ran," he said. "I won't step down from either one. I'd be letting (my voters) down."
-- hwagner@whig.com/221-3374
