KANKAKEE — The chairman of the Kankakee County Board resigned from his post on Tuesday ahead of a special board meeting to consider his ouster after he recently took a job with the firm behind a controversial electric vehicle battery plant being built in Manteno.
Under Andrew Wheeler’s leadership, the board was one of several taxing bodies that agreed to provide millions of dollars in incentives to lure Chinese-owned Gotion’s $2 billion EV battery plant, which was vigorously opposed by far-right Republicans who raised fears of communist infiltration.
Wheeler’s employment by Gotion after the board he sat on helped pave the way for the plant will no doubt create conflict of interest concerns, County Board member Robert Ellington-Snipes acknowledged Tuesday.
“It raises the eyebrows of individuals that are in opposition,” Ellington-Snipes said following Tuesday’s brief board meeting.
But Wheeler did not violate any laws by taking the job at Gotion, according to a county official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
A special County Board meeting on Tuesday to discuss whether Wheeler should be removed from his post only lasted about three minutes when Kankakee County State’s Attorney Jim Rowe read a resignation note he received late last week from Wheeler, whose term was up at the end of November. Wheeler gave no reason for his resignation in the note.
Wheeler responded to a request for comment after the meeting with a text message saying he would “no longer have comment on my time in government. That is over and I am back in the International manufacturing arena … where my expertise and education provide value.”
He noted that he was replying on his personal phone and that “when I get a Gotion phone I will be more able to respond.”
County Board member Peggy Sue Munday said she called for Tuesday’s meeting, with support from other board members, because she felt Wheeler has not been adequately performing his duties as board chairman since going to work for Gotion. Wheeler was paid about $60,000 a year as board chairman.
“Unfortunately when you make a decision to leave a job, you need to leave it 100% or you need to work it 100% until your time’s up. And that’s not what happened here,” Munday said. “He continued to draw a paycheck and wasn’t doing the job and that’s what this meeting was about. It had nothing to do with Gotion.”
“He’s not in the building. He’s not returning any phone calls. He’s not returning any emails,” Munday said. “I get it. He’s a lame duck. We understand. We know what that means. But just because you’re a lame duck doesn’t mean you don’t do the job. You continue to do the job until your time is up.”
Munday wouldn’t comment on the propriety of Wheeler’s move to Gotion, but said the board did everything properly in dealing with the company.
“When we voted on this, we voted with the material that was given to us,” Munday said. “And the County Board did nothing unethical.”
Gov. JB Pritzker has been an enthusiastic backer of the Gotion plant, which is in line for $536 million in state incentives. In addition, the Illinois Department of Transportation earlier this year announced the county was awarded $2.9 million to rebuild and modernize a local road to help connect to the new Gotion factory.
Kankakee County, along with the village of Manteno and eight other taxing bodies, agreed to cap Gotion’s real estate taxes at $2 million annually for 30 years as part of the deal that landed the plant.
Last year, Gotion got approval from the the village of Manteno to build the EV plant, which offers the prospect of creating about 2,600 jobs and fits into Pritzker’s goal of making Illinois a hub for electric vehicle manufacturing.
On Tuesday, the governor’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment on Wheeler’s resignation as board chairman, or his job with the company. A Gotion representative could not be reached for comment.
Gotion Inc. is a Fremont, California-based subsidiary of Gotion High-Tech of China, which is about 30% owned by Germany’s Volkswagen. Critics have cited the corporate bylaws of the parent firm requiring Gotion to “carry out Party activities in accordance with the Constitution” of the Chinese Communist Party. Such language is standard for Chinese corporations under the laws of their country.
The controversy in Manteno echoes one that ensued following Gotion’s earlier announced plans for a $2.4 billion electric vehicle battery plant in Big Rapids, Michigan, about 50 miles north of Grand Rapids.
U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood, a Peoria Republican who held a roundtable discussion in Manteno earlier this month over his issues with Gotion, and others in Congress have raised concerns about what they see as the company’s ties to the CCP and its alleged links to slave labor.
A judge recently dismissed a Manteno-area citizens group’s lawsuit against the company.
Meanwhile, supporters of the project, slated for a roughly 150-acre, abandoned Kmart warehouse distribution site near Interstate 57, dismiss such fears by noting long-standing Chinese investments in the U.S. They point to the prospect of thousands of jobs paying an average of $55,000 a year and the project’s potential to spur local economic development.
The Pritzker administration has said Gotion has been working in the United States for the last decade, starting with a Silicon Valley research and development center in 2014 under President Barack Obama and opening a Cleveland-area facility in 2018 under President Donald Trump.
As for other issues with the plant, Manteno officials have attempted to allay concerns about its environmental impact and the potential for fires by saying they plan to upgrade hazardous materials training for the town’s firefighters, and make changes to their various safety policies if necessary.
Tribune reporter Rick Pearson contributed from Chicago.
