Orland Park: Veteran and Pekau spar for a second time

By Jeff Vorva

Round two.

For the second time in three meetings, Orland Park’s Diana Howard, a veteran, stopped by Village Hall to get some things off her chest during her allotted three-minute public comment session.

Howard visited the Aug. 21 meeting and accused Mayor Keith Pekau, also a vet, of yelling and swearing at veterans during a veterans meeting in which the main topic was moving the American Legion post to bigger digs.

Pekau denied that and said, “We’ll, you’re on record with the defamation that you just made. It’s absolutely disgusting.”

Howard returned to the Sept. 18 meeting with some unfinished business.

“If there is one thing that anyone knows about me, love me or hate me, is that I am an honest person,” Howard said. “I walked into this meeting with the intent of bringing the truth to light. I listened to you all condemn me and scold me like a child.

“That man [Pekau] literally called me a liar and actually stated my comments were lies, mentioned defamation and acted all offended and indignant that these lies were being spread. Here’s the problem. They were not lies.”

She did, however, apologize for saying that Pekau was yelling at the veterans, but she still called it a “tirade.”

“I was told it was not yelling but it was a very angry conversation,” Howard said. “I was told ‘he was pissed.’ ’’

She said that he questioned her attendance at the veterans meetings and if she indeed was a veteran or not.

Howard said Pekau tried to get her attendance records and is “a little bit creeped” claiming he stalked her electronically and has screen shots of him looking at her social media pages.

Pekau wasted little time to jump on Howard’s admission that he did not yell at the veterans.

“You came here and you admitted that you didn’t tell the truth about what I said,” Pekau said.

He said that he did do some research on Howard because he needed to know if he, the board members or their families were in danger.

“The board members and [police chief Eric Rossi] knows about some of the things that we have dealt with, and we want to do a little bit of research to make sure that somebody that we haven’t seen before is not going to be a threat to us.

“I won’t apologize for that, ever.”

Happy 50^th

The board honored Fox’s Pizza and Irish Pub for 50 years in business in Orland Park.

Trustee Cynthia Katsenes said she worked at Fox’s when she was growing up and Pekau said he grew up within walking distance of the pub.

“Thank you all for what you do,” Pekau said to the Fox’s reps in attendance.