Activist Toolkit

1. What motivates you to seek this office? What skills, experiences, and perspectives would you bring to the Township, and why would those contributions be valuable in the role you are seeking election to?

The desire to serve my community is what motivates me to seek office. In my 37 years as a resident of Oak Park, I have engaged myself in service from coaching T-ball to serving on the school board. I have contributed my skills as a professional architect to deliver school projects on-time and under budget. I am currently providing Architect Peer Review for the Community Recreation Center. I am a consensus builder and strive to build working relationships with board members, staff, and the community. As a result, I have served on various committees and boards, including non-profit, for-profit, and political. I understand governance and have the track record to prove it. My tenure as President of the Oak Park Elementary School Board District #97 and my leadership as President of the West Suburban Medical Center are good examples.

2. What are the three biggest challenges or opportunities you expect Oak Park Township to face in the coming years, and how would you work with your colleagues to address these challenges or realize these opportunities?

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the inequities in our society, and we must ensure that our staff and the people we serve are beneficiaries of a fair and just system. The emotional toll on all age groups with varying degrees of loss, isolation, and debilitating stress will increase the demand for our mental health services. We will have to manage the need for social services while maintaining fiscal restraints. The Township also has a branding problem. Many people are unaware of our services even when they are availing themselves of a particular program. Our partners run programs funded by the Township, so the beneficiaries may not make the linkage with us.

3. How will you balance competing interests, such as your own values and opinions, input from Township staff and fellow Trustees, and diverse views from the community? How would you describe your leadership style and your decision-making process generally? 

We have to listen and be informed before making decisions. We are very deliberative in our process. All the essential programs have a committee that we populate with volunteers drawn from the township. We strive to be transparent and inclusive in our decision-making process.

4. What values would you bring to the budgeting process?  What changes do you favor in the process by which the Township conducts its budgeting and fiscal planning?

In April 2018, the Township Board of Trustees approved the creation of the Financial Advisory Committee the Township (FACT). The main goal is to provide a structured, systemic review of the organization's governance, risk management, and internal control practices.

The FACT Committee includes residents with knowledge of advisory roles, finance, IT, the law, risk, and internal controls. The committee meets at least six times a year and can convene in case of an emergency.

Each trustee serves as a liaison to each of our committees. We rotate assignments to be familiar with our programs and the budget process of the various departments. The budget develops over six months with presentations from the department directors. The board conducts its reviews and deliberations at public meetings.

5. How will you balance the community's desire to decrease the property tax burden with the Township’s mission of providing an array of services and supports to the community, including youth and seniors?

We must look for opportunities to collaborate with the other taxing bodies to look for savings and effectively limit overlapping services. We are very aggressive in seeking grants from state and federal agencies as we seek corporate and private funds sources.

6. How do you define equity? Have recent discussions in the larger community informed or changed your thinking? 

We serve as a safety net for our society. We provide social services for underserved people. Our challenge is ensuring that everyone gets the services that they need through the Township.

7. How do you plan to solicit feedback from people who may be experiencing this community in a different way than you? What barriers do you believe may exist in this process?

We must meet people where they are. The idea of focus groups and more participation in public and private meetings where we may gain the opportunity to promote our services is a worthy effort. We need to use every avenue of communication that is available to residents to reach them.

8. Residents often express confusion about the disparate roles of the Village and the Township, particularly in the wake of the advisory referendum on consolidation in 2018. What steps would you take to increase the visibility and community awareness of the Township’s mission and programs?

The Township is currently surveying residents to find out how they see our role and gauge their understanding of the services that we provide. We are working on branding all our programs to maintain awareness, primarily when our partner agencies implement such programs.

9. What relationship do you believe the Township should have with the other local taxing bodies? How can the Township and other government bodies work best together?

We currently have the opportunity to engage our peers in the other governing bodies through the Intergovernmental (IGOV) meetings and workshops. At the onset of the pandemic, we extended our reach to neighboring taxing bodies to share information and assets in a very collaborative manner. Our executive managers, directors, and superintendents maintain a reasonable degree of communication, and we must support such collaborative efforts.

10. What lessons learned from the adjustment of service and program delivery during the pandemic do you believe will be applicable going forward, even after the pandemic abates?

The pandemic allowed for more collaboration amongst the taxing bodies. It also forced some efficiencies in the delivery of services. While some of the efficiencies may be due to the reduction in person-to-person contact, we must prepare to adopt a hybrid of the processes that worked. We must not waste the experience by going back to business as usual.

11. Private fundraising for a proposed Community Recreation Center has begun. What resources do you believe the Township can or should bring to such a project? How do you see the Community Recreation Center leveraging existing local facilities and programs?

The Community Recreation Center provides visibility and access to some Township services, specifically Mental Health and the interventionist program. The Community Mental Health Board will locate in the public building instead of an obscure bank building in downtown Oak Park. It is a reasonable collaboration effort whereby the Park District builds a wellness center. The mental health board is a tenant supporting the program. The use of private funds is good for the taxpayers. I am committed to ensuring that we make it a community destination and a place for all Oak Parkers.

12. What concerns you most about the state of service availability in Oak Park? Is there a particular issue that motivates you to serve?

With a reasonable effort towards collaboration, we should maintain the standard of service delivery across the Village that residents and businesses demand. I am motivated to advocate for genuine cooperation amongst the government bodies. In the past, we have been successful when we have worked together with a shared goal.

13. How will you collaborate with neighboring communities? Discuss a specific initiative you would wish to undertake. What benefits and challenges would you anticipate?

I am always looking for ways to collaborate with neighboring communities. In 2015, I moved my architecture practice from Oak Park into the Austin neighborhood because I was invited to join the efforts to promote economic development on Chicago Avenue. We formed an organization that established itself as a partner with the Department of Planning and the Mayor’s Office. We have been able to create an economic empowerment zone that is changing the blighted avenue. We now have a new CTA All-Electric Terminal at the northeast corner of Austin Boulevard and Chicago Avenue. The residents are trying to create ‘Soul City,’ a destination for entertainment and business. There is currently no equity in the way we exist. The economic drain on our Austin neighbors is not sustainable.

14. Give an example of a time when you worked to understand a situation or view different from your own. What helped you to move through that process? What hindered you as you moved through the process?

During my tenure on the Oak Park Elementary School Board District #97, the Village had the option to either end or continue the TIF District on Lake Street for another 12 years. Both school districts were against an extension of the TIF. The Village argued that the extension would leverage the balance of developments projected within the TIF District. We were able to arrive at a compromise whereby the Village would carve out completed projects. As projects attained completion, they were added to the tax roll. The easy call for me as President of the school board was to end the TIF. Everyone wanted that solution, but we worked out an agreement whereby the Village could extend the TIF while carving out improvements.

15. Two advisory referenda were added to the ballot in Oak Park in November of last year through a process at the Township. Do you believe non-binding referenda such as these are a useful tool for governance and civic engagement? Why or why not?

No, non-binding referenda added to the ballot is not a useful tool for governance and civic engagement. The process by which an advisory referendum is added to the ballot is too self-serving. The number of individuals required to bring such questions to the Township is too small. Attendance at the Annual Meeting where the vote to accept such questions is poor. There is no civic engagement or requirement to educate the voters about the often oblique questions they are asked to approve.

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[The above answers were supplied on 2/19/21.]