LUCIA ROBINSON

candidate for 2025 OAK PARK VILLAGE Trustee

1. What motivates you to seek this office? What skills do you bring to the office? What sets you apart from other candidates?  What does success look like for you after four years in the position?

I am driven by a desire to create positive change and foster a thriving, inclusive environment for all residents.  Oak Park has been home to my family for two generations. My parents moved here from Little Village, looking for a diverse and safe community with good schools. My husband and I chose to raise our children in Oak Park for the same reasons.  My family is committed to service and to working hard to build a strong community.  We have served in teaching positions, worked with local non-profit groups, and volunteered in various capacities.  This commitment to civic responsibility motivated me to run for office in 2021. I won that seat and in 4 years of service, I have learned much about this community.  I want to bring that knowledge of our strengths, weaknesses and opportunities into the next term to continue building a better community.  

Being an attorney has given me analytical skills - skills I use to thoroughly prepare for our meetings and to balance the perspectives brought forth from Village staff, community members and data.  

Success in the next four years looks like a police station at a cost the community can bear, the adoption of a permanent alternative response system for non-emergency calls, continued funding for housing programs that ensure we remain a diverse community, and providing quality services without increasing the levy beyond the cost of living.

2. What do you see as the three biggest challenges or opportunities facing the Village in and what role do you see the Board playing to address them over the next four years?

i) Community Safety - Everyone should feel safe in this community. Ensuring a well-staffed police department is essential to re-institute the community policing program, to perform traffic enforcement to keep our streets and sidewalks safe, and to allow officers time to be properly trained.  

I support robust recruitment of new officers and lateral hires to improve staffing levels.  I also support making permanent our alternative response to low-risk and mental health calls. Using non-sworn personnel is the appropriate response for these calls and frees our police to handle more dangerous calls that require their expertise. It also saves money.

The Village Board needs to move forward with building a new police station expeditiously. I will focus on that project first, followed by necessary improvements to Village Hall.  These projects need to start by setting the budget and allowing that budget to determine what we can build, rather than deciding what we want to build and figuring out how to pay for it later.

ii) Affordable housing - Home ownership is becoming more expensive at an aggressive rate. Oak Park, typically a leader in many things, lags behind its municipal counterparts across the Chicago region in home ownership among Black, Latinx and Asian home owners. In 2022, I helped to create the Housing Trust Fund, a stand-alone fund in the Village budget that supports affordable housing programs. This fund has supported affordable rental and temporary housing. In the next term, I will advocate to use it to fund home ownership programs for low income residents so they can build equity.

iii) Financing capital improvement projects - We have several large scale capital improvements in the next term - the construction of a new Police Station; Village Hall improvements; the Oak Park Avenue Streetscape Project; the Chicago Avenue Streetscape Project and the Lead Water Line Replacement Project.  All of these are high ticket items and the impact on the taxpayer needs to be appropriately managed.

The Board should seek grant funding to the greatest extent possible for each of these projects. In addition, we need to understand how the cost will impact residents’ tax bills before we begin to design their scope.

3. What is your decision making process? What steps are steps the Board can take to ensure transparency, clear communication, and community engagement, hearing from the broad spectrum of Village constituents?

My decision making process is centered on one question - what is best for Oak Park? As I consider problems and proposed solutions, I look at both quantitative and qualitative information.  I weigh staff’s input as well as feedback from Village partners, community leaders and residents. Lastly, I talk with my board colleagues to build consensus around a solution to have a more streamlined and productive board discussion.

We should leverage technology to encourage greater community engagement.  That begins with exploring options to engage a more interactive survey process and virtual town hall meetings. We can also develop a method for board members on opposite sides of an issue to share their perspectives (the Village’s newsletter or local print media are options) on issues that garner community attention.

4. Volunteer citizen boards, commissions, and committees advise the village trustees. Do you believe that these entities are utilized effectively? What (if any) changes would you like to see to their authority, responsibilities, and oversight?

The commissions are like subcontractors to the Village Board, engaged to investigate matters more deeply than the board has time for and to report their findings back to the board for action.  It is my goal that those who volunteer for these roles use their time in ways that are impactful.  That impact is greatest when the board provides clear direction to the commissions. 

I have two proposals to make the boards and commissions more efficient:  1) combine commissions whose work overlaps and 2) hold commission meetings when they are needed, rather than monthly, so that those who chose to volunteer for our community use their time effectively.

5. Please share your thoughts about the Village’s current financial picture. What’s your understanding of the Board’s role in the budgeting process and the allocation of resources? Do you have organizational finance experience?

The budget is the board’s major responsibility.  It funds our core services, board goals and it supports our partner agencies. I have been a member of the board’s finance committee for the last two years.  I also have extensive work experience in the financial services sector.  This provides me with an understanding of the Village budget so that I can try to optimize Village services in ways we can afford.  

I would like the board to begin budget discussions earlier.  I would also like to discuss the discretionary portions of the budget first so that we have more time to deliberate on the portions of the budget where we can exercise the most control.

6. What would you say to voters who are worried about Oak Park’s overall tax burden?

I am worried about it too. It is one of the reasons I am running. I requested an assessment of the property tax impact to the Village Hall project as we proceed to the design/construction phase.  I am worried that the project will be so expensive that it will push people out of the community because they cannot manage the long-term tax increases. We should create a decision-making process where we are building what we can afford, rather than trying to afford what we want to build.

7. Given the Village’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Statement, what steps should the Village take to support underrepresented and disadvantaged people and businesses?  Give an example that is or would significantly advance the Village in achieving its aspirations. Have recent discussions in the larger community and or at the national level informed or changed your thinking?

The Village should maintain its commitment to the Language Access Policy we passed at the end of last year. We border Chicago where ~ 40% of its residents speak more than one language, and Berwyn with one of the largest suburban populations of Spanish-speaking residents. In addition, Oak Park’s Latinx population has more than doubled in recent years. 

Despite this, when I joined the board in 2021, the Village did not have any translation services for government services or resources. I successfully advocated for a language access policy so that everyone, regardless of their English proficiency, can equitably access local government services. It is imperative that we roll it out as planned. As the board’s first and most ardent advocate for language access services, I remain committed to implementing this policy and maintaining the integrity of our diversity, equity and inclusion goals.

8. What policies and programs should the Village undertake to improve its tax base and help local businesses, and continue to develop a diverse mix of businesses? Are there specific geographic areas on which you would focus? Please share your thoughts about the proposed Economic Vitality Strategic Plan? 

We should increase the number of residents and visitors coming to our business community. Increased traffic produces increased sales that benefit our businesses and raises our sales tax revenue (including food and liquor tax revenue).

In addition, we should focus on creating “missing middle” housing.  “Missing middle” housing is defined as 2 and 3 unit residential buildings in existing residential districts of Oak Park.  By adapting our current housing to allow for more than one unit in a home, we will create a tier of affordable housing that is distributed throughout the Village.  When residents are not cost-burdened by housing, they have more discretionary income to spend locally which boosts the local economy.

9. What do you see as the most pressing issue relating to housing in Oak Park? What policies would you advocate to address this issue? Do you consider support for affordable housing to be a core function of our village government? Please explain.

As noted in answers 2 and 8 above, we need affordable home ownership programs and “missing middle” housing. Please refer to those answers for details.

10. Rental units comprise about 41% of Oak Park’s housing stock. How can the Village better serve the needs of renters in our community?

The Village recently engaged a fair housing advocacy organization to assess rental housing providers’ compliance with county, state and federal fair housing laws. That assessment revealed a need for greater awareness of fair housing laws related to screening prospective renters. The assessment failed to address language access barriers and did not measure compliance with laws that prohibit landlords from discriminating on the basis of citizenship, immigration status or English proficiency. The Village should overhaul its landlord education programs to ensure compliance with ALL fair housing laws and support landlords in developing policies and practices that eliminate any possible discriminatory practices.

11. How can the Village better serve the needs of the disabled in our community? Those who wish to age in place here in Oak Park?

We can address the needs of both the disabled and older residents by incentivizing residential development that includes accessibility features.  Buildings that offer wheelchair accessibility, elevators, low counters and walk-in showers can provide livable spaces for older adults and those with physical challenges. 

In addition, we should ensure continued support for programs that assist older and disabled adults with home maintenance needs like snow removal, leaf collection and our single-family loan rehab program. These programs bring homes into compliance with housing and building codes and eliminate health and safety hazards. 

Lastly, we need to keep property taxes reasonable.  Due to labor contracts and inflation, there will always be some increase, but those increases need to be predictable so that residents on fixed incomes can budget appropriately.

12. Oak Park adopted the Welcoming Village Ordinance in 2017 regarding immigrants, and has often championed expanded rights for marginalized persons. What role should the Village Board play in the face of current national challenges?

The Village should identify programs that are wholly or partially supported by federal funds. We should then work with other Village taxing bodies who will also be impacted by federal cuts and develop a contingency plan to meet program needs. This is not an issue we should resolve in a vacuum, but an opportunity to come together with other Village leaders and look for solutions. 

If receiving federal funds is dependent on providing details on undocumented persons, we should ensure Village records do not include such information so that we can affirmatively deny such a request.

Lastly, we should support legal challenges to actions which threaten federal funding, such as joining amicus briefs to defend legal challenges to anti-sanctuary city policies. 

13. How do you define public safety and effective policing?  How would you work to create an Oak Park where all community members feel safe?

Everyone should feel safe in this community. A successful public safety program should be based on the principles of community policing.  In addition, the Village’s alternative crisis response program (ECHO) is in a 2 year pilot phase.  I support making it permanent so that low-risk and mental health calls for service are directed to non-police staff. This allows our sworn officers to handle more dangerous calls that require their training and expertise. 

In the new term, I will continue to support a robust recruitment program for new and lateral hires. I will urgently advocate for a new police station built at a reasonable price point based on construction estimates and the core needs of our police staff.

14. What is your opinion of the Village’s Climate Action Plan and its implementation so far?

I voted for the passage of Climate Ready Oak Park (CROP), our climate action plan. The Board has steadily approved plans and initiatives under CROP. Moving forward we need to identify a source of funding to continue implementing CROP goals. The Sustainability Fund was funded by our community choice electric aggregation contract.  This energy supply contract no longer adequately funds our goals.  We should restructure our community aggregation electric supply contract to allow for a higher municipal contribution.

15. What approach should the Village take towards intergovernmental cooperation initiatives such as the Collaboration for Early Childhood. Are there other specific initiatives that you would like to implement or expand upon with other local and or regional governing bodies and nonprofits? 

The mission of the Collaboration for Early Childhood (Collaboration) is personally relevant to me.  During my childhood I benefited from WIC, sliding scale preschool and other programs supported by the Collaboration. I know from firsthand experience that addressing the cognitive, social or emotional needs of children from birth to 5 is the building block for equity. 

In the next term, the Collaboration’s Tri-Board (made up of representatives from the Village Board and both school boards) should plan to assist the Collaboration in addressing any gaps resulting from federal funding cuts. In addition, we should continue to work with the Collaboration in getting longitudinal data on the impact of its programs.


16. Should the Village Board spend its time to make proclamations or take stances on national or international issues? Please explain your thinking.

We should focus on the local impacts of national/international issues. Oak Park does not operate in a bubble and we should address local issues resulting from larger actions/events occurring on the national or international stage.

17. One of the Village Board’s primary responsibilities is oversight of the village Manager. What criteria do you believe the Board should use to evaluate the performance of the Village Manager?

The board should evaluate the Village Manager’s performance in several ways, including the extent to which Village services are improving the quality of life for our residents, adherence to board goals, responsible financial management of the organization, the quality of information provided to the board for decision making, timely responses to board questions/requests, hiring and professional development of senior staff and maintaining political neutrality so that all board members are treated equally.

18. Last November, Oak Park voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot initiative that proposed that voters be able to approve ordinances and policies though a direct vote. At this point the vote on the ballot initiative was advisory or non-binding. The next step is for the Village or any other taxing body in Oak Park (as reported by the Wednesday Journal, November 7, 2024) to decide whether or not to place the issue on the ballot as a binding referendum. Please share your views on this initiative. 

Direct democracy is a way for meaningful participation in local government. I support allowing constituents to inform the legislative process. But democracy only reaches its fullest potential when voter access is equitable. I would like the Village’s law department to opine on the local ballot initiative.  There are legal challenges to similar initiatives in other communities, within and outside of Illinois. For example, a binding referendum would create a conflict with our form of government if an initiative required funding or staff resources that the board did not approve.  A legal opinion will help the board clarify how we can optimize constituent participation. 

In addition, if we, as a board, are listening to the needs of our citizens such a process will not be necessary.  It is my goal to be responsive to the needs and requests of our citizens.

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