Ross, Park, Garner win Gurnee trustee seats

Two incumbents and an advisory plan commission member were elected to the Gurnee village board Tuesday.

Five candidates competed for three, 4-year seats. There would have been a sixth candidate in the race, but he was kicked off the ballot.

With all 33 precincts reporting, unofficial results show Trustee Cheryl Ross led the pack with 1,362 votes. She was followed by plan commission member Steve Park with 1,264 and Trustee Greg Garner’s 1,123.

Out of the money were newcomers Matt Koch with 1,088 votes and Heath Hummel at 965. Garner, Hummel and Koch ran as a political team listed on the ballot as Repeal Red Light Cameras. Garner is a political opponent of Mayor Kristina Kovarik.

Ross is one of Kovarik’s village board allies. She said the relatively tame election and low voter turnout could have been the result of general satisfaction with the way Gurnee has been operating.

“For the most part, people have been happy, and it’s been kind of a rough time the way the economy has been,” said Ross, a retired teacher first elected to the village board in 2007. “We’ve been managing well.”

Park, a senior vice president for The Alter Group, said his top goal as a trustee will be to examine what village government has been doing to stimulate economic development and determine what should be improved. He said he believes his experience in the commercial development arena will help him as a village trustee.

One of the key issues was the future of Gurnee Mills. Differences in how some of the candidates viewed the village’s top sales tax performer showed on the campaign trail.

Ross credited Gurnee Mills management for doing a good job with upgrades and overall improvements, while Garner questioned whether Simon Properties is more willing to open upscale shops at a nearby mall in Wisconsin than in the village.

Garner, who’s in pharmaceutical sales, joined the village board in 2005.

Trustee Michael Jacobs had planed to seek re-election, but he was yanked from the ballot earlier this year because his political committee owes the Illinois State Board of Elections more than $2,500 in fines connected to his 2008 run for Lake County state’s attorney, officials said.