Huntley trustee leaving Sun City for ... Sun City?

A longtime Huntley trustee is leaving his Sun City, Huntley, digs for a new home in Sun City Vistoso — in Oro Valley, Ariz.

Trustee Paul Mercer resigned from the village board Thursday night, citing his pending relocation to the town just north of Tucson, with his wife, Judy. He would much rather dodge snakes and scorpions down south than the elements up here. “No ice, no snow, no tornadoes, no earthquakes, no flooding — stuff like that,” Mercer said.

He was first elected trustee in 1976 and served until 1984. He was reappointed to the board in 2002 and won subsequent elections in 2004 and 2008. With 17 years of service under his belt on the board, Mercer was its longest-serving trustee. He first moved to Huntley in 1971, when there were only 1,000 people in town. Today, there are nearly 25,000 residents.

“It’s grown a lot but the biggest reason for the growth was Sun City,” Mercer said, adding that the development helped end Algonquin’s and Lake in the Hills’ westward expansion near the village. “ ... Without the Sun City thing, I don’t know what would have happened to Huntley,” he said.

Even with all of the growth, he and the rest of the board and staff helped the village maintain its country charm — Mercer counts the weekly farmers market as one of his biggest achievements, in addition to the Route 47 interchange and its widening project. And the policies that late Village Manager Carl Tomaso put in place to helped guide Huntley through its exponential growth, Mercer said.

Trustees Pam Fender and John Piwko viewed Mercer as a mentor who took them under his wing and helped steer them through village politics.

He came with institutional knowledge about both the old and the new Huntley and wasn’t shy about sharing it, Piwko said.

Mercer was eager to keep the village connected, most notably through purposed bike trails all over the town, Fender said.

“He had a calmness about him that was really great,” Fender said. “He softly pushed and softly got progress done.”

Village President Chuck Sass will nominate someone to replace Mercer on the board at a later date. Trustees will need to approve that nomination.