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Hottest races on ballots in Tri-Cities area

A battle for Campton Hills village president and nine people seeking three seats on the St. Charles Unit District 303 board top the list of hot races going into Tuesday's election.

Voters in Elgin also will decide whether Mayor David Kaptain deserves a second term, and residents in Lily Lake will settle a contested race for village president.

Campton Hills

Patsy Smith, the only president in the Campton Hills' history and a driving force behind its incorporation in 2007, is seeking a third term as a write-in candidate against Trustee Harry Blecker.

A board majority led by Blecker has clashed with Smith on numerous issues, such as the continued employment of the village administrator and the police chief and whether a trustee who moved out of town should stay on the board.

Smith has accused Blecker and his slate of exploiting a technicality in the election code to be the only candidates on the ballot.

She says Blecker and his allies have walked out of board meetings and that voters must choose whether they want the village to get "back to work."

Blecker says Smith's take-it-or-leave-it approach was needed in the village's early days, but more "finesse" is needed now to move the village forward.

He says he can bring the village together and says Smith's overbearing style has hurt morale at village hall and caused turnover.

Each candidate has a slate of candidates seeking three 4-year trustee seats, along with a 4-year village clerk term.

Blecker's slate is made up of incumbents Laura Andersen and Susan George and newcomer Mike O'Dwyer for trustee and Nicholas Girka for clerk.

Smith's slate features Steven Galloway, Don Sheluga and Mike Turgeon for trustee and Stephany Impson for clerk. All but Galloway on Smith's slate are running as write-in candidates.

Blecker also declined an invitation from Smith for a moderated candidate forum.

St. Charles District 303

The race for St. Charles Unit District 303 school board features nine candidates vying for three seats. Whoever is elected will play major roles in selecting the district's next superintendent, dealing with declining enrollment but higher expenses, and implementing or fighting Common Core provisions.

Of the nine candidates, three are incumbents: Kathy Hewell, Judith McConnell and Nick Manheim. Hewell has spent more than a decade on the board. McConnell and Manheim are completing their first terms.

There are also two former board members seeking a return to the board: Lori Linkimer and Mike Vyrzal. Linkimer helped select current Superintendent Don Schlomann and wants to help find his replacement. Vyzral lost his seat in 2013 by finishing seventh out of eight candidates seeking four seats.

The remaining four candidates are a mix of faces.

Rick Leidig is on the ballot of the second straight election. He finished in eighth place, right behind Vyrzal, in 2013. Leidig's top issue is preventing a repeat of the process that led to the creation of the Davis/Richmond grade level centers.

Jennifer Reeder and Lowell Yarusso are newcomers. Reeder's top issue is combating Common Core implementation. Yarusso wants to bring his decades of experience as a corporate performance consultant to the district. He views the school board as a board of directors and the superintendent as a CEO.

Steve Bruesewitz is also on the ballot, but he is not actively campaigning.

Lily Lake

The race for village president featured eight-year incumbent Jesse Heffernan and challenger Mike Carlson.

Carlson is calling for increased financial transparency and elimination of the code enforcement officer, while Heffernan said the small town's finances are an open book and facing challenges because Lily Lake's only gas station closed.

School races galore

You could field three baseball teams with the candidates running for school board in the Kaneland, Batavia and Geneva school districts.

In Kaneland, eight people are vying for four seats. And the matter is complicated by a law that says no more than three people from any one township can serve on the school board. Five Sugar Grove Township residents are running: incumbents Peter Lopatin, Tony Valente and Teresa Witt, plus challengers Dan Nagel and Jerry Elliott. The other candidates are incumbent Gale Pavlak and challengers Ryan Kerry and Pamela Voorhees.

Two issues have been discussed at length at two community forums for candidates: the board's ability to act civilly, and whether board members have relatives working for the district. The behavior question is prompted by incidents at board meetings where Valente has accused the board president of improperly running meetings and trying to censor him. Other board members have called Valente a bully for comments he made, including one calling a school superintendent a "carpetbagger" because he didn't live in the district, and another one where he heatedly asked a board member, who was a homemaker, what she did for a living.

Valente has questioned whether Lopatin and Pavlak can serve impartially when they have relatives employed by the district. Lopatin's wife is an assistant principal at the high school; Pavlak's son is a dean at the high school, and her husband drives a bus for the district.

In Geneva, seven people seek three seats. Incumbents Michael McCormick, Mary Stith and Kelly Nowak are running. So are Tina Yagla, Taylor Egan, Ann Murtaugh and Evelyn Schneider.

The Batavia school board race features the GROBatavia slate of Bill Gabriel, Ron Rechenmacher and Michelle Olache running on the theme of "grow education, not taxes." There's also former Batavia High School teacher John Dryden, who was publicly disciplined in 2013 for advising students they had a right against self-incrimination before administering a school-mandated survey on students' social behaviors and emotions, including drug use. Incumbents Cathy Dremel, the board president, and Melanie Impastato are seeking re-election. And Christopher Lowe and Ellen Knautz are also running.

Eight candidates are vying for four 4-year terms on the Elgin Area School District U-46 school board: Lawrence Bury, Phil Costello, Susan Kerr and Ed Novak, all of Bartlett; Jeanette Ward of West Chicago; Arisleyda Taylor of Streamwood; and incumbents Traci Ellis and Jennifer Shroder, both of Elgin.

Kai Rush and Cody Holt, both of Elgin, are vying for a 2-year unexpired term.

Elgin Community College

Incumbents Bob Getz and Donna Redmer and challenger Jeffrey Meyer are vying for two 6-year seats on the Elgin Community College board.

Redmer, of Dundee Township, is a retired educator completing her first term on the board. Meyer, 33, is an Elgin attorney. Getz, 72, of Elgin, is a retired Harper College administrator who has served 12 years on the board.

The candidates don't support a future tax levy increase and believe in keeping college tuition low.

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