Double election, double the work

Already spending most of their waking hours campaigning in one of the area's most competitive races, the candidates vying to represent the 14th Congressional District have their eyes on yet another prize: the special election.

And with that comes a whole host of hurdles for the hopefuls to jump.

Candidates seeking to compete in the special election -- which will be held simultaneously with the Feb. 5 regular primary -- can begin circulating their petitions immediately.

Filing is expected to begin Monday; even candidates already running in the regular primary must submit new paperwork to run in the special primary to fulfill former U.S. Rep. Dennis Hastert's unexpired term.

Democrats must submit 863 valid signatures; Republicans must have 793. That number, determined by the Illinois State Board of Elections, equals 0.5 percent of voters who cast ballots in the last primary for each of those parties.

Representatives of the Jim Oberweis, Bill Foster and Jotham Stein campaigns were collecting signatures at the Geneva train station early Tuesday morning. Oberweis is a Republican; Foster and Stein are Democrats.

"We want to present petitions bearing 2,500 signatures to show the media that ours really is the campaign with the strongest volunteer organization and the most support for Jim at the grass-roots level," Oberweis' campaign wrote in an e-mail to supporters Tuesday.

Foster said he plans to run in the special election.

"We had been planning on this possibility for quite some time," said Foster, a retired Fermilab scientist from Geneva.

The Republican and Democratic winners of the special election will face off in a special general election on March 8. That date, set by Gov. Rod Blagojevich, falls on a Saturday and would be the first weekend election in recent state history.

Blagojevich spokeswoman Rebecca Rausch said a Saturday was chosen to encourage higher voter turnout.

The winner would fulfill the remaining 10 months of Hastert's term.

The winner of the special election then becomes a short-term incumbent before the November general election. In most cases, incumbency is a major plus.

"A member of Congress can do a lot in eight months to establish themselves," said David Wasserman, an editor at The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan newsletter of electoral politics.

"They can send free mail to people in the district and they can get plenty of interest group and PAC money that I like to call 'Welcome to Washington' money. It helps them establish the kind of war chest that can sustain an incumbent for many (election) cycles."

Republicans Chris Lauzen, a state senator from Aurora, and Kevin Burns, the mayor of Geneva, also plan to run in the special election. So do Democrats John Laesch, who challenged Hastert last year, and Joe Serra.

"With the special election finalized, the pace just doubled and the stakes got higher," Laesch said.

Also running on the Republican side is Michael Dilger, an Evanston resident who has not spoken publicly since entering the race. It remains to be seen whether he will run in the special election.

The most recent special election in Illinois was in 1995, when voters elected Democrat Jesse Jackson Jr. to serve out the term of Mel Reynolds, who resigned upon being convicted of having sex with a teenage girl. Jackson's been in office ever since.