Dist. 6 hopefuls not worried about handling larger budget

With an 18-year veteran board member's seat up for grabs, the race in DuPage County Board District 6 offers its share of uncertainty.

Three Republican hopefuls will tussle in the Feb. 2 primary to win their party's nod to replace Linda Kurzawa. The winner will advance to the November general election against Democrat Dave Barry.

The GOP candidates say there is one certainty, however: if elected, getting a grasp on a budget significantly higher than they have dealt with in the past will not be a problem.

The three hopefuls - Milton Township Trustee Bob Larsen, West Chicago Alderman Matt Fuesting and DuPage County State's Attorney's Director of Communications Paul Darrah - agree the principles of a budget are the same, regardless of its size. And in the county's case, that means getting their arms around a $451.8 million spending plan.

But Larsen, whose township handles an annual budget of about $4.5 million, said the jump definitely will cause more of a reliance on staff members than in Milton.

"Essentially, the concepts are the same," he said. "However, when you scale up, different problems arise and they are not the same."

Larsen, a 20-year Marine veteran, likened it to the difference between running a platoon and operating a division.

"You have to rely on your staff and have open lines of communication with your staff," he said. "You have to work with them because they're going to be the number crunchers."

In West Chicago, Fuesting has sat on the finance committee and also was a business major in college. At one time, he owned his own business. The city's total budget was around $49 million last year.

He said his experience in business will serve him well, should he be elected.

"We've acted philosophically that (residents are) investors and customers, they're not taxpayers," Fuesting said. "When the budgets come out every year, you have to be aggressive. You have to delve into the departmental things."

The wild card in the race is Darrah. While he admitted he has no practical experience in handling budgets at the state's attorney's office, he said he will dive into research and speak with other counties about their situations.

He also will look for information from staff members to put himself in a position to provide input into the county budget preparation, he said.

"I would rely on them to tell me: 'This is what we need; what we really need,'" he said. "Not what we want, but what we need to get the job done."

District 6 covers the northwest corner of the county, including portions or all of Bartlett, Carol Stream, West Chicago, Winfield, Wheaton, Warrenville, Naperville and Aurora.