Candidates: Increase debate on DuPage County Board

The two candidates for a District 6 seat on the DuPage County Board both say they have ideas for making the board more accessible and understandable for the average resident.

The Nov. 2 race pits Republican Bob Larsen and Democrat Dave Barry, both seeking their first terms on the board to replace Linda Kurzawa, who is not seeking re-election.

Larsen's idea revolves around bringing more debate to the county board floor. The 46-year-old Wheaton Republican said board members should start interacting during public meetings instead of simply giving speeches.

“The sunshine laws in this state suggest that people want to actually see the issues debated in front of them, and while the system as it's currently set up allows for people to speak to the issues, there's not a lot of interaction directly between the board members,” Larsen said.

But Larsen, a lawyer who currently serves as a Milton Township board member, said a county board with more debate also would need more structure.

“Certainly I don't want endless debate to go on forever, but I think the public would like to see greater interaction between the board members not simply answering one question in a speech and then sitting down,” Larsen said. “We would have to look to an appropriate format, but that's one of the changes I would like to see.”

The other District 6 candidate, 61-year-old Bartlett Democrat Dave Barry, said the board needs to slow down when addressing agenda items at public meetings and make its committee meetings easier for residents to attend. Barry said a process called “most favorable rule” allows board members to group items and vote on them together, but confuses non-board members in attendance.

“It seems the business is rushed through,” Barry said. “I don't think a lot of people understand what the county board is doing. I think you have to go to committee meetings to find out what is going on because I think a lot of things are decided by the time it gets to the county board floor.”

But scheduling issues can often stop concerned citizens from attending meetings of county board committees, such as the public transit committee, which meets at 7:30 a.m. on the third Tuesday of the month, or the stormwater committee, which meets at 7:30 a.m. on the first Tuesday of the month.

“The committee meetings, sometimes they're very hard to get to,” Barry said. “People really can't take off from work to go to them. I'd like to see those meetings pushed into the evening hours or more of them pushed into the evening hours.”

District 6 covers all or parts of Bartlett, Carol Stream, Hanover Park, St. Charles, Warrenville, Wayne, Wheaton and Winfield.