Major figure in South Barrington history dies

A former South Barrington trustee who saw the village through one of the most tumultuous periods in its history a decade ago is being mourned this week.

David Shotts, 69, now of Lake in the Hills, suffered a fatal heart attack Tuesday afternoon during the buildup to the blizzard. He was leaving Prairie Middle School in Barrington, where he had been substitute teaching, when he collapsed on his way to his car.

Shotts was attended by school nurses and two parents with medical training who worked to stabilize him with a defibrillator until paramedics arrived. He died in the hospital later Tuesday night.

“I’m proud to call him my friend,” South Barrington Trustee Steve Guranovich said Thursday. “He was a gentleman certainly, and a gentle man. He was just like — I hate to say it — a wise old owl. He was more than religious, he was spiritual. He was a good soul.”

Shotts had been an Army captain who was awarded the Bronze Star during the Vietnam War.

Later in life he became a visiting professor at Northwestern University and a lecturer in the Political Science Department of the University of Illinois. He was involved in the development of trade treaties during the ‘80s and ‘90s and served as president of several companies.

Shotts was elected to the South Barrington village board in 2001 as part of a slate critical of the prior administration’s approval of the Klehm Woods subdivision by Mesirow Stein Real Estate.

But he later became one of the chief negotiators of a settlement of Mesirow Stein’s breach-of-contract lawsuit against the village and what Guranovich considers the all-important boundary agreement between South Barrington and Hoffman Estates.

Though a Lake in the Hills resident at the time, he was appointed in 2009 to a commission looking at South Barrington’s police staffing levels. He previously had served on a similar panel for the Chicago Police Department.

Guranovich said Shotts had a history of heart problems. But Guranovich, whose wife works at Prairie Middle School, remarked that Shotts was doing something he absolutely loved on the day he died.

Shotts thoroughly enjoyed the experience of teaching younger students as a substitute during the last few years and that the kids had loved him too, Guranovich said.

According to Barrington Unit District 220, Shotts had been substitute at both the middle school and Barrington High School since September 2002.

Shotts is survived by his wife, Karin, two daughters from a previous marriage and his wife’s son and daughter. No information about funeral arrangements was available Thursday.