Batavia Ward 2 hopefuls talk development

The name of candidate Leonard Solfa was misspelled in an earlier version.

When it comes to picking an alderman for Ward 2 in Batavia, voters can choose from two candidates with deep roots in town.

Current alderman Alan Wolff, 52, can cite his 16 years on the council. His Batavia roots run deep; he has lived in the town since 1972.

He has spent 32 of those years working as an auto mechanic, working a block-and-a-half from the Batavia Government Center. On Friday nights in the fall, you can hear him on BATV, commenting on Batavia High School football games. He is president of the BATV board, and has represented Batavia on the Tri-City Ambulance board.

Then there's 70-year-old Leonard "Len" Solfa Jr. He's lived in Batavia for 41 years. He has the time now, he said, to give back to his community, as work and family commitments have lessened.

Solfa has said his experience in business would make him an asset to the city council. He is an attorney, with certification as a mediator. His practice has included a stint as senior counsel for Old Second National Bank; he now is in private practice, in personal injury litigation representing plaintiffs and corporate defendants, as well as labor, employment and estate matters.

Issues

Development: "Batavia is a superb family community that faces many challenges from a developmental and fiscal standpoint," Solfa recently told a crowd at a League of Women Voters forum.

Solfa says the city should develop a team of people to scout locations and recruit mid-size and large corporations to move to town. He noted it already has the U.S. headquarters for Aldi.

Wolff says the city is "constantly" reaching out to recruit businesses, including working with organizations such as the Batavia Chamber of Commerce and Batavia MainStreet to highlight what the city has to offer. He says the city could improve the information it puts online for when companies are searching for a site.

Second bridge: Both favor having a second bridge over the Fox River.

"I've been for it since I started," Wolff said. "But the first thing is we have to agree on where we are going to put it."

Then the city should have a plan ready, in case the federal or state governments create a capital-projects improvement plan and start offering money.

"The last time that happened, we weren't ready (to apply) because we couldn't agree on it (a location)," Wolff says.

Solfa says that while the city should look for state or federal money, it is likely local residents will have to pay for at least some of it.

"We are going to have to face the fact that at some point we are going to have to have a tax increase," he says.

One North Washington: Solfa says he is disappointed that the Wilson Street retail space in the One North Washington Place complex planned for downtown has been reduced. Wolff defends the council's decision to allow the change, and says the project will spur retail development on several properties nearby.

One good idea

The Daily Herald has asked many candidates for village boards and city councils what one idea they have to better their community, that nobody else is talking about.

For Wolff, there are two. One is to improve public transportation. Although Pace has bus lines that run through Batavia on major arteries such as Route 31 and Randall Road, he would like to see more intracity public transportation to connect people to those lines, for traveling to train stations in Aurora and Geneva.

The other? Working with the Batavia Park District to put a recreation center into the former Sam's Club building on Randall Road. The building is set far enough back from Randall that it wouldn't diminish the city's goal of having sales-tax-producing businesses lining the road, which is lined with shopping centers.

Besides the recruiting team, Solfa says the city should survey the condition of streets, then develop both short- and long-term plans for improving them. The city does inventory the condition of pavement, and checks conditions annually. It had a consultant do a large-scale analysis in 2011.