House District 96 hopefuls face off
It didn't take long for the dust to start flying during Wednesday's first head-to-head meeting between 96th House District candidates Republican Darlene Senger and Democrat Dianne McGuire.
The two squared off for an hour and a half at North Central College's new Thrust Theater, in a forum moderated and organized by the League of Women Voters of Naperville.
Opening remarks were cordial but many of the more than 100 in attendance wanted to hear more about a recent string of attack mailers, paid for by the Democratic Party that called into question Senger's voting record on issues of school funding and Senger's anti-abortion position.
McGuire's most recent mailing featured a coat hanger and stated "Senger wants to turn the clock back" on a woman's right to choose.
"Basically the campaign literature has been horrendous. If you've seen the fliers, this a new lowest of the low. No I do not condone it. I do not support it," said Senger, a two-term Naperville councilman to a rousing ovation. "This is typical style of Democrat Chicago politics in Naperville which we have not experienced before but I am above that. I basically am not going to worry about it."
McGuire got her own applause from her supporters for her defense of the fliers.
"Pointing out our differences is not smearing my opponent. The contents of my pieces point to public record," McGuire said. Efforts to educate the voters about our positions should not be construed as smearing someone.
"The style of the pieces was to draw attention to the issues and they have certainly drawn attention."
As for their initiatives, Senger promised to bring more accountability into state government and push for state residents to be able to log online and find a complete accounting record for the state.
"We need to have a more transparent accounting system at the state level," she said. "The technology is there so we need to make it happen. McGuire promised to push for legislation to ban predators from social networking sites and require them to wear electronic monitoring bracelets. The most serious offenders, she said, need to be sentenced to life in prison.
"I'm a teacher, I'm a mother and I'm a grandmother and I care deeply about the safety of our children. I am tired of hearing about child molesters who are released from prison and go on to molest other children," McGuire said. "We also have to keep children safe from online predators."
The women also disagreed on the status of the cause of the state's current budget deficit status and how to fix it.
"From a business perspective, this is not rocket science. We need to look at our expenditures, compare them to our revenue and if there's a shortfall, go back and look at the expenditures," McGuire said. "Springfield is spending money they don't have and that has got to stop."
Senger blamed her opponent's party for the shortfall.
"Democrat lawmakers in Springfield passed a budget this year that is over a billion dollars unbalanced," Senger said. "Before you begin to budget you need to know what your priorities are. You need to say these are my core business. Our core in state government are our roads, our schools and our public safety. Fund those first. Do not start new programs until you can budget for them and we are not doing that in Springfield right now."