Naperville elects most women at once to city council seats
Naperville's new-look city council will have more women serving at once than at any time since the municipality was incorporated in 1857, according to historical records from Naper Settlement.
Voters on Tuesday elected four women to the eight-member council - Patty Gustin, Rebecca Boyd-Obarski, Becky Anderson and Judith Brodhead. They will join Paul Hinterlong, Kevin Coyne, John Krummen and Kevin Gallaher, who also were elected Tuesday, to form the council that will be sworn in May 3.
Some say the election of four women - up from the maximum of three who served as council members at once from 1993 to 1997 - is a great stride for equal representation of the city's residents.
"I'm really excited that we finally have more women on the council," said Anderson, a lifelong Naperville resident and owner of Anderson's Bookshop who leads the city's advisory cultural commission. "We've had very few women in past years. We need that representation of women on the council. I think it's about time."
Nine women have served on the council since Barbara Bean was the first woman elected to the panel in 1971. One of the nine, Margaret "Peg" Price, served as a council member and as Naperville mayor from 1983 to 1991.
After Bean, women including Price, Phyllis Rasmussen, Toby Hayer, Carol Piper, Carolyn LeSage, Mary Ellingson and Darlene Senger served on the council at various times between 1971 and 2009. But Brodhead has been the only female member for the past several years. That's soon to change.
"I'm very happy that there are several women," said Boyd-Obarski, an attorney and chairwoman of the board of fire and police commissioners. "I think that together we will bring a very good balance to the council and a good perspective on problem solving."
The real benefit of the new council is not in its gender balance but in the variety of professional experiences its members will bring, some say.
"I just look at it as new perspectives and backgrounds," said Hinterlong, a plumber who has been on the council for six years. "Whether they're female or not doesn't bother me any."
The council has a plumber, a real estate broker, a book seller, three attorneys, an engineer and an English professor.
"I think all eight of us will make one very good, solid team, and I think we're all team players," said Krummen, an engineering executive and chairman of the public utilities advisory board.
During the campaign, retiring Mayor George Pradel said the potential for more gender balance among Naperville's elected leaders was an exciting element of an unusual election in which all eight council seats were up for election at once instead of four at a time. Five female candidates, the four winners and Nancy Marinello, were among 20 people seeking the eight seats.
"I'm hoping for some added female (representation), some more female councilwomen," Pradel said earlier this year. "I hope that's one of the changes because we really kind of relish the fact that we have Judy (Brodhead) on there now, and it'll just be embellished by even more people, and we'll have a little more equalization up there."
Gustin, the top female vote-getter, finished second overall with 10,162 votes in unofficial results from Tuesday's election. She said Pradel hit it on the head.
"I agree with Mayor Pradel. I think that the female perspective brings a balance and a rounded board," said Gustin, a real estate broker. "I think women and men work a little differently, but when they work in conjunction with each other, they can really go far. I think that's an advantage for the city."
New council members say they're gearing up to deal with retail and commercial vacancies, liquor control laws, zoning code updates, distribution of cultural event funding and potential budget issues if the state cuts the amount of income tax money it gives back to municipalities.
With all these and other topics to discuss, incoming members including Gallaher, an attorney and former city council member, say it's important to value each other's skill sets and form an environment of collaboration under Mayor-elect Steve Chirico.
"I think different experiences allow everyone to bring something to the discussion," Gallaher said. "By sharing ideas you absolutely end up with a better result and a more thoughtful result."