2 incumbents, 2 newcomers win seats in Wheaton District 200 school board race
Two incumbents and their allies who supported a failed attempt in Wheaton Warrenville District 200 to borrow $132.5 million swept the four available seats on the school board Tuesday.
With all 87 precincts reporting, newcomer Ginna Ericksen led the pack of eight candidates with 7,752 votes. Brad Paulsen won his second term with 7,452 votes, followed by the other incumbent, Jim Mathieson, with 7,055 votes. Rob Hanlon captured a fourth seat with 6,294 votes.
Falling short were four anti-referendum candidates: Marcus Hamilton, who received 5,672 votes; Harold Lonks with 5,444 votes; Neil Harnen with 5,413 votes; and Thomas Hudock with 5,272 votes.
Voters seemingly sent mixed messages Tuesday by shooting down the district's request to increase taxes to pay off the loan, and yet they elected candidates who defended the plan for building projects.
Challengers criticized the costs and questioned whether some of the improvements in schools were linked to student learning.
"The easy way out is taxing people. ... And I'm completely fed up with it," Hamilton, a political newcomer, said recently.
But Paulsen, 50, and Mathieson, 68, - who both voted in January to place the question on the ballot - portrayed the referendum foes as single-issue candidates.
Paulsen, who was first elected in 2013, said his career as an architect lends him the expertise to oversee what he described as needed repairs in schools. If voters had approved the measure, the district would have allocated about $83.6 million for fixes to roofs, plumbing and heating and air conditioning systems in 18 schools.
During the hard-fought campaign, Ericksen, a 55-year-old volunteer with a master's degree in counseling, commended the district's administration. Hanlon, a 51-year-old chief information officer for a food processing company, called the position a "bigger-issue seat."
"We need people with strategic points of view who know how to engage and listen," he said during the campaign.