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player ready...The Elgin School District U46 Board will be split 4-3 after Tuesday’s election elected three candidates who have been highly critical of how things have been going in the district and two candidates who support the status quo.
With all 137 precincts counted in three counties, the top vote-getters for four four-year board seats unofficially were incumbent Traci O’Neal Ellis, with 15 percent of the vote, followed by pro-status-quo challenger Sue Kerr with 14.7 percent, anti-tax candidate Jeanine Ward with 14.4 percent and challenger Phil Costello with 14.3 percent.
For the lone two-year seat that was open, Republican activist Cody Holt ran well ahead of teacher Kai Rush, with 55 versus 45 percent of the votes.
Also seeking the four-year seats, challenger Ed Novak garnered 13.9 percent of the vote, challenger Larry Bury obtained 12.8 percent, incumbent Jennifer Shroder 9.1 percent and challenger Arisleyda Taylor 8.7 percent, according to unofficial returns.
In the next few months the school board faces the need to hire a new superintendent, approve a new five-year strategic plan, redraw its school attendance boundaries, consider whether to close schools and decide how far it is going with a new grading system. As all this looms, five of the board’s seven seats were up for grabs, with only two of the current seat-holders running again. On such issues as taxes, spending and ethic diversity, the board seems likely to be divided with Ellis and Kerr plus holdovers Veronica Noland and Donna Smith on one side, versus Ward, Costello and Holt on the other.
Proclaiming victory Tuesday night in a party filled with conservative politicos at the Elgin Public House, Ward said that “I will continue to take a stand for the taxpayer, the citizen and the students. And no more global culture!” referring to a move at Monday night’s school board meeting in which the board had agreed to teach the importance of different cultures and religions in the schools’ social studies classes.
Speaking to the same cheering crowd, Holt said that “special interest groups and unions have been defeated,” referring to how the Elgin Teachers Union had endorsed Ellis, Kerr, Bury and Taylor.
They had no formal alliances or political parties. But in philosophy and endorsements, the candidates split into two camps. On one side, riding a wave of anger over a mistake in the Kane County clerk’s office that resulted in high U46 tax rates in the DuPage County sections of Bartlett and Wayne, were four candidates who emphasize tight purse strings and lower taxes. They also tend to be critical of the new ways of teaching, testing and grading. They included, for the four-year terms, Costello, Novak and Ward, and for the two-year term, Holt.
These four were endorsed by such groups as the Elgin Township Republican Committee, the Elgin OCTAVE political action committee, theNewYou46 political action committee and, in the case of Novak and Ward, by former congressman Joe Walsh.
On the other side were six candidates who tend to approve of the way things have been going in the school district. For the four-year terms, they include incumbents Ellis and Shroder, plus challengers Larry Bury, Kerr and Taylor and Rush for the two-year seat.
Some or all of these six have been endorsed by the Elgin Teachers Association and the moderate new group Concerned Voters of the Fox Valley. Shroder herself, in fact, has urged her followers to vote for the other five instead of for her, saying she would rather lose the election than see Costello, Novak, Ward and Holt win.