While Chicago attracted most of the media attention for its mayoral race Tuesday, several prominent suburbs held hotly contested elections to choose new mayors.
Some races, including Naperville and Oak Brook, featured candidates trying to succeed outgoing officeholders. Other races attracted candidates trying to oust long-serving mayors, including in Joliet, where a challenger declared victory over the incumbent. And one election, in normally staid Lake Forest, featured a controversial challenge to a long-standing caucus process.
Flashpoint issues ranged from assault weapons to lead water pipes to leaf blowers. While the contests typically are meant to be nonpartisan, they sometimes reflected divisions between conservatives and liberals in the suburbs. Results are unofficial until they are certified in the coming days.
Naperville
A first-time office seeker from a long-established local family declared victory in the race to become the next mayor of Naperville.
Scott Wehrli held a commanding lead, according to unofficial results.
Wehrli won 53% of the vote compared to 45% for Benny White, and 2% for Tiffany Stephens, with all Will County precincts reporting and 99% of the countywide DuPage County vote.
In a speech to supporters Tuesday night, Wehrli said the amazing part of his journey was meeting so many people and learning about different facets of Naperville he never understood.
“We worked so hard to represent every voice in this community,” he said.
He added that he would be a nonpartisan mayor “for the people, of the people.”
The candidates were vying to replace Steve Chirico, who is stepping down after eight years as mayor.
Wehrli is an executive at a family-owned concrete construction company and a part-time Park District police officer whose family settled in Naperville in 1840. White is a City Council member, high school department head, former school board member and retired U.S. Army artillery officer who was seeking to be the city’s first Black mayor.
A third candidate, Tiffany Stephens, who is also Black, founded Caring For Children Daycare and Kids Teen Rider, a nonprofit that provides transportation service to kids and teens.
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Wehrli took in almost twice as much in campaign donations as White, much of it from real estate developers and brokers and Republican political action committees, while much of White’s money came from unions and Democratic state lawmakers.
White voted for the city’s ban on the sale of assault rifles, made in response to last year’s mass shooting in Highland Park, while Wehrli questioned whether it’s made anyone safer.
Joliet
Terry D’Arcy, a car dealer and well-known philanthropist, held a big lead and declared victory over two-term incumbent Bob O’Dekirk in the race for Joliet mayor.
Unofficial combined totals in Will and Kendall counties put D’Arcy at 61% of the vote, followed by 30% for O’Dekirk, an attorney and former Joliet police officer. Community affairs professional Tycee Bell had 9%.
“I’m really excited,” D’Arcy told the Tribune by phone from his results party at Inwood Golf Course. “I’m so grateful to the city for this opportunity.”
D’Arcy said he received a call from O’Dekirk, who wished him well and pledged to help with a smooth transition.
Joliet’s courting of the booming logistics industry and the repercussions of those developments on formerly rural areas south of town loom large among the myriad issues facing Illinois’ third-largest city.
O’Dekirk’s supporters praise the mayor for economic development projects that include a roughly $2 billion NorthPoint Development warehouse complex in south Joliet, a multimillion-dollar mixed-use development — anchored by the relocated Hollywood Casino Joliet — on the city’s West Side, and a possible redevelopment of the long-dormant U.S. Steel plant site north of downtown.
Still, the mayor’s critics accuse him of alienating neighboring communities with an often-overbearing leadership style that provokes political infighting that has marred his tenure as mayor. The city has had five city managers in as many years. The Police Department, meanwhile, is on its fourth chief since 2017 and is the target of an ongoing Illinois attorney general’s office civil probe.
The first order of business, D’Arcy said, would be to work with the new City Council to review candidates for the city manager position. Current City Manager James Capparelli, whose contract expires this summer, will be able to add his name to the search, D’Arcy said.
“It’s time to work together for the future of the city,” he said. “We’re one Joliet, and we need to be that way.”
Elgin
Elgin Mayor Dave Kaptain appeared to have held onto his seat for a fourth term after facing a challenge from a member of the City Council.
Kaptain, a retired chemist for the Fox Valley Water Reclamation District, had 56% of the vote to Councilman Corey Dixon’s 42% with all precincts reporting in Kane County and Cook counties, not counting mail-in and provisional ballots.
Dixon is an administrator in the Kane County sheriff’s office who manages programs addressing mental health and substance abuse among inmates.
In a recent forum, Dixon questioned Kaptain’s leadership on the need to replace the city’s lead water pipes, while Kaptain asked why Dixon was fined for repeatedly filing campaign disclosure forms late.
Dixon was seeking to become the city’s first Black mayor. While Kaptain boasted of a low crime rate and a flat property tax, Dixon emphasized plans for affordable housing and environmentally sustainable operations.
Oak Brook
The candidate endorsed by outgoing incumbent Gopal Lalmalani finished on top in the race for Oak Brook mayor.
Laurence Herman led with just under 50% of the vote, compared with 38% for Asif Yusuf and 12% for A. Suresh Reddy.
The three village trustees were vying to succeed Lalmalani, who is stepping down after three terms. All three candidates made public safety their top priority after high-profile store thefts and a shootout that injured four people at Oakbrook Center mall in 2021.
Asif Yusuf is a four-term trustee and real estate broker who ran unsuccessfully for village president in 2007.
Dr. A. Suresh Reddy is a first-term trustee, a neuroradiologist and the president of the Indian American Medical Association.
First-term Trustee Lawrence “Larry” Herman is a tax accountant and CPA who owns an insurance agency. He received the endorsement of the outgoing village president.
Lake Forest
Despite a rare dispute over the process, the caucus committee-recommended candidate won the race for mayor in Lake Forest.
Stanford “Randy” Tack had a commanding lead, with 58% of the vote, to 40% for Prue Beidler and 2% for Paul Hamann, with all precincts counted.
A controversy interrupted the usually preordained nature of the election, as Mayor George Pandaleon steps down.
Typically, a volunteer Lake Forest Caucus committee recommends candidates for mayor and other offices. This election, the chosen mayoral candidate was former City Council member Tack.
Former council member Beidler objected that the caucus committee had nominated no women for the position or for three council seats, and a large group of residents turned out against the committee recommendations.
But the committee said the result was nonbinding, and went ahead with its endorsement of Tack. That prompted Beidler to run as an independent. A third candidate, Hamann, also ran as an independent.
Country Club Hills
Incumbent James Ford appeared poised for a third term as mayor, getting about 45% of the vote with all 12 precincts reported, according to unofficial Cook County results.
Current City Council member Lisa Evans, 3rd Ward, was next with almost 26% of the vote. Her fellow council member, Ricardo Spivey, 4th Ward, had 21% of the vote, followed by 8% for former NAACP south suburban chapter President Clifton Graham Jr.
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Evans lost to Ford in 2015, when they were among five candidates seeking to replace a controversial longtime mayor, Dwight Welch.
Spivey is in his second term on the council, while Graham previously ran for state representative of the 38th District, which includes portions of about a dozen south suburban communities.
Harvey
Harvey Mayor Christopher Clark looks to have staved off a familiar opponent in his bid for a second term. With all 16 precincts reporting, Clark had almost 48% of the vote, according to unofficial Cook County results.
Business owner and former park board President Anthony McCaskill was next at nearly 35%. McCaskill lost to Clark in 2019 and to Clark’s predecessor, Eric Kellogg, in 2015.
First-term 2nd Ward Ald. Marshun Tolbert had roughly 17% of the vote.
Public safety was at the forefront of the mayoral contest.
Homer Glen
For the first time in its 22-year history, the village of Homer Glen elected a female mayor.
Village Clerk Christina Neitzke-Troike held a 65% to 35% lead over Trustee Rose Reynders with all precincts reported, according to unofficial Will County results.
Despite early tension in the race, Neitzke-Troike and Reynders espoused similar views on topics ranging from the need for political civility and land preservation to thoughtful economic expansion that maintains the village’s small-town feel.
Palos Park
Two attorneys — one a four-term Village Board member, the other a former educator involved in multiple civic groups — were vying to replace Mayor John Mahoney, who decided not to seek reelection to spend time with family.
With all nine precincts reported, Village Commissioner Nicole Milovich-Walters had 54% of the vote, compared with 46% for Ronette McCarthy, according to unofficial Cook County results.
Milovich-Walters and McCarthy have said they both want to boost engagement with the village’s nearly 5,000 residents.
University Park
With all precincts reported in Will and Cook counties, incumbent Mayor Joseph Roudez III had the slimmest of leads.
Unofficial combined totals in both counties put Roudez at nearly 36% of the vote, followed by Trustee Theo Brooks at 35% and Trustee Sonia Jenkins-Bell at roughly 29%.
Access to clean drinking water continued to be a pressing issue for the village’s roughly 7,100 residents. Roudez said the village has sought grants to replace pipes, while his opponents want greater accountability from the village’s private water utility, Aqua Illinois.
Village finances were also a concern leading up to the election.
Alexandra Kukulka and Mike Nolan of the Daily Southtown; and freelance reporters Gloria Casas, Daniel I. Dorfman, Chuck Fieldman and Michelle Mullins contributed.