Robert Schillerstrom will formally announce Thursday his candidacy for re-election as DuPage County Board chairman and vowed to balance continued efforts to improve the area’s basic public works needs with protecting and bettering the county’s quality of life.
“I still have work to finish,” Schillerstrom said in a statement released by his campaign, adding that he, his County Board colleagues and supportive mayors and other elected officials “have formed a good team and a productive working relationship.”
Schillerstrom, 49, an attorney who lives in Naperville, is not expected to face significant opposition in his bid for a second term. County Republicans said they were unaware of plans to challenge him in the March primary, and most political observers doubt a Democratic challenger could defeat him in the general election.
Among the issues Schillerstrom said the county and his administration will face in the future is the continued push for western access to O’Hare International Airport to spur growth and to help relieve traffic congestion for the airport’s neighboring communities.
Also, traffic problems place added importance on identifying alternative methods to get people to work, he said.
Schillerstrom said he will continue to stress the need to preserve open land and keep rivers and streams clean, as well as provide a comprehensive trail system to display the county’s natural resources.
During his tenure as board chairman, Schillerstrom embarked upon a bond-funded infrastructure improvement program of nearly $245 million to pay for roadwork improvements, flood-prevention projects and a new annex to the county courthouse in Wheaton. Work has begun in some cases.
Schillerstrom also was able to win another $300 million from Gov. George Ryan’s Illinois FIRST public works program.
A former president of the Naperville Park District, Schillerstrom has embraced environmental movements in the county, playing a more active role than his predecessors in forest preserve matters and having close ties with the politically influential Conservation Foundation in Naperville.
He has nudged the Forest Preserve District to buy more open land as the last pieces of space in DuPage are developed.
Schillerstrom has overseen three county budgets, including a proposed budget unveiled this week for the 2002 fiscal year, that have modestly lowered property taxes by $300,000 while building a new youth home, buying the Wood Dale-Itasca Reservoir and working on stormwater projects.
A former chairman of the Naperville Township Republican Organization, Schillerstrom had considered bids for statewide office, including the GOP nomination for secretary of state or attorney general.
He has more than $500,000 in campaign funds, including a $100,000 personal loan to his campaign.
But with Atty. Gen. Jim Ryan, a former DuPage County state’s attorney, seeking the Republican gubernatorial nomination and current State’s Atty. Joseph Birkett planning to seek the GOP nomination to replace Ryan as the state’s top law-enforcement officer, many leading Republicans were concerned that there were too many DuPage candidates.
