District 4 candidate talks economic development, keeping taxes low

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Bonnie Lee Kunkel is running for re-election to the Kane County Board District 4.

Updated: March 20, 2012 8:02AM

In Kane County Board District 4, which includes most of Aurora’s West Side, incumbent Democrat Bonnie Lee Kunkel will face newcomer Alexis D. Cervantes in the March 20 primary.

Kunkel, who has served on the board since 2004, said she is concerned with encouraging economic development throughout the county and keeping taxes low, “because people just can’t afford more. Without an expansion of the tax base, the levy should stay at the same rate.”

To that end, Kunkel said County Board members have to be responsible for cutting costs with every vote.

“If you do item-by-item review of every expense that comes in front of you, everybody on the board should be suggesting ways to keep costs down,” said Kunkel. “And our suggestions should be saving taxpayers more than the $25,000 a year they’re paying us.”

Kunkel challenged Cervantes’ election petitions in an attempt to remove her from the ballot, but the challenge was overruled.

Despite repeated attempts to contact Cervantes, she could not be reached for comment. It has been reported that she has dropped out of the race, but election officials said her name remains on the ballot.

Saving money

As a board member, Kunkel said she’s been successful in saving money around the county — in one instance, finding alternatives to renting storage space for voting machines, in another, getting car dealers to pitch in on an electric charging station.

She also said she’s tried to discourage internal lawsuits at the county, but added that “sometimes there’s nothing you can do to stop a lawsuit.... I have a good idea of how expensive and how time consuming they are. They’re usually polarizing, rather than bringing people together, and as a County Board member I have usually discouraged them.”

Kunkel said she would like to explore hiring an economic development director to bring in more business and grow the tax base, but that the idea of a county administrator is a non-starter for her. “There’s really no transparency when you take major decisions away from officials elected by the people,” she said. “Also, who’s going to pay for it?”