Village Board Sees No Benefit to Term Limits

The question was asked, and the answer was clear: The Board does not need term limits.

Trustee Garrett Peck to board members Monday night. It's one, he said, that the community should decide.

"I believe that is worth really looking at and seeing what it would cost (to place a referendum on the ballot)," he said. "It's a few thousand (dollars) well spent to allow the voters to decide."

Under any scenario proposed, current board members should be grandfathered in so no one would lose their position simply because of the change, he said.

That seemed not to be as much of a consideration among board members as the fact that there was the potential of losing a trustee with indepth institutional knowledge and accrued experience just because of the length of his or her tenure.

"It's like an educational process," Trustee Larry Kachel said. "The more you learn, the better it is for the community."

Trustee Bill Lamb said he could see why someone, after eight or 12 years in the position, might get "stale.

"But I also agree with Trustee Kachel's point. If you've got somebody who's doing the job well (why get rid of them)?" he said. "It takes a while to know what the village is doing and to get to know all of the people."

And it's not as if the positions are so well-paid or come with such enticing perks that someone would want to keep running term after term just to keep them, Trustee Margie Bonuchi said. 

"You do this job because you really love it because there's not such a great benefit beyond your love for it," she said. 

Bonuchi also argued that with voter turnout so low, it would be a small percentage of the residents actually deciding the issue.

"If you really want to be heard as a voter, show up," she said. "Eleven percent or 15 percent (voter turnout) just isn't cutting it."

Peck said the trustees' position was "a big mistake and I urge the board to reconsider."

Later, however, he said he was not upset by the board's unwillingness to embrace the idea but that he wouldn't be surprised if someone in the community were to get the signatures needed to put the issue on the ballot regardless.