Arlington Heights Mayoral Candidate: Mark Hellner

Arlington Heights Patch wants to help you get to know your candidates for Arlington Heights mayor. 

1. Name, professional background, community affiliations, public and private service, other experiences that you feel qualifies you to run for mayor of Arlington Heights.

Mark Hellner.  I am an attorney with over 35 years of experience in a variety of fields, including government, state and local tax, the regulation of racing and gaming, ethics, finance and real estate.  I am employed by the Center for Elder and Disability Law and by the University of Illinois College of Law.

2. How long have you been an Arlington Heights resident?

Over 16 years.

3. What are the reasons you chose to run for Arlington mayor.

I care about this town. My wife, son and I have found that the myriad opportunities and community spirit here have helped each of us thrive. However, as the town has struggled to deal with economic stagnation, it has become apparent that new talent, energy and ideas are needed to maintain and then improve the current environment.   

4. List 2-3 top issues-and how you plan to address them-that you believe are important to residents living in Arlington Heights.

(1) Fiscal responsibility is needed to address our unfunded pension liability of over $100,000,000.  We can and should achieve that by amortizing this debt faster than the scheduled 27 years.  The money can come from reallocating funds presently used on lower priority items. (2)  Another example of a way we can address fiscal responsibility is to adopt a policy that all major expenditures must be intended to benefit the entire Arlington Heights community.  For example, we can expand the use of Village Hall by making it a true community center.  And we should revisit the $40,000,000 plan for the new police station in order to assess whether we can solve the identified space limitations through renovation of the current building and purchase of an additional smaller building to fill in remaining need.

5. What improvements, if any, would you like to see in the way that the village of Arlington Heights is run?

We must energize the business sector by eliminating unnecessary hurdles and expediting the review of permit applications. We should ask the entire community to actively become involved in government through volunteering of their expertise.

We can encourage such participation through greater transparency of proposed government activities and by recognizing and utilizing the ideas of our volunteers. Better coordination of the activities of the town, schools, parks and library is also important. We should particularly focus on cross-utilization of our facilities and personnel.

6.   Biographical information, family, children, upbringing, religious beliefs, etc. (optional).

My wife, Tracy and I have been married nearly 23 years. We have a son, David, who is 11.  Our extended families live in Chicago, Springfield, St. Louis, Austin and Denver.  

7. Additional comments, any other relevant information to your candidacy you would like voters to know about you.            

My wife and I are devoted to helping the disadvantaged. Tracy runs the Autism Resources Center at Clearbrook and I work for a pro bono legal clinic. As parents of a special needs child, we keenly appreciate the pressures on families less fortunate than us. I bring this perspective to everything I do. My ultimate objective in this endeavor is to help make our fine community even stronger and even more mutually supportive of all of our residents.