Small Town IL Mayor Collects $340K In Campaign Cash In 2025

LYONS, IL – The mayor of west suburban Lyons is running for Congress as an independent, trying to position himself as the opposite of a typical Washington politician.

But Chris Getty, who is also the elected supervisor of Lyons Township, raises campaign money like a seasoned insider.

In 2025, Getty's two political committees raised $340,000, an unusually high amount for someone who holds local offices. He has gone unopposed in elections for years.

By comparison, Elmhurst Mayor Scott Levin, who leads a town 4½ times Lyons' size, raised $41,847, according to elections board records. All that money was collected during the first quarter when Levin faced an opponent in his re-election bid.

In La Grange, Village President Mark Kuchler raised $19,431.

Getty's two elected positions draw full-time pay.

As the township's supervisor, Getty's pay rose to $74,000 last year. When he started in 2017, it was $40,474. By 2028, his salary will reach $80,000, according to township records.

As village president, Getty's pay was $63,980 as of 2021, according to the latest salary information on the town's website. That was up from $46,659 a year earlier. (Some mayors are unpaid; Elmhurst's and La Grange's make $8,400 and $3,600, respectively.)

Last week, Getty announced his congressional candidacy in an Oak Brook meeting hall filled with supporters. He is seeking the 4th District seat held by the retiring Rep. Chuy Garcia, a Chicago Democrat.

Getty said that when he graduated from college, he wasn't looking for a political career. So he worked for his family's insurance business. At 26, he was elected as the youngest mayor in Illinois in 2009.

His father, the late Kenneth Getty, who owned the insurance agency, was also Lyons' mayor from 1989 to 1997.

Kenneth Getty was convicted of rigging construction bids as mayor. He was released from prison in 2004, according to a Chicago Tribune story.

"At our dinner table, the conversations weren't about status or power," Chris Getty told supporters at the Oak Brook event. "They were about responsibility, about service, about leaving things better than we found them."

The 4th District is Democratic turf. In November 2025, Garcia announced his retirement at the end of his term. He left little time for candidates to collect petition signatures to get on the ballot. Only his chief of staff, Patty Garcia, got a heads-up, so she met the requirements on time.

"Recently, we saw our current congressman choose to bypass the democratic process, handpicking his successor, instead of allowing the voters to decide who gets to represent them," Getty said. "No open debate, no real choice."

Patch left a message for comment with Getty on Thursday.