Meet Oak Lawn Third District Trustee Candidate Bob Streit

OAK LAWN, IL -- Bob Streit is the longest -serving elected official on the Oak Lawn Village Board. Streit has held the Third District seat since 1991 and is running for his eighth term in the April 2 consolidated election. This is the village board’s only contested race.

Name: Robert J. “Bob” Streit
Age: 63
Education: Bachelor’s Degree, Business Administration. University of Illinois at Chicago. Occupation: Managing Member, Illinois Energy Aggregation LLC
Activities/Involvement in Oak Lawn: Past supporter of Oak Lawn Baseball, served on the Worth Township Youth Commission for 8 years, member of the Oak Lawn Chamber of Commerce, Oak Lawn Village Trustee since 1991.
How long you have lived in Oak Lawn? 63 years
Family background: Wife Linda; Daughter Alexis; Sons Christopher and Robert

1. Why are you running for village trustee? What skills and experience do you bring to the office?

I was born and raised in Oak Lawn. I chose to stay here and raise my own family in this community.

As the only Independent Trustee on the Village Board, I’ve been the voice of the residents against developments and decisions that ignore the best interests of our neighborhoods in favor of developers’ interests. Every governmental unit needs a voice that questions the majority and represents the interests of the community. Since being elected in 1991 as an Independent, I’ve worked with the people of my district sometimes stopping wrong-headed developments, at times gaining protections for the neighborhoods and at times simply giving the residents a forum to learn about the developments and work with staff to address concerns.

My experience in working with district residents cannot be replaced with someone who has not been involved in any elected office. There is a learning curve with the position if you want to be an independent voice working for the people. Knowing how to research issues and dig through the talking points that the staff and developers put forward isn’t something that is quickly learned if you’ve never held office. My record proves that I’m always on the side of the people as an Independent voice willing to stand up to the Mayor or my fellow board members when it is in the interest of the people of my district.

2. Do you think Oak Lawn’s 95th Street corridor is healthy and successful? What would you do to improve the corridor’s economic viability? Safety? Road conditions?

95th Street has often been a passageway for drivers to travel between Chicago and the Chicago Ridge Mall. For years, Oak Lawn lost sales tax by failing to act on the property prior to its annexation to Chicago Ridge. As we fast forward to the new age of shopping wherein retail store sales continue to decline and internet sales are increasing, Oak Lawn must try to take advantage of the new way of shopping by attracting specialty shops to 95th Street and assisting those entities in building internet sales.

3. Some residents complain about traffic conditions in Oak Lawn. What would you do to mitigate congestion?

Some ideas are in progress. For instance, with the Advocate Medical Development at the old Beatty site, the traffic for the Metra Parking will be redirected to 95th Street and a stoplight is set to be installed. Increased traffic on 95th Street has been a burden for several years. It is especially true near the tollway entrance and exit, where cars back up waiting to exit the tollway or head north. That problem can be fixed through working cooperatively with the Illinois Tollway Authority. The 95th Street Corridor plan does encourage bike use and hopefully decreases some traffic.

4. Are you satisfied with the current economic development in Oak Lawn, for example Stony Creek Promenade, Southwest Highway and 95th Street? What would you do to attract new businesses and develop these areas?

First, it should be recognized that full time staff members, like the Village Manager and Economic Development Director, are responsible for attracting new businesses and developers to the area. Too often those developments have been met with great promise at the beginning and then subdued realities wherein the promises are rarely met. Stony Creek Promenade was sold as an “upscale” development that would include clothing stores found in places like Oak Brook and Orland Park. While Mariano’s is a fine addition to the village, some of the other promised stores have not been delivered.

However, the board can set policies and enforce those policies that in the end will promote economic development. For instance, we should encourage and assist local entrepreneurs to open businesses in our village. Disturbances and crime issues are more often found at our big name operations rather than the locally operated establishments. After ridding the village of problem operations, such as Chuck E. Cheese, we should not repeat the same mistake by attracting those types of businesses.

Economic development and safety are tied together hand in hand. As a village board, we can set policies that provide for greater safety which will make families want to live and shop in Oak Lawn. We have to make Oak Lawn as safe as it was when I was growing up, which will lead to greater investment by businesses in our community.

5. If you could change one thing in village’s zoning code what would that be?

The implementation of the zoning code is what should be changed. The code itself is clear but much too often the board is provided staff recommendations for projects that require zoning exceptions, parking variances, and other zoning variances. The result is that we often end up with medical buildings on 95th Street or strip malls with inadequate parking. When staff makes such recommendations rather than recommending that medical buildings, for instance, be redirected to Southwest Highway, we all pay a price as a community. Valuable economic development is often wasted on buildings that don’t produce sales tax and under-utilized space like Southwest Highway does not become a focus for staff members in charge of developing that area.

6. If elected, what three steps would you take to put the village on firmer financial footing?

I’ve been proud of my record to hold the line on property taxes. While most property taxes are charged by other local governmental units, the Village of Oak Lawn’s portion has been a very small percentage of the total bill. In 1991 and for many years thereafter, I was the sole vote against raising taxes. At this time, we have a board that has been united against raising property taxes. But property taxes are only a part of what accounts for the revenue to the village. We also receive funding from the Local Government Distributive Fund (LGDF), which is a designated portion of state income tax revenues. Municipalities currently receive a percentage of total state income tax revenues through this fund. Distributions occur on a per capita basis. For that reason, it is important that we make Oak Lawn a place that is safe to raise families and a place that people want to remain.

Historically, until 2011, 10% of total income tax collections were dedicated to LGDF for distribution to municipalities and counties. Unfortunately, the percentage share of state income tax revenue was reduced from 10% to 6% following the temporary Illinois State income tax increase of 2011. The percentage share of state income tax revenue subsequently increased to 8% when the higher income tax rates declined in January 2015, based upon the schedule established by our State Representatives and Senators in Springfield.

In July 2017, the income tax was permanently increased, and the local government share was reduced, for one year only, to 5.45% of total collections for State Fiscal Year 2018. The local government share is scheduled to increase to 6.06% in State Fiscal Year 2019 and the years thereafter unless the state changes the law again. Hopefully, our state leaders will discontinue the practice of changing our share of the LGDF and thereby provide stability to our own budgeting. With unfunded mandates the norm from Springfield, Illinois municipalities are already pursuing a return to 10% as the municipal share.

7. How do you plan to involve residents more in the decision-making process in the village? I’ve always worked to involve our residents in decisions.

I am the only Trustee with a constituent services office, which operates on a daily basis to speak with residents about their concerns and to help residents navigate government at the village, township, county, state and federal level. I will continue to operate my constituent services office, at no expense to the taxpayers, if the people of the district honor me with re-election to the office.

In addition to the Third District Constituent Office, I regularly communicate with residents through my Third District Newsletter, which publicizes news, events and issues in our community. The newsletter is produced at no expense to the taxpayer and any third district resident can be on the mailing list by contacting my office at 708-422-3600.

8. If the village were to receive a $1 million grant to use any way it wanted, what would you do with it and why?
Unfortunately, grants only come with a specific purpose and we’ll never receive one that allows you to use it for any purpose you can determine. Last year, the Village of Oak Lawn accepted a SAFER Grant, in the amount of $1,347,000, to hire additional firefighters, which I thought was the right decision. The Village’s acceptance was conditioned on the fire department members' union, Local 3405, agreeing to a reduction in the minimum manning numbers that the majority has pushed for many years. When the union didn’t agree, the administration unfortunately cancelled the $1,347,000 federal grant.

As far as a hypothetical $1 million dollar grant, the best use would be to invest in solar energy. The village was previously approached on a project that would have required no investment by the taxpayers. In fact, the village would have received $1,250,000 in lease payments for the land and would have saved over 4 million dollars in energy costs over the contract. Those savings could have been passed along to fix the budget deficit. With an additional $1 million dollar grant, we could offer a program to residents to allow each resident to enjoy similar savings on their energy costs.

9. Where are your favorite places to spend time in Oak Lawn?

Oak Lawn has some wonderful parks to spend time in with family. My sons and daughter were very active in park activities, schools and local little league as they attended the local schools. The park district does a great job in providing activities for people of all ages.

The library is the premier system in the suburbs. Being born and raised in Oak Lawn, I have an appreciation for the library. I know that people from surrounding suburbs marvel at everything the library has to offer.

I’ve operated my business in Oak Lawn throughout my adult life. I’m in Oak Lawn every day and I enjoy the many choices in the third district where you can enjoy a quick meal or a dinner that can’t be matched by other places. Frankie’s is one place in my district that residents have a wide range of choices and you can enjoy yourself knowing that it is a good place to eat.

Palermo’s is a top rated restaurant that attracts people from Oak Lawn and many surrounding communities. Over the years, I’ve enjoyed family dinners, business lunches, and gatherings with friends at Palermo’s.