Edward N. Tiesenga: 2023 candidate for Oak Brook Village Board
Bio
Town: Oak Brook
Age on Election Day: 63
Occupation: Attorney
Employer: Tiesenga & DeBoer LLP
Previous offices held: Oak Brook Village Trustee (2015-present)
Q&A
Q: What is the most serious issue your community will face in the coming years and how should the village board respond to it?
A: Preserving and enhancing the investment of our residents in our homes and businesses, by defending Oak Brook from organized and opportunistic crime, and by balancing the appetites of our developers against the "plumb line" standard of "Restrained Good Taste" set by Paul Butler and continued ever since by responsible elected officials, staff and residents.
Q: How would you describe the state of your community's finances?
A: Holding steady but under attack by escalating Springfield spending pressure mandated in the Illinois Pension Code, particularly the public safety pensions, which in Oak Brook remain seriously unfunded and as a balance sheet matter according to GASB 68, more than swamp the current general fund 16-month reserve.
Q: What should be the three top priorities for spending in your community during the next four years?
A: 1. Limit; 2. Decrease; 3. Repeat #1 and #2
Q: Are there areas of spending that need to be curtailed? If so, what are they?
A: Duplicative major fire apparatus that can be shared between neighboring towns; redundant extra fire station absorbing staff and capital maintenance; over-staffing of 24-hour fire/EMS shifts that can be better managed in 12-hour shifts due to minuscule comparative call volume during overnight hours.
Q: What do you see as the most important infrastructure project the community must address? Why and how should it be paid for? Conversely, during these uncertain economic times, what project(s) can be put on the back burner?
A: Streets and subdivision reconfiguration to structurally interdict mobile criminal crews hitting residential areas, due to Chicago, Cook County and Illinois politically-driven surrender on public safety standards of policing, and resulting catch-and-release of criminals into Oak Brook.
Payment depends on pricing models, which rely on "standpoint epistemology" or presuppositional understanding of who paid for those streets in the first place (it was not the Village of Oak Brook). From there we will work it out for the benefit of our residents.
Q: Describe your experience working in a group setting to determine policy. What is your style in such a setting to reach agreement and manage local government? Explain how you think that will be effective in producing effective actions and decisions with your village board.
A: Collaborative and respectful review of facts, discussion, and embrace of policy continuity on the model of Hamilton's establishment of the Bank of the United States in a disputed policy environment, with the survival and embrace of that bank by its original opponents.
And to do this while avoiding "matters of honor" leading to things like duels in Weehawken. Good policy often emerges from the refinement of data among trustees acting in good faith and with the concision and restraint that our residents expect. It can survive on its own merit apart from personalities. It becomes operative policy.
Q: What makes you the best candidate for the job?
A: The judgment of our residents. I am available to serve for a "third turn" at the request of our residents on April 4 and look forward to hearing from them.
Q: What's one good idea you have to better the community that no one is talking about yet?
A: To work with the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association to amend the section of the Illinois Vehicle Code that allows red light cameras, to add a private right of action for (i) anyone injured by a rear-ender induced by the cameras; and (ii) any unit of government whose ambulances, police cars and fire trucks respond to additional rear-enders induced by cameras; and (iii) any insurance company, tow truck company, hospital system or other party impacted by the cost of those accidents, to all sue (i) the camera vendors; and (ii) the host municipalities that make all of the profit but currently absorb none of the costs of the business they run to induce accidents generating that profit.
If this were done with the Route 83 and 22nd Street cameras, all of the profits of those cameras would be returned to their victims. We need the trial lawyers to finally administer this correction to the most incredibly corrupt festering example of government failure in Illinois.