3 Terms And You're Out? Term Limits For Skokie Elected Officials Are On The Ballot
SKOKIE, IL — In this year’s election, Skokie residents have an opportunity to decide whether to impose term limits on elected officials in the village.
The referendum question that appears on the Nov. 5 ballot asks voters whether they support limiting the mayor, village, clerk and trustees to a maximum of three terms in office.
Some suburbs, like Lake Forest, have a tradition of self-imposed term limits and others, like Niles, Des Plaines and Wilmette, have instituted mandatory ones, but Skokie is no stranger to long-serving mayors.
Find out what's happening in Skokiewith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Al Smith was elected to six terms, serving from 1965 to 1987. His record has since been surpassed by current Mayor George Van Dusen, who was first appointed in 1999. The
“Members of the board, in fact, told me some time ago that they wanted this put on the ballot,” Van Dusen said ahead of the July 15 vote to place the referendum on the ballot. “This is nothing new.”
Find out what's happening in Skokiewith free, real-time updates from Patch.
The village board voted 4-0, with two abstentions and one absence, to place the binding referendum on the ballot.
Click Here: cheap puma shoes
Trustee Ralph Klein said he abstained because he was “not clear on this.” And Trustee James Johnson abstained after declaring that it interfered with separate citizen-initiated referendum efforts.
Earlier at the meeting, Johnson was the sole member of the village board to support placing a ranked-choice voting referendum on the ballot following a presentation from an attorney that laid out the challenges to its implementation.
Trustee Alison Pure-Slovin said in July that several state lawmakers have told her that they are done discussing ranked choice voting, an idea that is at least 10 years away from even being considered.
“It’s not even on the horizon right now, and it is not recognized by the state of Illinois,” Pure-Slovin said.
“I’m glad we’ve done our due diligence. We’ve looked into it, we’ve spent money on it, we’ve done it legally,” she said. “And I think this point, if it’s not something that is recognized by the state of Illinois as a legal way of voting, we need to be done with this.”
If approved, term limits will apply to all elected positions starting in the 2025 Consolidated Election for mayor, clerk and at-large trustees.
District-level trustees will begin their term limits after the 2027 election, due to the village’s new staggered election cycle established following the approval of a trio of electoral reform referendums in the last general election.
The limits will apply only to future terms, meaning any previous time served by current officials will not count toward the three-term limit.
And officials reaching their term limit in one office could still run for another elected position within the village. For example, someone who has served three terms as a trustee could then run for mayor or clerk for up to three terms.
Earlier: Skokie Referendums On Term Limits, Ranked-Choice Voting Set For Ballot
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.