McHenry County Blog

Although Republican Precinct Committeemen were told all the 2012 Illinois State Republican slots were filled and a list was never made public, there were lots of empty seats allocated to the McHenry County Republican Party in Tinley Park.

And some people who were registered as “Guests” were made “Delegates” on the day of the plenary session, Saturday.

(In another party jurisdiction, such a request made by the party head, was denied.)

There were even names on them.

McHenry County had most of the seats in the back two rows. On the empty seats were the names of Delegates who did not attend the main session.

I checked with three and asked if that person had paid, but just not attended.  I was told nothing came out that checking account.

McHenry County GOP Treasurer Fred Wickham told me that no check was written from the Central Committee’s coffers.

Did someone pay for the delegates?

If so, who?

Beats me, but if you see any of the following, whom I did not see at the convention, you might want to ask them.

I should emphasize that it is possible that some named below were in attendance prior to the main session and went home early and there were two people on the floor I did not recognize, so did not put them in article on who went (which misses some people who attended Friday, but left before speeches).

• Joe Calomino, Lake in the Hills
• Tine Hill, Woodstock
• Al Jourdan, Johnsburg
• Carrie Jourdan, Johnsburg
• Ken Koehler, Crystal Lake
• Mary Ann Louderback, Cary
• Rick Mack, Ringwood
• Mary McClellan
• Bernard Narusis, Oakwood Hills
• Regina Narusis, Oakwood Hills
• Roberta Panfaleo, unknown
• Jack Schaffer, Cary
• Mike Shorten, Crystal Lake
• Joyce Story, McHenry
• Barbara Wheeler, Crystal Lake

Since I hadn’t gotten a reply from the McHenry County Republican Party to my request for a list of Delegates and Alternates to the State Convention in Tinley Park, I decided to make my own list.

I didn’t meet the couple on the left who are sitting next to Dave Hubbard.

I know I missed one man and his wife (maybe you can identify them in the photo above), but below are the people I recognized are listed in alphabetical order:

• Pam Althoff, McHenry
• Beck Cress, McHenry
• Jerry Davis, McHenry
• Larry Emery, Crystal Lake
• Andrew Gasser, Fox River Grove
• Shawn Green, Huntley
• Damon Hill, Woodstock
• David Hill, Crystal Lake
• Michele Hill, Woodstock
• Cameron Hubbard, Crystal Lake
• Dave Hubbard, Crystal lake
• Prat Kata, Lake in the Hills
• John Landon, McHenry,
• Sharon Meroni, Barrington Hills
• Cheryl Meyer, Lake in the Hills
• Doug Meyer, Lake in the Hills
• Anna Miller, Cary
• Betty Miller, Crystal Lake
• Bob Miller, Cary
• Nick Provenzano, McHenry
• Michael Smyk, Marengo
• Cal Skinner, Lakewood
• Michele Skinner, Lakewood
• Paul Slebodea, Oakwood Hills
• Demetri Tsilimigras, Cary
• Cathy Tryon, Crystal Lake
• Mike Tryon, Crystal Lake
• Fred Wickham, Crystal Lake
• Mark Widhalm, McHenry

Let me know if I missed anyone.

A pollster for Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Schillerstrom called yesterday afternoon.

Schillerstrom is DuPage County Board Chairman.

The pollster wanted to know if I would vote for Schillerstrom for governor.

I told her, “No.”

She didn’t ask why, but, if she had I had an answer.

I would have told her that I was really disturbed that he balanced his DuPage County budget by getting most of his county’s state senators to vote to triple my RTA sales tax.

The bill that eventually passed, after an amendment (allowing collar county board’s to use the quarter of a percent sales tax offer of free road money for collar county boards to be diverted to public safety purposes) was added.

That allowed Schillerstrom to forego an already-on-the ballot countywide referendum to raise sales taxes one-quarter of one percentage point for law enforcement to fill his budget hole. (Winnebago County passed such a referendum in 2002.)

Schillerstrom’s intervention was so egregious that he was taken to the wood shed by Illinois Republican Party Chairman Andy McKenna at the Decatur state convention last June.

That made Schillerstrom hopping mad.

It stung so much most DuPage County Republicans walked off the convention floor.

Later my wife and I got a letter from Schillerstrom about it.

Schillerstrom let his state senators take the heat.

He got “free money.”

How ironic that one of them, Kirk Dillard is also running for the Republican nomination for governor.

But, the pollster was onto her next question. No time for an explanation on my part.

She asked if I would be more likely to vote for Schillerstrom if I knew I knew he had lowered property taxes seven ten years in 10 years.

I told her, “Yes.”

Would I be more likely to vote for Schillerstrom if I knew he had cut $200 million in wasteful spending?

I told her, “Yes.”

The final question was whether I would be more likely to vote for Schillerstrom if I knew DuPage County had passed “comprehensive ethics reform.”

I told her, “Yes.”

Do you see television and radio ads coming out of this survey?

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The photo of DuPage County Board Chairman Robert Schillerstrom comes from the Young Republican Candidates’ Bar-B-Que held in Barrington Saturday, August 11, 2009.