Current McHenry County Board Chairman Joe Gottemoller has made his intentions known that he will be running for McHenry County Board Chairman at large.

McHenry County Board Chairman Joe Gottemoller has announced he will run for the chairman seat when it becomes a county-wide elected position in 2016.

The announcement was made Wednesday at a gathering of more than 125 supporters in Crystal Lake. Illinois Comptroller Leslie Geissler Munger was the guest speaker at the event, and said Gottemoller has done a great job as chairman so far, and is the right man to lead the County Board in the future. “I’m glad Chairman Gottemoller is stepping up to run in McHenry County’s first ever county-wide election for County Board Chairman. I just wish I could take some of Joe’s fiscal responsibility and McHenry County’s Aaa credit rating back to Springfield with me where we deal daily with a nearly $6 billion bill backlog and huge budget deficits,” said Munger. “The State of Illinois could certainly take a cue from the McHenry County Board and Chairman Gottemoller who have passed balanced budgets and frozen property taxes the last three years.”

Gottemoller, a Crystal Lake attorney, was first elected to the McHenry County Board as a District 3 representative in 2012. He was re-elected to his seat as the top vote-getter in November of 2014, and then elected by his peers a month later to serve as their chairman. “When I ran for county board for the first time in 2012, it was because I wanted to promote job and economic growth, protect taxpayers from unnecessary tax increases and improve the efficiency of County Board operations,” said Gottemoller. “I have a record of success in those areas and continue to hold them as priorities today.”

Since Gottemoller was elected to serve on the McHenry County Board, the county’s taxpayers have saved over $10 million in property taxes. This savings is the result of deliberate action by the board not to access additional tax revenue available annually though the property tax cap law. “Here in McHenry County we have some of the highest property taxes in the nation,” Gottemoller said. “While the majority of a residential tax bill represents school taxation I believe we have a duty at the county level to do everything in our power to control our portion of people’s taxes.”

In addition to holding the line on taxes, Gottemoller said he considers other key achievements during his tenure on the county board to be:

• Creation of a Unified Development Ordinance (UDO): The UDO will guide growth and development in the McHenry County for the next decade. Through the UDO, all land and development regulations were consolidated into one central document, making it easier for people to know the county’s zoning rules/regulations.
• Creation of a Statute of Limitations for Building Permit Violations: Through this update to the county’s zoning regulations, there is now a 10-year limit for how far back the county can go when issuing fines for zoning violations. This removes issues that arose when property owners were being fined for property issues that pre-dated their ownership of land.

“I believe I have made some great strides since being elected to the McHenry County Board in 2012 and becoming the Chairman in 2014,” said Gottemoller. “Now that the county’s voters will, for the first time, start choosing the board’s leader in 2016, I hope my record has earned me the support of the voters for the position of County Board Chairman.”