New Electoral Map, Schedule Implemented By Skokie Village Board

SKOKIE, IL — Just over a year since they were approved by Skokie voters, local election reforms received unanimous approval Monday from the village board and mayor, who vocally opposed the changes ahead of last November's election.

The transition to nonpartisan, staggered elections for a village board composed of both district-level and at-large trustees is now complete.

When the next village elections come around in April 2025, voters village-wide will elect the mayor, clerk and two of the six trustees for four-year terms. At the same time, voters in each of four newly drawn districts will pick a trustee from their quadrant of the village.

In order to implement the staggered schedule, the district-level trustees will initially serve a two-year term. Then in 2027, trustees for the four districts will be elected for four-year terms, guaranteeing that some seats on the board will be up for election every two years.

The approach was touted as a way to enhance local representation for Skokie's diverse communities while maintaining a village-wide perspective on the board with the at-large trustees. Previously, the village board had been dominated by residents of the wealthier, northeastern quadrant of town, where nearly two thirds of trustees in the last decade have resided.

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In order to draw up the new map, village staff hired the law firm of Klein, Thorpe & Jenkins and mapping consultant Peter Creticos to draw up the new boundaries. The staff implementation team convened three public meetings last quarter to update residents on the process.

Creticos said the new districts have nearly identical populations. (District 4 in the southwest has the fewest residents at 16,766, while District 2 in the northeast has the most, with 17,055.) And dividing the town into quadrants made natural sense, the mapping expert said in a memo to staff, considering public services are already distributed that way.

"We determined that long districts spanning the village along either an east-west axis or a north-south axis would make no sense to residents on opposite ends of such districts," Creticos said.

"We considered the merits of all public testimony," he said. "Several citizens asked that three maps be presented for consideration. We responded by presenting maps labeled as Prairie, Marsh, and Orchard."

Based on feedback from the community, the consultants created a final proposed map called "Forest" and presented it in October.

The shift to nonpartisan elections was simpler. Starting with the 2025 elections, candidates will not be able to list any political party affiliation on their nomination petition and no party will be listed alongside their names on the ballot.

"A nonpartisan election system does not prohibit candidates from coordinating their campaigns, fundraising and platforms with other candidates and political parties," Village Manager John Lockerby said in a memo to the board.

Ahead of last year's elections, the voter-initiated electoral reforms were opposed by Mayor George Van Dusen and the Skokie Caucus Party, which has dominated local elections for more than six decades. Nonetheless, Van Dusen and all five trustees elected as members of his party voted in favor of the changes.

Trustee James Johnson, the board's lone independent member, was a vocal backer of the changes, which were advocated by a group called the Skokie Alliance for Electoral Reform.

Ahead of Monday's vote, Johnson acknowledged a potential downside of the new system and suggested ranked-choice voting was the solution. Neighboring Evanston last year became the first municipality in the state to approve such a system and is due to implement ahead of the 2025 election.

"I do acknowledge that I think the greatest lingering flaw in the new system is the possibility of too many primary elections," Johnson said.

Primary elections would be triggered anytime more than four candidates run for a single spot, which may be more likely with staggered elections for the hybrid board, rather than six at-large trustees.

Johnson said the new system is a "vast improvement" over the older one but suggested a move to ranked-choice voting, also known as "instant runoff" ballots — where voters rank candidates in order of preference — would eliminate the need for primaries.

"If we did this in Skokie," Johnson said, "it would make our new system even better."

Earlier: Voters To Get First Look At Draft Of 4-District Skokie Electoral Map