Five vying for three seats on Village Board; ‘Mundelein is on its way to becoming a destination and a walkable community’

Five candidates, including three incumbents, are jockeying for three open seats on the Mundelein Village Board as voters cast their ballots in the April 4 consolidated election.

As Mundelein prepares to undertake a 700-acre mixed-use development project with the Wirtz Family, the owners of the Chicago Blackhawks hockey franchise, incumbent trustees Kerston Russell, Kara Lambert and Erich Schwenk each believe they have the credentials to manage growth efficiently and keep the village on firm financial footing despite an uncertain near-term economic outlook.

Retired software consultant Ramesh Sharma remains in the running in a campaign despite attempting to drop out of the race at one point.

Then there’s former trustee Robin Meier, who hopes to make her return to the board after a runner-up finish to her 2021 mayoral campaign.

Meier, who said she is “not a politician,” said that projects come and go, and that quality trustees are defined by how they are, “looking at the everyday issues.”

“I run into people, and part of what they like about me is they know I do the research,” Meier told the News-Sun. “The know I read every single thing, and sometimes that’s 700 or 800 pages.”

Sharma briefly withdrew his candidacy, but reentered the race..

“I rethought after maybe a week and thought, ‘Maybe I will make a difference,’” Sharma said. “I am highly educated. I have a master’s in history, a master’s in computer science with honor, I am a fellow of life and health management with distinction. I have taught introduction to law.”

He said Mundelein trustees should not consider the board or village a “champion of diversity,” and that he has the life experience to help make a difference.

“Diversity means everybody should be included,” said Sharma, who is Asian. “So, I question, how many people are Asian in your police? How many people (of other races) are on any committees, and how many persons (are) on your payroll?”

Sharma criticized a board status quo that he believes does not “have any ethical standard,” and questioned the financial acumen of other candidates, though he said he has voted for them in the past.

Growth spurt or growing pains?

Even before the Wirtz development was proposed, Mundelein looked set to swell in population — which according to the U.S. Census is about 31,500 people — in the coming years because of in-progress apartment and commercial developments.

The incumbents spoke of the importance of ensuring that coming growth is managed sustainably and efficiently, making the case that their experience will be a major plus.

“You either grow or you die in the world, as far as I’m concerned,” Russell said. “Growth is inevitable for any community. Now how you grow, how you manage that growth, is what’s important.”

Russell said current board members and his competition are “very capable people,” but argued his eight-year board tenure equips him well to succeed in the coming years. He added that his “even-keeled” approach helps him accomplish more than “drama.”

“There’s no learning curve, so I don’t have to relearn everything,” he said. “I’ve got some age and wisdom on me. I know the ins and outs.”

Lambert, who recently gave birth to her third child, and Schwenk are supporting each other, and are making similar pitches about their experience in local government.

“We got a bunch of stuff done before the baby came, and the baby was two weeks late, so it bought me some time,” Lambert joked.

Lambert said she has worked to make sure the budget has “really, really been paid attention to” during her term, touted board moves to add money to the village’s reserves, as well as the addition of a capable village administrator in former Police Chief Eric Guenther.

“The reason you vote for somebody like me versus somebody that’s maybe more of a seasoned politician is, I genuinely care about where I live,” Lambert said. “I’m raising three kids here.”

She added that village staff has done a wonderful job of bringing in “novel businesses” to occupy vacancies in Mundelein’s industrial business complexes, such as the Midwest’s first padel club, a game that along with pickleball is swiftly growing in the United States.

“Mundelein is on its way to becoming a destination and a walkable community,” Schwenk told the News-Sun.

A flight attendant by trade, Schwenk has acquired a real estate license and his managing broker’s license in recent years. He speaks of a growing passion for “municipal math” and said he has “really started to enjoy, oddly, the budgeting of municipal government and how developments come to be.”

“The walkability and the dense developments that create a walkable community are the way of the future for our village and probably others,” Schwenk said. “It’s exciting to see that in fruition here.”

He said balancing the maintenance of existing roads in need of repairs with planning efforts geared toward new developments will be important in the years ahead.

“It is so much cheaper to maintain what you already have than to let it fail and rebuild it from the ground up,” he said.

Sharma, who has also previously been a homeowner’s association president, said he has “ample time” to go along with “logical and historical thinking” to responsibly oversee village development.

Meier, who spent more than four decades working in telecommunications, said she has dealt with “every crisis known to man” in her decade-plus tenure on the board, which she believe sets her up to be a stable addition to its ranks.