ENDORESMENT: BURGESS FOR MAYOR

EDITORIAL SAUK VILLAGER ENDORSEMENT:  The Sauk Village election kicks off and voters go to the polls beginning THIS MONDAY!  At this time, Sauk Villagers must make the crucial decision about what they want in a Mayor; one who has no vision nor plan and will shoot from the hip to get through day to day operations or one that will throw out the same failed past practices to move this town in a substantially new direction.  Sauk Villagers, a blind man can see there is only one person for the challenge and that is Trustee Derrick Burgess!  HE IS SAUK VILLAGERS CANDIDATE OF CHOICE! 

We remind our loyal readers that he has always reported the facts based on retrievable and substantive documentation.  We have researched each candidates’ record which includes their public and not so public information and remind the public on the best choice based on those facts, temperament, experience and preparedness to lead.

In our findings, Derrick Burgess' public and not so public record stands head and shoulders above any other mayoral candidate for the energy and leadership qualities Sauk Village should demand in their next mayor.

What most impresses us is Burgess’s clarity of vision and ability to articulate exactly how he would use the mayor’s office to make much-needed improvements, particularly in terms of his Strategic Plan for Progress and how he will work diligently in getting Sauk Village on a Pathway to Progress he has been speaking about.  The Village has lacked true leadership and many important things like the youth and cleaning up the Village have been neglected for far too long.  If you like the status quo, you should consider one of Burgess’s opponents who have both voted in lock-step with the current administration.

To be a successful mayor, Burgess has the right tone and is the only candidate that has the ability to unite a greatly divided community.  The mayor doesn’t represent just one segment of the village but all residents. Burgess is the only candidate running for mayor that has taken on the status quo fighting against unbalanced budgets and regularly questioning and challenging the administration on its reckless course of financial decisions.  Burgess’s plan also focuses on truly fighting crime not just making up fake numbers about the crime in Sauk Village to help improve enforcement some of the most troubled neighborhoods.

Burgess says that under the past two administrations, development tended to focus on “politics” and “The administrations have really dropped the ball” on tending to the village’s needs.

Burgess has been out in the community and has been inviting residents to his campaign office to discuss his plans to get Sauk Village on that Pathway to Progress he has been talking about.  The handful of supporters of the current administration, including the mayor himself, have tried to vilify those who have supported Burgess.  Their efforts have included personal attacks and other diversionary tactics like printing cards helping residents identify which social media pages did not support the current administrations misguided policies for which we openly have admitted we are one of those pages.  The most recent effort was to resurrect the 2016 vote of no confidence letter against the administration of David Hanks, and they tried to include Burgess in this current administration, which clearly he has stated he is not a part of!  All their efforts to divide the community clearly failed in 2015, when every single candidate supported by the administration failed to get re-elected to a seat on the Village Board!  That was the tidal wave!  2017, will be the tsunami and hopefully purge the poison politics and status quo from Sauk Village once and for all.

Unlike his opponents, Burgess will dedicate his time and energies seeking out new business and economic development opportunities.  Burgess is well known throughout the South Suburban region by community leaders, State Officials and it will not take him an entire term learning to do the job of Mayor. 

The other candidates who are running for mayor currently sit on the Village Board of Trustees.  Current three-term Trustee Rosie Biag and one-termer Lynda Washington-House, have expressed their intentions to continue the status quo of the current administration with some fuzzy ideas and half-baked solutions to the problems the Village faces.  One candidate even has some real pie in the sky story boards with multi-million dollar plans, but for the last 4 years have voted in total lockstep with Mayor which has resulted in the Village being over $5 million dollars in debt.  Audits with substantial negative "findings" have not been addressed even though a number of them are repeated from prior years.  Because of this, the Village has not had a bond rating by the 3 major Rating agencies since 2009.  And These candidates offer no plan on how they would pay for these “pipe-dreams”.  Their voting records are riddled with consensus votes allowing the withdrawal of over $2 million without public votes.

We have, however, thoroughly read the Burgess Plan a Strategic Plan for Progress which is authored by Burgess and approved by a consortium of professionals.  Burgess plans to release his plan publicly.  This plan, is his vision for the future, his ideas, his goals, and his objectives for Sauk Village's future.  The plan is so well laid out, that subsequent mayors will still have a blueprint to guide them.

A vote for Burgess is a vote for a New Direction, a true step on a Pathway to Progress!  We are proud to give him our Endorsement!