Election 2011: Village Board Candidate Don Labriola

Four candidates are vying for three seats on the. Incumbent  talked with us about his ideas for bringing new businesses to town, maintaining services and keeping the budget balanced.

What ideas do you have to spur economic development in Mokena?

We have some pretty effective policies on the books right now, but it’s obvious with the way the economy is, the interest to develop in Mokena is not what it used to be. If you look at the past eight years, we brought in JC Penney, Petsmart, another CVS, businesses that could have gone anywhere, and they chose Mokena. There were no incentives or anything, but from talking with them, they say they have never been treated so well as by our village board. I believe our policies had a lot to do with that.

We’re going to do whatever it takes to increase economic development in Mokena. We will rely on the policies that are already in place. If we need to refine those policies based on presentations, we will. We are going to continue to reach out to developers.

What ideas do you have for dealing with the village’s decreasing and stagnating fund balances?

They are stagnating, first of all, because the state has been behind in disbursing sales tax and other funds, and community and economic development is related to that. That’s why we want to generate retail and sales tax. We still have 800 undeveloped residential lots in Mokena. When the economy picks up again and people start building homes, we’ll begin collecting more fees again. If a building boom or a mini-boom happens, we’ll collect fees on every one of those developments. We’re not counting on it, we’re not planning our budget around it, but if it happens, it will build our reserves back up. Economic development is a fluid thing. Stores don’t last forever and things change, and we should always be on top of that.

I will not support any kind of tax increase for this purpose.

When it comes to budget cuts, what should be off-limits?

Anything that will have a negative impact on public safety or core services can’t be touched. We’ve got to protect our citizens, we’ve got to pile the snow, we’ve got to pick up the garbage and we’ve got to take care of the roads. That’s why people pay taxes.

Where in the budget can the village cut deeper?

We’re going through the budget right now and staff are making recommendations. I would hesitateto say at this point, I don’t know if “cutting deeper” is the right vernacular. We’ve already laid people off and cut the paper newsletters.

We do have an opportunity to reduce the cost that the village pays for 911 dispatch services. The surcharge we pay right now does not get collected by us, but by by the county. There are funds there I think should be dispersed, which would decrease the amount we would have to pay into it. My continued goal is to bring the money home.

Editor's note: Mokena Patch was unable to reach village board candidate Jim Richmond by publication time.