North Riverside voters will have plenty of choices when it comes to next spring’s election of three village trustees after seven candidates filed to run for the three four-year terms up for grabs.

Two full slates of candidates and one independent filed to run for trustee by the 5 p.m. deadline on Dec. 19. The first slate to file was the North Riverside United Party, whose candidates were revealed publicly in a campaign disclosure filing back in November.

Incumbent Deborah Czajka is joined on the North Riverside United slate by newcomers Nicholas Tricoci and Antoni “Tony” Santucci. Independent candidate Jose Del Angel, who confirmed to the Landmark that he was running for trustee weeks ago, also filed nominating petitions.

Filing petitions late on Dec. 19 were three candidates running under the Municipal Integrity Party banner. The party’s chairwoman, incumbent Marybelle Mandel, is running for a second term on the village board after being elected in 2019. She filed paperwork creating the MIP political committee with the Illinois State Board of Elections on Dec. 13.

Running alongside Mandel, who lost a bid for North Riverside mayor in 2021, are Sandra Greicius, who ran unsuccessfully for trustee on Mandel’s slate in 2021, and Joseph Maruska, who is making his first run for elected office.

Brookfield, Riverside trustee races uncontested

For the second straight municipal election in Brookfield, there won’t be a contested village board race.

At the Dec. 19 deadline the only three candidates to have filed to run for the three trustee seats up for election were the PEP Party slate of incumbent Katie Kaluzny, newcomer Julie Narimatsu and Nicole Gilhooley, who served two terms as trustee from 2013 to 2021.

Kaluzny, the associate director of the Illinois Green Alliance and the village board’s liaison to the Cross Community Climate Collaborative (C4), will step into her second term as trustee.

Narimatsu, who works in the Office of the Inspector General at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s office in Chicago, will leave her spot on the Brookfield Parks and Recreation Board to serve as a trustee.

Gilhooley, who is the human resources director at a consulting firm, will begin her third term as a trustee after the election next April.

Incumbent first-term Trustee Brain Conroy decided not to run for re-election, while incumbent two-term David LeClere will exit the board due to term limits.

Meanwhile, Riverside voters once again won’t face a competitive race for three trustee seats up for election next spring. The only candidates to have filed before the Dec. 19 deadline were incumbents Cristin Evans and Alex Gallegos and Jill Mateo, who will serve her first term after serving on the Riverside Planning and Zoning Commission eight years, the last five as its chairwoman.

Evans, who is public information officer for the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority; Gallegos, who works in the financial services industry; and Mateo, who is a biology and psychology professor at the University of Chicago, were also endorsed by the Riverside Community Caucus in October.

Despite the endorsement, all three are running independently and not as a slate. 

Contested race for Brookfield Library Board

Five candidates have filed to run for the four four-year terms up for election to the Brookfield Public Library Board of Trustees, but one of them won’t be Dianne Duner, the library board president who has served as a trustee for 23 years.

Duner and fellow incumbent Jennifer Perry, who is finishing up her third term as a library trustee, did not file nominating petitions by the Dec. 19 deadline.

However, two incumbents – Linda Kampschroeder and J. Edgar Mihelic – did file, along with three newcomers, including Mitzi Norton, Karl Olson and Jennifer Paliatka.

The races for Riverside Library Board and North Riverside Library District Board will be uncontested.

While five candidates filed nominating petitions for the four terms up for elections on the Riverside Library Board of Trustees, one withdrew almost immediately.

Staying in the race are incumbents Kenneth Circo and Courtney Greve-Hack, who will resume their seats alongside Nancy DeFauw and Daniel Loucks. Kimber Day Coombes had filed to run, but withdrew on Dec. 20, according to Riverside Village Clerk Ethan Sowl.

Running for the two six-year terms up for election on the North Riverside Public Library District Board of Trustees is longtime trustee and board President Annette Corgiat and incumbent Kathy Bonnar. Running for the lone two-year term is incumbent Kyle Johnson, who was appointed to the board in September 2021 to fill a vacancy left by the resignation of Allen Pineda.