The Caucus Is Not the Answer. You Are.

Winnetka has let a few neighbors choose its government over the last decade, and it is costing the village. Very few people drive the Caucus elections, and from our perspective the result is not representative of the community. The people chosen that way are now deciding how to handle more than $600 million in capital needs identified by the Village's own staff.

The Caucus cannot fix that. More of us voting can.

Five and fifteen decide

Here is how a name reaches your Town Hall ballot.

Nine Caucus Council volunteers interview the applicants in closed session and recommend a slate; eight vote, and the chair breaks ties. So five people can decide the initial slate.

• The Park Board applicants went to the Parks Committee: Sandra Berger, Jackie Blackett, Charles Brown, Mounif Elyoussef, Steve Huels, Jude Offerle, Bashir Qaasim and Ian Rinehart, chaired by Brion Doherty.
• The Village slate went to the Slating Committee: Stanton Anderson, Kelly Heneghan, Mary Hickey, Robert Mucci, Duff Peterson, Katie Stevens, Jessica Tucker and Anne Wilder, chaired by Ed Keller.

Good neighbors, every one. Also the people choosing your government, and not necessarily representative of the community or of what the community wants.

The full Caucus Council then votes. It has 68 seats available, but only 56 were filled this year, and not one member was elected by you. A quorum is 29, and a slate passes on a majority of those voting — so 15 people can approve one. This year's vote was September 24, on Zoom: 31 present, 11 proxies, no minutes or tally posted.

Then the slate goes to the Fall Town Hall, where every voting-age resident may vote and no quorum is required. Last October more than 700 ballots were cast, a uniquely high turnout. Winnetka counted 12,744 residents in the 2020 census, about 3,925 of them under 18. Call it 8,800 adults.

Five recommend. Fifteen can approve. Fewer than 1 adult in 10 decides. That is not much of a democracy.

Nothing in the Caucus rules stops 5,000 residents from voting on October 15. The door is open. We do not walk through it. Historically the Caucus has made it hard on younger adults by requiring them to attend and vote in person. With young children that is hard to impossible — and yet one of the first statements in the Caucus bylaws is a commitment to drive community involvement and represent the full community, not just the loud few.

A gate, not the answer

The Town Hall is not the election. April is. The Caucus petitions its picks onto the ballot and backs them, and so few decide because the Caucus historically was rarely challenged. Given its recent performance, that should change. The real election needs to happen in the Skokie School auditorium in the fall, and again in April. Participation is required.

What a small room produces

A process this small can be — and is — heavily influenced by a few. It leans toward the people who have been in it. We see two biases.

The first is toward tenure

The Caucus tells would-be candidates it is looking for “a track record of service,” which in practice means years on appointed boards and commissions, or in the Caucus itself.

All seven members of the Village Council arrived on a Caucus slate. The village president is a former Caucus chair, one trustee is a past chair and another served in Caucus leadership. All four Village candidates on this year's slate are incumbents.

Last October the Council recommended three sitting trustees for three seats. Ryan Harrison, nominated from the floor, with young children and no board experience, told the room the trustees were “a very narrow band of people, and I don't think they necessarily represent this entire community.” He drew 306 votes and finished fourth. He is a great candidate.

The second is toward spending nothing

In May, staff told the Council that Winnetka faces more than $600 million in potential capital needs over two decades. The five-year capital plan totals about $196 million.

The Council's stated aim is to keep the Aaa bond rating and hold new debt under $60 million. Reasonable enough. But by the Village's own count it has levied $26.8 million less than the tax cap would have allowed since 2005. And Winnetka does not spend even what it budgets: The Record reported $32.25 million budgeted for capital in 2024 and $4.11 million spent.

The result is decline, and you can see it from the lakefront. The end of the Tower Road pier has been closed since 2020, and in January the Village closed the whole thing after its consultant found it unsound. The budget line was $300,000; the estimate came back at $500,000 to $1 million, and the work has slipped to 2027.

Elder Lane Beach, where a Village storm sewer empties beneath the pier, lost six swim seasons, reopened in May, then posted hazard advisories on 24 of its 86 swim days. When the Park District asked to fence the Centennial dog beach, the Village Council voted 5–1 to draft a denial — the fourth no from a Village body this year, and not the first since 2024.

Does the Caucus select for this? The paper trail says it at least rewards it. This year's Village platform has three planks: parking, business zoning, and sustainability and long-term investment. The $600 million list is not among them. The sustainability plank favors steps residents can take “without requiring broad tax or utility increases.” And Caucus rules make an incumbent's regard for the platform a factor in re-slating.

When a few dozen people vet the candidates and a few hundred ratify them, we get a Winnetka that is falling behind. Look at how Wilmette is outpacing us.

Neither bias requires bad faith. The volunteers are our neighbors, unpaid, and nearly half are new: 27 of this year's 56 were not on last year's roster. The bias is arithmetic. When very few people choose, the village gets the priorities of a very few people.

Who is missing

Residents 35 to 55 are about 4 in 10 Winnetka adults, by census estimates, and they will live longest with what the village builds or does not. Look at the Caucus slate. We do not believe they are represented.

What Doug Williams saw

Doug Williams, Winnetka's village manager for 18 years, saw where that leads. In his 2010 farewell to the Village Council he warned that if the pool of civic-minded volunteers dries up:

“Winnetka will end up slating advocates who have an axe to grind, a single-issue agenda, or worse yet, a hidden agenda.”

His remedy was not to guard the pathway. It was to keep the pool full. The pool is shallow already: in 2024 the Caucus had three Council seats and two applicants, and the third went to a former trustee nominated from the floor.

Three things the Caucus can fix

1. Post it, do not just hand it over. Under its own rules, each slated candidate's written qualifications and an interview summary are available on request a week before the Council votes. Put them on the website, with the questionnaire.
2. For contested elections, hold a candidates forum. Before Town Hall, send a questionnaire to all candidates and publish the responses verbatim. In the Park District race there is plenty to consider.
3. Write remote voting into the rules. They say nothing about it. It was offered in 2023 and 2024, and whether residents could take part from home this year was unsettled 11 days out. It should not depend on who is chairing, or who asks.

The first two need no rule change. The third does: Council approval, then a Town Hall vote. One more reason to be there.

The one only we can fix

None of that touches the real problem. The Caucus is a room, and it reflects whoever is in it. No committee can slate for the priorities of residents who never show up, and no rule change will make Winnetka invest in its future while the people with the most future here stay home.

Williams left the village a harder line, too:

“Voters get the government they deserve. And Winnetka deserves the very best.”

The few hundred who always show up will show up again on October 15. Whether a thousand more join them is the one question the Caucus cannot answer for us.

Then, when the Council fills its empty seats this winter, take one.

Related: Get in the Game — register to vote online and Two Flyers. Five Questions. Straight Answers.