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Del Mar makes stops in Ottawa, IVCC · Illinois Valley - Shaw Local

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  Speaker 1: Del Mar makes stops in Ottawa IVCC written by Matthias Warner.
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  This article is being read by an automated voice brought
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  to you by Everlett. As November nears, the Republican hopeful
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  for Illinois Lieutenant Governor Aaron del Mar made a stop
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  Thursday in LaSalle County. Darren Bailey's running mate, stopped off
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  for a private lunch at Halftime Restaurant in Ottawa as
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  one of his stops stops through the Illinois Valley ahead
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  of November's election to address the main issues of the race.
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  Following his stops in Ottawa, del Mar took a private
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  tour of Illinois Valley Community College, followed by a visit
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  to a local gun range. This interview has been edited
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  for length and clarity. Q. The state legislature was able
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  to come up with a cell phone ban for schools.
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  Where do you stand on this issue? A. I happened
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  to support a telephone ban for schools as a dad
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  of six kids. I think that they should have access
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  to them for an emergency situation. An emergency situation, but
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  I don't think you're going to have a good learning
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  environment when you're on your cell phone, when you're supposed
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  to be learning, reading, writing, and arithmetic. Q. A big
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  issue in this area is data centers. What would be
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  your administration's position on them. A. If you're in LaSalle
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  County and your county board that was duly elected by
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  your people doesn't want to have a data center here,
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  or they want to regulate that data center in a
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  way to keep them accountable for the increased cost of
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  the water usage or how much it's going to be
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  on the power grid. I think that those local communities
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  should be able to do it instead of Springfield JB.
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  Pritzker and the Democrat majority trying to take control away. Q.
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  What's the biggest thing that's challenging residents right now that
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  your administration would aim to address. A. Property taxes, No question.
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  Under JB. Pritzker, in the last seven years, most property
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  taxes have gone up sixty seven percent and they're unsustainable.
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  That mixed with increased utility bills and the costs associated
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  with keeping power and water to your home are pushing
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  people in families out of Illinois. It makes Illinois less competitive.
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  That's why we lost a congressional district and we're projected
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  to lose another congressional district in twenty thirty because we're
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  losing population. Q. What's the topic that's on the horizon
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  in the next four years that maybe we're not thinking
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  about right now that your administration would be better at
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  handling than the current one. A. The three biggest things
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  about our administration are going to be affordability, education, and safety.
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  That takes us into property tax relief and redoing how
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  we assess property taxes. Right now, most of your property
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  taxes go to the local education system. That's how we
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  fund schools. So anytime you talk about property tax reform,
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  everyone starts screaming that you want to start defunding schools.
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  That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about doing
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  it in a responsible manner and attaching it to other
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  different governing bodies and revenue streams. You can do it
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  on sales tax, you could be doing it on rental tax.
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  You can be doing it in other places outside of it.
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  If we don't figure out how to make Illinois affordable
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  and competitive, there's not going to be anybody here in
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  four years or eight years. I think that we're going
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  to need to really look at our education system, which
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  is part of that. With taxes and then also our safety.
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  We need to reform and rebuild how we look at
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  public safety from an educational standpoint. Nobody wants to get
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  into the law enforcement profession because they don't feel like
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  they're supported, and that ultimately makes us less safe. Hugh,
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  what's the impact of Colin Corbett's campaign going to be
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  on this race? A. He doesn't have any impact yet
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  because we just challenged his petitions. Me and my team
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  are objecting to this petition of thirty eight thousand submitted signatures.
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  I challenged twenty thousand of them. We are having our
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  first court date with the Illinois Board of Elections to
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  set our judicial schedule, and then we'll be going through
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  a full audit all twenty thousand that we objected to.
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  If he survives that and keeps seven thousand of the
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  twenty thousand that we objected on, he will be a
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  candidate and then we'll dispatch him accordingly, just like we are. JB. Pritzker, Q.
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  What's the issue that's going to ultimately push your administration
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  over the edge in November so that Bailey and delmar
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  are in charge. The difference is four years ago when
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  Darren Bailey ran I wasn't on the team. Actually I
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  was running against Darren. I was Gary Rabine's lieutenant governor candidate,
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  So this is my second time running for lieutenant governor.
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  I don't think Bailey understood as much as he does
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  now because he's had a huge evolution of understanding of
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  the state of Illinois, which campaigning makes you do. But
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  more importantly, this is also a referendum on JB. Pritzker
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  and the last seven years of failed policies. So you're
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  going to say, well, we've balanced the budget. We didn't
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  balance the budget. You tax people more. You said, this
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  is how much we're going to spend, and then we're
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  going to tax you until we get there. That's not
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  balancing a budget. So what can you point to? Are
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  we safer? Is it more affordable? Are your property taxes down?
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  Are your kids smarter? Cute? What ultimately made you want
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  to join up with Darren Bailey in this campaign? Hey,
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  just like Democrats, we're not a monolithic group. We don't
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  all believe exactly the same thing. There are differences. We've
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  been a little unkind to each other. He said some
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  negative things about me, and I've said some negative things
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  about him. But when we actually acted like adults and
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  put our egos aside and took the chips off of
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  our shoulder and sat down and had a chill conversation.
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  We realized that a lot of the same issues that
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  he's pushing against are the same issues that I'm pushing against.
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  H