Mokena's Future Slate - Meet The Candidate Night 2/4/2025

This is was the first candidate meet and greet for the Village Board and Mayoral races. Mayor Frank Fleischer's "Mokena's Future" slate provided a spread of coffee, pastires and a chance to hear from their candidates.

When I planned to attend this event I thought I could put a quick set of clips together but the Mayor and his slate, for the first time, laid out their plans as well as talked about their opponents and how they differ. I think that a shorter video wouldn't have shared the message as well as I intended so you get to hear it all. 

Let us know what you think and lets hear what is important to YOU this election! Share in the comments and please remember to subscribe to our YouTube channel! 

Our website has a page dedicated to local elections, with the candidate interviews (as they are released) and election updates throughout! This is meant to better inform the public so please don't hesitate to send us your questions and we will do our best to get an answer! 

Chapters

• 0:12 Candidates Forum Highlights Mokena's Vision
• 8:48 Revitalizing Mokena's Downtown Area
• 20:53 Mokena's Community Impact Over Time

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:12

Hi, I'm O'Kena. We're out here at Clancy's and tonight is the very first candidates forum, and so I came out here and we'll talk to some of the candidates, find out what's important to them in this election, as well as, hopefully, talk to some people attending and find out what's important to them as well. So let's go check it out.

Speaker 2: 0:46

I'm really hoping the downtown area can be built up a little bit more. Maybe some new restaurants, some new stores down there. I want to have a cute downtown, like all the surrounding communities have. We have the opportunity to do it. I mean, we have enough space and everything here, but we're just hoping we can do that. That's one of my biggest things.

Speaker 1: 1:05

Kim, you're running for trustee this election, so tell me, what do you think is important to Mokina voters this election?

Speaker 3: 1:12

You know, I think most voters are concerned about our downtown area and I would like to revitalize the downtown area to make it family friendly and make it a location where it's a destination and not a drive-thru.

Speaker 4: 1:26

Hi, I'm Kiri Abrahamson. What I think is important in the upcoming election is obviously a lot of growth in Mokena. I have been here 28 years. I built my house I'm in the same home that I built 28 years ago and I love it but what it's missing is the growth of our community, the Front Street, like was mentioned here tonight. You know, my sisters live in the western suburbs and I'm going to Hinsdale and I'm going to their little store there because they have the best chicken salad. Or I'm going, you know, to Western Springs for the same bakery and I want that to come to Mokina, where people are going to come Springs for the same bakery and I want that to come to Mokina, where people are going to come to Mokina for these businesses. I do believe Clancy's Brothers has been a big start to that and I'm here a lot and it's a community that I love to see. So I want that brought to other businesses on Front Street. My name is Glenn Iden.

Speaker 5: 2:24

My wife and I have been brought to other businesses on Front Street. My name is Glenn Iden. My wife and I have been residents of Rokina for over 10 years. I served on the executive committee for the homeowners association of Foxboro Estates and I've known our current mayor for over 10 years, President Frank Fleischer and I fully endorse him because of his fiscal responsibility, fiduciary responsibility to the town. He watches where everything goes and how it's being run. He's always been very responsive, very energetic and, again, responsive to my and our subdivision. I live in needs as well as everybody in Mokena.

Speaker 6: 3:08

Thank, you the downtown and I think for me personally that's a big motivator and influence of why I'm running in the first place is because the people of Mokena want to have a viable downtown. They want to have a place that's filled with vibrant businesses and they don't want to have a place that's filled with vibrant businesses and they don't want to have to travel. They want to have peace of mind, knowing that they don't have to go far away to get everything they need in their community. And to me, that starts with a hub, a downtown that just has everything that you would want, and so I want to help build that. I want to help make that a reality. I believe the mayor has a good vision for that and he's assembling a good team to execute on that vision.

Speaker 6: 3:46

So I'm just excited to be a part of it and yeah, just trying to have a good time and listen.

Speaker 7: 3:56

I've been doing this for a long time and I hope you will not. A lot of us have known each other for a lot of years and everything I do here is for the right of the community and I really want people to understand and to know that. And to see this many people come out tonight for our first meet and greet really really makes me and my candidate feel really, really good. So thank you very much. So we're going to do tonight like I said, I'm welcoming you what we're going to do tonight. I'm going to hand off to Nick Franci, who put all this stuff together, did a beautiful job with it, and then, if you have any questions, we'll stand up here and just ask you some questions.

Speaker 7: 4:43

I want you to get to know us, but if you have some concerns everybody's got a couple of concerns don't worry about bringing those up tonight at all. I'll try to answer what you have. I've been doing this for a long time. I don't run away from questions. That's not what I'm here for. I've been your president for a long time and hopefully I'm gonna be your president for four more years.

Speaker 6: 5:06

So Nick, thanks for being here. Everybody, to echo what the mayor had to say, this is really great just to see a packed house of people in the community that care and are interested in local politics and are interested in talking about what's important to us and to this town. So why I'm running really quickly just to give you a quick snapshot into what I'm up here doing, talking and conversing with you guys, is just because of what we were able to accomplish with this business here, kinesy Brothers. So we drove through Wolf Road three years ago and we saw this bank building and it was empty. It was vacant. And we're like man, that's kind of a crazy scenario.

Speaker 6: 5:51

To have this amazing building vacant and then to hear the conversations about how long it was vacant was just kind of like wow, there's so much untapped potential in this town. And then you go down to Wolf and you make a right on Front Street and you just blow it away that this is such a great community and there's so much right development that I think is just on the cusp of exploding. But we need the right people, we need the right effort, we need teamwork, but most importantly, we need a vision, and I believe that Mayor Frank Fleischer has that vision and now we are assembling a team to get to work to actually take that vision and start to put put our hands together and start to give Mokina a downtown, start to give Mokina some really great pedestrian safe uh pathways, bikeways, walkways, and just to grow this town and to make us proud of just living here.

Speaker 6: 6:48

So thank you for being here.

Speaker 8: 6:51

Hello everybody, I'm Kimberly Hildman For those of you who don't know me, thank you so much for coming out tonight.

Speaker 8: 6:57

I do want to thank Frank, nick and Jim for bringing the run as a slate. I think it's a really powerful slate that we are going to present to the people of Molkina. I also want to thank Mark, who's the man behind the slate doing all the work. So, if we can really quick, I'm running because I believe in honoring Molkena's rich history while building towards a vibrant and modern future for the families of Molkena. This campaign is really important to me because I want to show my kids who one of them was here but had to swim and the other was at soccer.

Speaker 8: 7:39

so you may see them running it out, but I want to show them it's important to have a voice in your community as well as make a difference in the place that you call home. Moketa has such potential to grow and expand and, as trustee, I really do want to revitalize our downtown area to make it family friendly and to attract new families, as well as support and grow the families that are already here, to make it more collaborative, to allow to have a voice in terms of family connections, which is really important. I do thank everybody for coming tonight. I think if we work together and everybody comes out to vote on April 1st, then we can lead Mokena into a future that will not only bring Mokena's charm to life, but values to life to have it shine for the future. So thank you everybody.

Speaker 9: 8:48

I moved into Mopena back in 1990, so I've been here a long time. I moved in with my wife and I had three daughters at the time. Now we've grown to a bigger family of nine grandkids. I originally ran for the first time back for trustee back in 96-97. I had some ideas of where I thought the village should go and what direction it should be heading in, and it didn't seem like that was being done. So I figured I'm gonna try and see if I can't get a seat and give a voice to where Mocena's future should head. I didn't win that year. I called Frank Sensen and I've got video. We did a debate. I got video crashed me pretty good that year. So here we are now. We're in the same slate now.

Speaker 9: 9:33

But, um, the things over the years, they really haven't changed since 1990 after the same stories from the residents. Uh, in the village, as I hear today, a lot of people want to see something done downtown, clean it up, do something with it, and um, and the other point was about the traffic in the village. Back in the late 90s we were were already seeing traffic cutting through our village to ridiculous amounts. And now we're 20-some years later. We've done nothing about it. And now it's basically gridlocked, with our major thoroughfares north and south, and we're cutting through on the Fort Road 191st. And where are we going to be in 15 or 20 years if we don't look at that issue now? Yeah, so, um, growth is not happening in boquina residents and speaking as much as it is, surrounding communities, so we have to find a way to take some of the burden off of our streets, of our neighborhoods, and that's part of what we've got the uh re-motivated into it.

Speaker 9: 10:30

And then last fall Frank called me. We'd been talking about, you know, I'm always thinking about what can make things better, and I had this crazy idea about how ridiculous internet service is in the village. And I said so. I called him and I said isn't there a way we can look at it as a utility and negotiate rates as a city, as a village, so that everybody could have the same rates at a more affordable price? And so we had a few conversations and then, all of a sudden, frank called me one day and said hey, I have an opening on the board. Would you be interested in filling it? So that was probably a mistake. I said yes. So I agreed to do that, and on November 11th I was appointed to the board and I've been a trustee ever since.

Speaker 9: 11:21

I've learned a lot already. It's a lot more than I thought it was, and there's a lot going on in the village that the residents don't know. No one goes to our board meetings I don't know how many people watch it, but the residents for the most part are not engaged in what's going on. So when we get bad things and they look back and they slip the trustees or whatever. But if you didn't make a difference in some sense, then we're all blamed for it. A difference in some sense, then we're all blamed for it, and so I'm thrilled to be having this opportunity to run and hopefully get elected to an appointment, and I hope to be able to make a difference for the future of Mokina and leave it in a better place than when I came to it, and that's why I'm kind of here.

Speaker 7: 12:17

I'm kind of here. All of us feel the same way about a lot of the stuff we're doing together. The downtown is ridiculous. I haven't finally hit a downtown since I was a trustee years ago. I took a poll last year and took another poll this year. 70% of the residents make no difference about age, make no difference about gender, want a viable downtown. They want a downtown.

Speaker 7: 12:43

And I've been fighting with the supposedly friends of Mokina which is what they call themselves for the last 12 years to work with me on this. Don't want nothing to do with it. They didn't work with me at all. Well, that election's coming up, so they'll probably say literature says, oh, we're for downtown. They were never for downtown.

Speaker 7: 13:03

We needed traffic study done. How do you like the traffic out of the Grange and Wolf Road? Because there's only two roads that get you out of Mokinas. We should have had this planned out years ago. They wouldn't let me put a traffic study together and that's considered a Phase 1 traffic study. The only way you're going to get grant money is to prove that you need it, and that's what a Phase 1 would do. Grant money is to prove that you need it, and that's what a phase one would do. We'd have engineers come in. They would tell us what we need, where to put the roads, and if they were important enough at the time, we could get grant money to get it done Again. They fought me every step of the way. Not because they're bad people, they just don't know what they're doing. That's the way. Not because they're bad people, they just don't know what they're doing.

Speaker 7: 13:55

That's the problem. They're not bad people. They just sit up there for whatever reason and don't go to seminars, don't go to conferences. That's going to be different for the free people. We're going to have a good cohesive unit that's going to work for you folks. So when you see us walking around the building, knocking on your doors, these people are wide open to talk to you whenever you want. That's not a problem. And tonight, please, any questions, let us know.

Speaker 6: 14:38

Good, it's just a nice long stretch of property, and so I think it only makes sense to have a front street that just has this sense of consecutive businesses that are all businesses, that are all businesses that we want to have in the community. You can ride your bike, park your bike and walk and frequent these businesses. Then it's got a nice horseshoe pattern, so you start developing the other side of the train tracks and you can just walk around and then, hopefully, behind you know, yunkers Farm, yunker Park, back there there's so much great potential on that property of, uh, you know, amphitheaters and just opening up that back spot behind uh, et cetera, zap taco back there, just really creating a place for families to come in and just enjoy that space I would agree, like having more gathering places where families can come.

Speaker 8: 15:33

Well, anybody of any age can come and just sit and enjoy the downtown area, get something to eat, get something to drink. I'd love to see more green initiatives. Bring in local art, bring in local history to be able to capitalize on that Mokina we're the only Mokina in all of the nation. There's no other Mokina in the nation. So I feel like that's something that we can capitalize on and so make a name for ourselves. We already have a name, but what else can we do to bring Mokina to everybody's?

Speaker 9: 16:06

home. I think that's a good point and one of my ways about the downtown areas. We just can't open a bunch of businesses and fail. It's not really our position to make it accessible to people easier. I think that's where our job comes in. They have to make. I'm sitting right now in the five-year comprehensive plan of the park district. They can do, and my part with that really is representing the village, and I'm very interested in seeing bike paths extended from the park all the way into downtown, circling the farm field and making it much easier for bike riders and joggers and walkers to get into the downtown area. And once we do that, we might then find a few businesses that might take a risk and gamble on us to open some. But with a little bit of traffic that we're getting on street right now, no one's going to open a business and put a big investment. We're going to have to make more money and I think that's where we as board members, what we have our day.

Speaker 10: 17:07

I mean one of the things that I think about is the real property lot itself. Yeah, it can bring something Well during the yeah, I mean right, there's a little parking lot itself.

Speaker 9: 17:12

Yeah, Well, during the day, for sure, I see there's more to it.

Speaker 7: 17:17

Like Jim and I have been talking about, you need to get more accessibility. You're going to have to take Willow Road, bring it over the top of the park district, connected from the government. Now that kids go bigger downtown, that gives it better access to downtown and that's the kind of stuff again we need somebody smarter than us, that's a consultant. Let's bring a consultant in. Don't just sit up there and say no, because we're all pretty good about downtown.

Speaker 10: 17:54

I mean, like I said, 70% of the people, that's a pretty good percentage want downtown.

Speaker 9: 18:00

You know, I think the downtown area also looking at what type of businesses fit downtown For me I was talking to someone earlier today about me. You know I got, I think, about the type of business I'd want to see down there, but then I asked my daughter to know that it should be sushi, to be an ice cream shop and things like that, you know so. So people of my age we kind of went to different restaurants. We did so. We really need to reach out and see what the unit of the village one here, once it are, you know, walking the bike trails once that are going to come in to walk downtown to get an ice cream or candy bar or get their sushi and things like that. So the kind of businesses I think that are going downtown are different than what I personally would think. If you are sitting in our building, this is going to really direct that to us of our city, our building is gonna really direct that to us.

Speaker 9: 18:50

I have a question. You know it sounds great making Front Street beautiful and everything, but that's you know you guys gotta work together with Park District, right? What kind of relationship does the current-.

Speaker 7: 19:07

Very good, very good. One of the things we wanna do when you ask a question. The Park District part of that is the Park District. That's the best board in the building. I don't know what the next in line is. They work extremely well together. Very well. It was fantastic job over there. As we've talked about moving the train station parking over there behind, etc. And combining park district parking and village, you know commuter parking in that one area. So now you've got some place to park for. You know events downtown or things like this, and then we open up our downtown. So yeah, we have been looking at it and the park district is very easy to work with.

Speaker 9: 20:01

Thanks for that question. You know we have a we knew a comprehensive plan in the last year in in 2002 I believe it was and we're currently working on a new comprehensive plan. I spent some time reading through it. After I ended up on the board here, I found out that about 90% of what we did back in 2002 we could just like copy and run again because we didn't have a gun and um, because we're not the same age, the agenda has to be put forward at the beginning of the session. Our administrators got to do their background work and then we ask trustees to have that faith to hold and make these changes. And that's where it seems to be stalling is that we're not getting.

Speaker 10: 20:41

We're not getting trustee support when we do get into that point, getting trustee support when we do get to that point let me just make a point. I worked 40 years for the tribune so I covered many, many boards and commissions, art districts, school awards, and I did a lot of editing. Well, my first big job was I come to edinston and they had a city council. I knew the members, I knew the city clerk, I knew the city clerk, I knew the manager and I would marvel at how they would waste money.

Speaker 10: 21:14

Just, it was completely stupid in my mind, but I was right enough and I didn't always have to say that, well then other places, people at work would say you know that town is run by the mafia and we knew that. All right. So I've lived in Mokina since 1951 and I never wanted to live anywhere else. And I was in Vietnam for a year and I thought of one thing just get back to Mokina. So then I married a woman from Texas. I told you my brother was here at the second. We had about 900 people, as I recall Now what we got 20,000? And in my mind the way people honestly served us and given us an orderly future. Through those what? 70 years, 75 years. They've done a great job and to this day I still want to live in Milwaukee. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 7: 22:26

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you bring back channel.

Speaker 8: 22:49

Okay, so that's showing my age. Hey, I get that one, don't worry you.