Lake County Gazette

Craig Wilcox wants to bring back to Illinois politics the level of honor he’s always prided himself on standing for.

“Leaders have an obligation to take action; more importantly, elected officials should be morally obligated to first ensure safety and well-being of the person or persons who have been mistreated in any way by anyone within their sphere of influence,” Wilcox recently posted on his Facebook page. “Associates must have trust in the system and believe that they can confide in their leader and know that proper actions will take place in a timely manner.”

Wilcox, a member of the McHenry County board running to replace retiring state Sen. Pam Althoff (R-McHenry) in District 32, knows all about honor and commitment.

The McHenry County native was in the U.S. Air Force for 24 years, retiring as a colonel.

“I believe in almost every circumstance, transparency is paramount when acting as a public servant,” Wilcox added in his Facebook post. “Public servants must be as loyal to their subordinates, as they are to the very public that put them there. All too often, situations like these are mishandled, and the leaders appear as if they have been caught off guard in some way, when the reality is, the issues percolated behind closed doors and leaders have not taken action for far too long.”  

Wilcox has vowed to make government spending a signature issue, pointing to lawmakers recently coming together to pass a new state budget that carries a 32 percent permanent income tax hike as a prime example of how tone-deaf leaders have grown in Springfield.

“Thank goodness for the courage of the victims themselves who have now found a voice, are rallying together and taking a stand, forcing leaders to address issues they might wish were never public,” he added. “The result being we now recognize how rampant the dire inaction by so-called leaders is, and quite frankly it

is appalling. True Leaders are inclined to action when crisis erupts, ethical leaders are committed to action long before the public or others are aware, because they foster and instill high standards of conduct everyday while motivating the people around them to achieve great visions.”

A fiscal conservative, Wilcox said the fact that residents in areas like McHenry, Woodstock and Crystal Lake are being forced to pay higher property taxes than others also strikes him as grossly unfair.

In the end, he added he sees his run for Springfield as his chance to be a part of the “generation of leadership that will one day put an end to this type of behavior.”

Wilcox is on record in asserting the answer to slowing the state’s crisis of out-migration does not lie in simply freezing property tax rates.

“You are freezing taxes at an already high level,” he previously told the Lake County Gazette. “We have municipalities where the property tax burden exceeds 4 percent of the home value and in some places in South Chicago it pushes 7 percent.”