Ed Jauch contested by CJ VanSchaick in Spring Valley 1st Ward

Spring Valley Alderman Ed Jauch will be contested by Charles “CJ” VanSchaick for a 1st Ward seat on the Spring Valley City Council in the April 4 election.

Jauch has been a 1st Ward alderman for four years.

Ed Jauch

Age: 58

Other info about yourself you wish to share

I consider myself to be well rounded in the world and appreciative of my countless blessings. I am a fighter for justice, fairness, sensible economics and will continue to be a strong voice for the people of the 1st Ward. I’m dedicated to the job.

What is your vision for the city? How will you go about bringing that vision to fruition?

I envision a city that’s capable of prosperity and regrowth. A city that’s more than a bedroom community to Peru, La Salle or Ottawa. A city that’s capable of standing on its own merits. To help bring this to fruition, we as a united council must look to the larger metropolitan areas and demonstrate why Spring Valley is better for them in the way of cost and work force. Spring Valley is full of smart, hard working people involved in the trades, business and education. We must try harder to showcase our talents while protecting our assets. I will continue to meet and speak with major investors and invite them to Spring Valley for a shared profitable future.

What is the most important issue facing the city? How do you plan on addressing it?

I believe we must fix and become more aggressive in building our tax base. We have to reduce the burdens from the people and work with businesses to be attractive for rebuilding and expansion. As previously stated, we have to form partnerships to rebuild our dying downtown and industrial areas.

In your role as an alderman, how will you promote economic development?

I have and will continue to meet with large investors and people who have capital willing to come to Spring Valley. I will continue to promote Spring Valley’s assets such as excellent education systems, a talented workforce of people and an extremely well trained, caring police force to protect a person’s most valuable investments.

Charles “CJ” VanSchaick

Age: 64

Info about yourself you wish to share

I was a member of the Spring Valley Elementary Board of Education for seven years and I spent many years on the Spring Valley Park Board. I also was one founding member of the Spring Valley Neighborhood Watch board. The years I spent on the board of education taught me a lot about how meetings should work and how to be a good member. As a board member I learned to respect other members’ opinions and feelings while working towards decisions that were best for the students and staff of the school district.

What is your vision for the city? How will you go about bringing that vision to fruition?

My vision for the city would be to have the downtown revitalized with some nice unique shops and possibly a coffee shop. I would like to see us have a downtown that will bring people to Spring Valley. To get there, I will work with the rest of the council and our mayor to develop incentives that could be used to get the owners of the empty buildings to renovate them so we can bring in new businesses.

What is the most important issue facing the city? How do you plan on addressing it?

I would say the future of St Margaret’s is an extremely important issue facing Spring Valley, however, as an alderman, and part of the City Council, we are extremely limited on what we can do. I would encourage us to continue talking with state Rep. Lance Yednock (D-Ottaw) and state Sen. Sue Rezin (R-Morris) to get a decision that includes Spring Valley have access to health care.

More directly in our control than St Margaret’s is, I would say the most important issue facing Spring Valley is the condition of our downtown and some of our streets and alleys. To attract businesses to downtown, we have to have buildings that are rent ready or attractive to a buyer. People looking to start a business not only want a decent building for their business, they also want good streets, alleys and sidewalks that allow people to easily get to their business. I would work with the rest of the council to find any additional funds from the state or federal government that could be used to rehab our downtown and improve our streets, alleys and sidewalks.

In your role as an alderman, how will you promote economic development?

Our downtown buildings need work to get them to a place where someone will either want to buy them or rent them. We need to figure out a way to get the money to invest in the buildings to get them ready to be sold or rented. One way would be to work to form an investment group made up of city residents who would be willing to invest in or possibly purchase the empty buildings, rehab them and then sell them to future shops or businesses.