To honor Crystal Lake’s longest-serving mayor, the city’s municipal building now will be named Aaron T. Shepley City Hall.

Shepley, who died in May 2020 at age 56 after being mayor for more than 21 years, was well known in the community not only as an elected official but also for his co-founding of the Crystal Lake Strikers Drumline and work as an attorney.

“The mayor and City Council of the city of Crystal Lake wish to recognize Aaron T. Shepley for his dedicated service to the city, its residents and his commitment to excellence, bettering oneself and serving the community he loved, and to honor that legacy,” according to the resolution, which was unanimously approved by the council at a meeting Tuesday.

Shepley’s wife, Regan, said at the meeting that she was honored by the decision to put her husband’s name on City Hall.

Aaron Shepley did his job as mayor with the “utmost sincerity, integrity and passion,” she said.

“To me, he was a force of nature who saw challenges as opportunities, including the building of the city hall, Three Oaks Recreation Center and the countless other projects that took place during the nearly quarter-century he served as mayor,” Regan Shepley said.

During a public comment period, Donald Kountz, a Crystal Lake resident and former mayoral candidate who ran in April’s election, read a letter from his son Erik, who could not be at the meeting. The letter expressed dissent from the decision to rename City Hall.

City Hall and the municipal complex are the most important municipal symbols of Crystal Lake, Erik Kountz wrote, and naming it after even highly qualified individuals removes “we the people” from center stage.

However, Erik Kountz wrote, he would be in favor of naming a bike path after Aaron Shepley, an idea previously suggested by current Mayor Haig Haleblian.

In response, City Council member Cathy Ferguson said Aaron Shepley represented everyone in Crystal Lake and worked hard for the city.

“While people may not have agreed with every decision that he made, he always was trying to put the best interest of the city first,” Ferguson said. “I’m sorry that people don’t think that we have the right to do this. ... But we work for the people, too, and as a representative of a lot of people, I am just fine with naming this building.”

Haleblian echoed those sentiments, saying he knows of no one in government who has sacrificed more than Shepley did.

“[He] was probably one of the fairest individuals I’ve ever known,” Haleblian said. “No one represented the city better than Aaron T. Shepley. ... Renaming the building embodies what this building is about. It’s about the people, for the people, and we up here are all public servants.”