Gary Grasso - Mayor of Burr Ridge

09/11/2026

09/08/2026

Hello — I am Gary Grasso, Mayor of Burr Ridge, running for DuPage County Board Chair this November.

Janet and I have been married 48 years. DuPage has been home for 36 of them. We raised six children here. This month we welcome our tenth grandchild.

I did not come from money. My mother, Vivian, worked as a secretary, a waitress, and a clerk. My father, Anthony, left school after sixth grade, joined the Army at 17, served in World War II, came home to work as a sanitation worker and a house painter, and at 39 passed the exam to become a firefighter. He was so proud.

I was the first in my family to go to college. Georgetown. Law school at night at Fordham while I worked.

I am asking for your vote because county government should work as hard as the people who pay for it.

Family First. Freedom Forever.

Questions? garyfordupage.org

09/05/2026

DuPage Taxpayers: Deb Conroy collects $131,000 a year — pensionable — plus a $5,000 car allowance for a part-time position to chair a part-time Board with real governance power over the unincorporated part of DuPage County - about 12% of the county.

Too much? It got worse a few months ago.

Last April, Conroy chaired a vote to jack that salary to $185,000 by December — a 40% raise — with automatic hikes pushing it past $200,000 (plus car allowance) by 2030. Pensionable. For a part-time job. Chairing a fractured Board.

Our great, full-time State's Attorney makes less than that raise!

And here's the kicker: that raise was never on the April agenda. Sprung at a board meeting without notice during discussion of other raises. Call it what you want — a technical dodge of the Open Meetings Act or a brazen violation of its spirit — it was done suddenly and purposely. That's not transparency. That's subterfuge.

Compare that to Burr Ridge (and almost all DuPage mayors). My stipend as mayor - also part-time - is $6,000 a year (since 2009) — no pension, no car allowance, no benefits. In 2020, I proposed raising it to $30,000. But the proposal was put to the voters to approve. They said no. I accepted the residents vote — and ran unopposed. It's still $6,000. That's the will of the people, not the will of one.

Conroy played along with politics over people. I'll roll back that raise and more if elected.

DuPage taxpayers deserve better. It starts with cutting government and cutting taxes — and it's entirely possible at the County level, if there's the resolve to do it.

Your vote counts - cast it for better government this November.
FAMILY FIRST - FREEDOM FOREVER

09/03/2026

Yesterday, DuPage voters got a front-row seat to the County’s continuing dysfunction.
It was a special session – full blown chaos on display.
Why? Because the outgoing County Clerk forced the Board and Chair to hand over $665,000 more of YOUR tax dollars — just to process the November election. She has blown through her significant budget already - by a lot.
Oh – brazenly - the Clerk didn't even show up to make her demand for more money.
She sent her Chief Deputy, who, just as brazenly, wouldn't guarantee that the extra money would be spent as the Board intended – on the November election.
Remember, I explained earlier this week that Chair Conroy engineered the Clerk's primary defeat. They are in the same political party – but not colleagues anymore. They're enemies. And it showed. Conroy cut off the Deputy Clerk MULTIPLE times during tense exchanges — with nothing more she could do to fix a situation the Daily Herald recently called a DEBACLE.
Here's the kicker: the Board can set the Clerk's budget. But it has NO POWER to direct how that money must be spent. Even after the Clerk exceeded her budget. Even with election day two months from today.
That's a county government that has stopped working for you. It’s politics over people; the Clerk and Chair placing their feud over governing.
It doesn't have to be this way.
Elect leaders who will work for DuPage County.
Elect Patricia Kladis-Schiappa for Clerk and me as County Board Chairman.
YOUR vote counts – cast it this November for change.
FAMILY FIRST. FREEDOM FOREVER.

09/02/2026

I'M THROWING DOWN THE GAUNTLET to Deb Conroy.
I'm running for DuPage County Board Chairman to shrink a bloated County Board that already has more members than authority. It should have even less — starting with shifting zoning in our unincorporated pockets to be consistent with contiguous municipalities. (More to come soon on this and other cost saving ideas.)
And I'll roll back the raise Conroy and the Board rammed through last April: her base pay jumping from $131,500 to $185,000 (plus a $5,000 car allowance) — a 40% base raise, effective this December — with automatic hikes pushing it to over $200,000 with the car allowance by 2030. Pensionable, of course. For a part-time job over a fractured board. Our great States Attorney, full time, makes less! Outrageous.
DuPage taxpayers deserve better. It starts with cutting government and cutting taxes. All possible at the County level if there is resolve to do it.
I've done the work. Six years on the County Board (2012–2018). Chairman of the 9-1-1 Emergency Board, where we saved taxpayers millions, cut response times, and saved lives. Twelve years on the Board of Health (1999–2010). Fourteen years as Mayor of Burr Ridge — a village that's debt-free and likely to abate the village portion of property taxes entirely, because we govern with fiscal discipline and plan where the money will be before we spend it.
As Reagan said at his first inaugural: government is not the solution to our problem — government IS the problem. I'm no socialist. I'm sure as heck no communist. I have a record of proven results, with the help of many, built on consensus.
FAMILY FIRST - FREEDOM FOREVER

08/31/2026

The DuPage County Board is too big. Cut it by at least a third.

Here's what most DuPage residents don't realize: the County Board and its Chair only govern the unincorporated pockets of DuPage. Seventy-five percent of the county sits inside about 35 municipalities; for example, Wheaton, Naperville, Downers Grove to name just three. Another 13 percent is forest preserve. That leaves the Board with authority over roughly 12 percent of DuPage County — roughly 100,000 deserving residents.

And we've been paying eighteen members to do it for years. Three members from each of six districts, every one of them drawing a salary of $52,000 a year — pensionable. (Public officials collecting pensions is a conversation for another day, but it's coming.) [BTW - did you know that the member salary is set to rise under a new pay schedule the Board approved on April 28, 2026 (13-4 vote): $53,144 in FY 2027, climbing incrementally to $62,000 by FY 2030. All pensionable.]

You do not need eighteen elected part-time officials to govern 12 percent of the land. Cut the Board to twelve — two members per district is plenty to do this job well. Fewer seats, lower cost, no less accountability. Let's right-size county government to match the work it actually has to do.

Family First - Freedom Forever!

08/30/2026

President Ronald Reagan — the Great Communicator — never wasted a word. He put it plainly: the job of our legal system is to punish the guilty and protect the innocent. That's not a slogan. It's a promise government should make and stand by. I will.

I know Sean Noonan. I trust Sean Noonan. And I am sure he too believes exactly what President Reagan believed.

As a lawyer and a mayor, I've said this for years: the number one job of government is to keep people and property safe. Nothing else works if that doesn't.

This November, DuPage County has a clear choice. Elect Sean Noonan Sheriff. Elect me County Board Chairman. Together, Job One will always be protecting your family, your home, and your community.

08/29/2026

The Daily Herald has rightly criticized the ongoing operational and financial feud between the DuPage County Board Chair and County Clerk as a significant governance and transparency failure. The editorial board is right: cooperation is needed now, before this dispute compromises the upcoming election.
Chair Conroy and Clerk Kaczmarek are from the same party. Where is the leadership?
Conroy supported Kaczmarek in 2022 despite the Clerk's already-controversial record on transparency and cooperation. So it was foreseeable that Chair-Clerk dysfunction — what the Daily Herald calls an "entire debacle" — was coming. Here we are: on the brink of a November election, and the Chair is asking for much more money for our November elections.
The Daily Herald noted that the Chair reached out to the Clerk two weeks ago. That's simply too late. The Chair orchestrated the Clerk's primary defeat. A leader would have gone to her fellow Democrat — but by then likely former friend — right after that primary loss, and made sure we never ended up here: a public feud between two of the county's most important offices.
This is not the first lapse in leadership from the Chair since she took office in 2022. County Board meetings have become battle grounds with her own party board members. Shouting is commonplace and Conroy even refused to allow a board member from her own party to be recognized to make a point Conroy obviously did not want to be heard at a public meeting of your representatives.
Compare that to my track record: since I returned as Mayor of Burr Ridge in 2019, the Village has become debt-free, our local economy is stronger than ever, and I've asked our Village Board to abate our village portion of the property tax going forward.
Patricia Kladis-Schiappa for Clerk and me for Chair give you better choices. You get to decide who should lead DuPage County in November. Weigh the evidence, and vote.

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