Dupage Policy Journal

Wheaton digital town crier Gregg Slapak refers to mayoral candidate John Prendiville as “Spenderville.”

“He voted [as member of city council] for every tax increase that ever came before him,” Slapak, who publishes WIN on Facebook, told the DuPage Policy Journal. “Our taxes are way out of control.”

Prendiville has a knack for being on the wrong side of the issues, his record shows.

Running for mayor in 2010, he wrote on his campaign web page that he was “committed to developing the former Wheaton High School/Hubble Middle School property in a manner which will benefit our community for the long term.” 

But in December 2011, Prendiville told the Daily Herald: “The 22-acre property is worth next to nothing to developers because 13 acres are on a flood plain and cannot be developed. I can’t see anybody paying for that property.”

Prendiville lost the mayor's race to Mike Gresk in April 2011.

In 2011, Bradford Equities LLC bought the site for $5,000,200. The high-end grocery store, Mariano’s, opened in 2013. The store now returns $700,000 a year to the city in sales tax receipts.

In 2010, Prendiville wanted to stiff a consultant who found that the city’s proposed investment in refurbishing the Wheaton Grand Theater was unwise. In 2011, he supported a non-binding referendum for the city to move ahead with the investment. It lost.

Gresk and Prendiville’s opponent in this year's mayor’s race, city council member Phil Suess, opposed the plan. Suess said at the time that he would like to see a project to refurbish the theater to move forward but not at the cost of the taxpayers.

In 2011, Prendiville told the Tribune that "Nothing of any substance has happened in our downtown in the past 20 or 30 years without some sort of public assistance.”

He neglected to mention the DuPage Medical Group Building, Adelles, Burger Social, Andrew's Garden, Emmetts, Moveable Feast, The Ivy Restaurant, Moore Toys, Kilwins, Kimmers, Courthouse Square Apts, Wheaton 121, the renovation of the Wheaton Meat Company and other investments.

But possibly more than the tax increase votes, the love of spending, the refusal to acknowledge private investment, nothing has angered residents more about Prendiville then his defense of coyotes – again on the rise in and around the city and again threatening pets and residents.

“Human beings are just one part of the natural world, and we must do everything reasonably possible to co-exist with nature," Prendiville wrote after a rash of coyote attacks in 2010. "It is our duty as stewards of this planet. While I value human life over animal life, I don't value the lives of pets over those of wild animals.”

Former Wheaton resident Rhonda Graff has never forgiven Prendiville for his stance on the coyotes; she lost her pet dog to a coyote in 2010.

“He’s very deceitful," Graff said of Prendiville. “And he cares more about coyotes than he does the residents of Wheaton.”

The election is Tuesday, April 2.