Get political

SUN CITY – As the upcoming 2012 presidential election begins to draw public attention, local political groups are preparing for their most active months.

Local affiliates of national parties are working to get the word out about voting, gaining members, and raising funds for their desired candidates.

Sun City is no exception. Though political groups are not based in the community, local groups certainly look to expand into it from Huntley and McHenry County to gain voters.

Sun City residents often play a critical role in these groups; they are founders, organizers, or dedicated activists looking to make a change in the community and country. The following are two examples of groups who have received substantial contributions from Sun City residents.

Organizing for America

Organizing for America is a non-profit, grassroots movement in support of President Barack Obama. The group has grown in Sun City ever since Jessica Chipkin, N. 22, began volunteering as a neighborhood organizer.

Chipkin’s inspiration came from a close friend with very conservative political views. Because Chipkin feels these ideas are prominent in the area, she signed on with OFA.

“I just woke up one morning and I just said we need to have an active democratic group here in Del Webb that supports Obama and can drive home the point that every major governmental program we rely on, especially in a senior community, like social security and Medicare, even some things like the GI bill, they’re all tied up to the Democratic Party, and we need to fight to keep those in place,” Chipkin said.

Though McHenry County is traditionally Republican, Chipkin has made headway in Sun City, getting about 80 residents to join OFA since she started volunteering, according to her estimates.

“Del Webb is considered kind of more of an upscale neighborhood, but there are a lot of middle class people and a lot of upper-middle class people, and I just really hope that seniors who are kind of on the bench or thinking that they’re conservative, that they really ask themselves, does their party really represent their needs, and to try to understand what the other party offers and to really be clear about what the differences are,” she said.

Chipkin works closely with Dr. Kathsuri Henry, McHenry County Team Lead for OFA. Henry explained some of the core ideas the group believes in.

“Eroding of the middle class erodes democracy, and we want to preserve our democracy, and we want to have choices for our middle class. And therefore, we want to work as a group to make sure that society sustains itself,” she said.

Henry said the OFA is planning more activities for early next year, but they are currently in the building stages to make a foundation of volunteers to go out and get voters.

Chipkin said she does not think Obama has ever strayed from his commitment to the middle class but said some of his attributes as a leader may work against him.

“I think his greatest strength is his ability to want to work together and be a collaborator, but I also think now that’s also becoming a weakness,” she said.

Huntley Area Tea Party

The Tea Party protests that caught the nation’s attention in 2009 have spread as a grassroots movement across the country ever since. The unofficial political party’s ideology centers on small government, lower taxes, and conservative values.

Those ideas came to Huntley last June when Linda Bahwell, N.29, founded the Huntley Area Tea Party. Huntley’s affiliate of the Illinois Tea Party now boasts about 350 to 400 members, according to Bahwell. Though no official record is kept on how many are from Sun City, Bahwell estimates Sun City residents make up about half the group.

“People are getting hit very hard with high taxes, unemployment, benefits, insurance, you can just keep naming everything that’s more or less being taken away from us,” Bahwell said.

Though the Tea Party’s opposition to big government is clear, Bahwell stressed her group is about informing the public – not taking sides.

Last year, the HATP gathered information on candidates, organized them into packets, and distributed them to about 1,700 homes.

“When it came to election time, we had a very high rate of people voting, and we want to get that rate even higher,” she said. “We want to get them out there voting instead of sitting at home.”

The HATP hopes to outdo themselves this year by handing out even more packets to voters and by participating in a town hall debate as they did last year.

The HATP informs people on topics other than specific candidates and brings in speakers to their meetings to discuss various topics, such as the election process.

Bahwell was inspired to start the group after attending a Tea Party event in Algonquin last year.

“I want to do it for my grandkids; I’m really afraid of what type of life they’re going to end up with the way things are going in Washington,” she said.

At first, Bahwell wasn’t sure she would find like-minded people in the area, but she soon found that many shared the same concern over the country’s future.

Now she is excited to see the HATP’s recent growth.

“We’re happy that people are getting involved,” she said. “Their eyes are being opened to what is happening, and they want to voice their opinions.”

Regardless of what side they lean to, as Chipkin and Bahwell have discovered, Sun City is a community of many active, politically-motivated people.

State Rep Mike Tryon (R-Crystal Lake) expressed his thoughts on the community’s political activity.

“We’re never worried that there’s a lack of interest in voting in Sun City, because if the entire country was as active politically as Sun City, we probably wouldn’t have a lot of the problems we have,” he said.

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