Two candidates for the Evanston/Skokie School District 65 Board of Education facing objections and potential removal from the ballot argued for the challenges to be dismissed Tuesday afternoon during preliminary hearings at the Cook County Administration Building in Chicago.
Brandon Utter and Anita Opdycke both filed motions to strike objections from resident and digital campaign contractor Neal Weingarden following an initial hearing on Dec. 5. A third objection against candidate Peter Bogira was recommended for dismissal by default judgment because Weingarden’s attorney, Ed Mullen, did not appear for that hearing, effectively clearing Bogira to be placed on the ballot for the Consolidated Election on April 1, 2025.
During Tuesday’s speedy hearings, the parties delivered their arguments from filings submitted over the weekend to hearing officer Barbara Goodman. Goodman’s recommendations are sent to the County Officers Electoral Board for final determinations, and the entire process is expedited to meet the Jan. 23 deadline for the Cook County Clerk’s Office to certify all candidates and referenda appearing on suburban ballots.
Voter registration now or later?
Weingarden’s objection to Utter is based on his voter registration. While his nominating papers list his current home address in Skokie, at the time of filing he was still registered to vote at his previous address in Evanston. Both locations are within District 65’s jurisdiction, but that isn’t the basis of the objection — “This is not a residency case,” said Mullen at one point.
Rather, Weingarden’s attorney argued that the different addresses for Utter’s residence and voter registration constituted falsely swearing a “material statement” on his nomination papers, which should thus invalidate his candidacy.
“He couldn’t be a petition signer [from his current address], he couldn’t be a voter,” Mullen said, “and he couldn’t be a candidate.”
Attorney Jeff Smith, representing Utter, responded that where he’s registered to vote when he files actually doesn’t matter, as the Illinois School Code only requires that board members be registered voters within their districts “on the date of his or her election.” Since he’s already updated his voter registration since filing for candidacy, Utter satisfies this requirement and should be allowed to stay on the ballot, Smith argued.
Smith added that the template candidacy statement’s language swearing the candidate is “a qualified voter therein” is “vague enough” about whether it refers to the candidate’s address or the school district’s boundaries to leave room for confusion for a first-time candidate like Utter.
“I wouldn’t phrase it that way,” Smith said. “But that’s what clerks hand out sometimes.”
Objections should have ‘the same rigor’
Opdycke’s case is far less technical, as Weingarden objected to her not including a candidacy statement at all in her nomination papers. The candidate, representing herself, did not dispute this, but moved to strike the objection on the basis that Weingarden misspelled her name throughout his filing, writing “Opdyke” rather than “Opdycke.”
Mullen responded that she still appeared for the hearings despite the misspelling, to which she replied that she was still served notice of the challenge by the Electoral Board.
Goodman concluded both hearings by taking the preliminary motions “under advisement” and will issue recommendations on them to the Electoral Board in the near future. If the board sustains a motion to strike, the objection will be settled and the candidate will appear on the ballot; if they deny a motion, the case will return to Goodman for an actual hearing on the underlying objection.
Speaking to the media after her hearing, Opdycke said although she doesn’t “know what the motivation is” for Weingarden’s objections, she expects “the same rigor” of him that he expects of them, adding that she understands it’s important for both candidates and objectors to follow the electoral rules set out.
“If he truly believes that, he would dismiss the objections,” Opdycke said.
District 65 candidates move to dismiss objections is from Evanston RoundTable, Evanston's most trusted source for unbiased, in-depth journalism.