13th District has 3-way race for Congress
Candidates: Energy is key local issue
Energy is a charged topic for U.S. Rep. Judy Biggert and the political novices who are trying to unseat her.
For the first time, there's a three-way race for the 13th Congressional District: Democrat Scott Harper suspended his Oxford studies and software engineer Steve Alesch agreed to fill the Green Party ticket to take on Biggert, a fifth-term incumbent.
Continuing her work as chairman of Congress' energy subcommittee is a major draw for Biggert, who is hoping to return to Washington for another two years. The Hinsdale Republican says working for better energy, and particularly nuclear energy, has been her top priority ever since she first won the seat in 1999. She speaks proudly of her contributions to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which provided tax incentives and loan guarantees for various types of energy production.
"I'm just having too much fun and I have too much to still accomplish," Biggert said. "My No. 1 issue has always been the nuclear and I really want to see that happen and work on that."
Reprocessing nuclear energy to make it clean and safe is a top goal for Biggert, and she returns frequently to the topic as she discusses American's overall energy predicament. The nuclear industry must be revived, she says.
"I think we've come quite far in convincing the American people that this is such an important part of the energy process because it is clean and it is safe," she said. "The main thing that is so hard for building new nuclear plants is the cost and permitting process."
"I think I have a really good background to tackle energy issues," Harper said. "For a lay person, I have a deep understanding of science. I think I will be a leader in the Congress on those issues and in fighting for funding."
Like Biggert, Harper encourages drilling for oil and thinks the U.S. should be investing in nuclear energy. He says the long-term answer will be clean, renewable energy, possibly solar, wind or geothermal energy.
"I'd rather not pick specific technology," Harper said. "I'm very interested in seeing how much of our energy we can get from clean and renewable sources."
"What we're doing now is not sustainable, we're seeing that," he said. "Our economy is blowing up, we're seeing pollution out of control, seeing polar ice caps melt. I would enact legislation to get us off fossil fuels which are burning up the planet and causing global climate change."
Alesch, a Warrenville resident and father of two grown children, has lived for 28 years in the 13th Congressional District - which includes Naperville, Lisle, Woodridge, Bolingbrook, Romeoville, Lockport, Lemont, Homer Glen, Darien, Westmont and Hinsdale, and portions of Oak Brook, Aurora, Downers Grove, Orland Park and Tinley Park. He works as a software engineer at the now Alcatel-Lucent campus in Naperville.
In the last few years Alesch has defined his political beliefs, he said. Watching the Bill Clinton impeachment and the 2000 presidential election disputes made him more interested in politics and eventually led him to the Green Party. As county chairman, he's trying to promote the party as much as he's running for Congress.
"We're growing the party, so I'm very much about running for Congress," Alesch said. "But I'm also very much about growing the Green Party. I don't hide that I'm a Green candidate, I put that out there."
If this race follows recent trends, he'll at least give Biggert a run for her money. Over the last six years, Democratic contenders have steadily narrowed the gap in their races against the reigning Republican. Biggert won her 2002 race with 70 percent of the vote, followed by 65 percent in 2004 and 58 percent against opponent Joe Shannon in 2006.
And Harper's fundraising has far surpassed efforts by Shannon, who pulled in a mere $55,719 to run his campaign.
A graduate of Naperville Central High School and Wheaton College, Harper, 43, has two grown children. He's spent most of his career building a media consulting firm called Closer Look, which he founded in 1993 and sold to his business partner last year.
When he visited the DailyKos political convention in Chicago last year, he was finishing a master's degree at Oxford University in England. At the urging of Democrats he met at the left-leaning gathering, he put his thesis on the back burner and moved to Lockport to launch his campaign to unseat Biggert.
"We are a targeted race, and I think that might have Judy running a touch scared," he said. "We have the best grassroots campaign in the entire state of Illinois."
Taxes is one issue on which Harper likes to distinguish himself from Biggert, who voted for Bush's tax cuts. As a self-described "fiscal hawk," he says he'd let the Bush tax cuts expire and advocate for middle-class tax cuts. Raising taxes from 33 percent to 37 percent for the upper crust of Americans wouldn't be an appreciable difference, he said.
He also talks about the importance of supporting jobs in the building trades, like carpenters, sheet metal workers and installation work - so-called "green-collar" jobs affected by the push for LEED-certified building.
"What I think my background is ideally suited for is fighting for realistic, business-friendly programs with pro-environment energy policy," Harper said. "Between my science and business background, I'd be a great advocate for Argonne and for the green-collar jobs."
