SYCAMORE – At least four and maybe more Sycamore residents will campaign to be elected to a city office in the 2025 consolidated election, but only one of them is not currently an elected official, according to city documents.

Mayor Steve Braser, Clerk Mary Kalk and Ward Mayoral Councilor Alan Bauer have filed petitions to run for office for their respective positions. As of Thursday afternoon, no one else had filed as potential challengers, but Rob Dancey has indicated he will run for a seat on the Sycamore City Council, representing Ward 4.

Like DeKalb, the Sycamore mayor’s office is open to the will of the voters. As of Thursday afternoon, only one person, Mayor Braser, has filed for the position. Braser, formerly a Ward 3 alderman, said he has thoroughly enjoyed his time in the office, as well as the people he has worked for and with since was elected mayor in 2021.

Over the past four years, Braser said he has focused the city’s efforts on streamlining efficiency, succession planning and cybersecurity, and plans to focus more on the same if elected to another term.

“The biggest thing I would like is to keep the city moving in the right direction,” Braser.

Kalk’s candidacy comes after Sycamore voters rejected a referendum measure on Election Day that would have made the clerk’s office an appointed role instead of being elected by the people.

Dancey is currently the sole candidate for the open ward seat, but was not immediately available for comment. Fourth Ward Councilwoman Virginia Sherrod said she plans to file her own nominating petition in the coming days. The incumbent councilor said he is running to stay on Sycamore City Council because she enjoys what the governing body is doing for the city.

Sherrod said the city’s efforts to address public concerns about the city’s water quality will continue to be among her top priorities if re-elected.

The city’s years-long effort to replace lead water lines that connect individual properties to the city’s overall public works system was largely completed in 2024. The City Council recently approved construction projects that will replace sections of the city’s water main in 2025.

“I think we did a really good job of getting the lead pipes out,” Sherrod said. “We always tried to be transparent about what was going on and when there appeared to be a problem we addressed it head on. And that’s a big thing for me, to be transparent, because there’s nothing you can do when you’re trying to hide and hide things.”

Sycamore residents filed a lawsuit against the city in 2020, citing problems with the city’s drinking water. The lawsuit was settled in 2023 and required it to pay an average of $1.2 million to improve water quality and also pay for additional testing of lead and chlorine levels, according to the filing. regulatory agreement ended up outside the court.

But city officials have argued that recent public works projects are not being done as a result of the process.

In late 2023, after Sycamore City Manager Michael Hall presented preliminary numbers for a proposed property tax levy, a Local Shaw investigation uncovered that the city charged about $120,000 more to property tax payers in 2023 than the City Council voted for the previous year. As a result of the investigation and without requiring the approval of the City Council, city ​​officials chose to return the money which was overtaxed in a rebate check.

Bauer, who has served on the City Council since 1997, said he will continue to seek re-election as long as he believes city government is working toward transparency.

“We’re still working toward, as always, open government,” Bauer said. “We’re always going to be open, and the day we’re not, I’m going to step aside and stand on the podium and fight for it, but so far so good.”

Bauer is currently running unopposed, but that could change. The candidate filing period for the 2025 consolidated election opened on Tuesday and will close next Monday, so opposing candidates still have time to file.

The April 2025 consolidated election will decide the face of various municipal offices in DeKalb County, including the city of DeKalb and several school boards.