Early results Tuesday evening indicate incumbent Geneva Mayor Kevin Burns holding an advantage over challenger Tom Simonian in a rematch from the 2017 election.Burns, a five-term mayor, leads the former alderman by 11 percentage points, 1,511 votes to 1,208, with six of 19 precincts reporting as well as all the early-voting ballots and the mail-in ballots that have been received.The results are unofficial and could change with the addition of remaining mail-in ballots, which could trickle in as late as April 20.As of Tuesday, Kane County overall had received 2,851 completed ballots out of 5,778 it mailed out.The 2021 rematch has played on many of the same themes as the 2017 election, which Burns won with 62 percent of the vote. Simonian declared that being the mayor of Geneva should be looked upon as the job of a lifetime rather than a lifetime job.It’s a job Burns has held for 20 years.Simonian slammed what he called a “bloated” city budget and said he wanted to create a finance committee to oversee spending, while Burns claimed the city has been prudent with budgets that passed unanimously the last four years in the city council.Burns noted the city shaved $5 million in planned spending in the 2020-21 budget to account for COVID-19 pandemic shortcomings and waived $800,000 in various city fees to help businesses and residents. Simonian, however, said Burns hasn’t done enough to help businesses during the pandemic.Stay tuned for updates on this story.
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