Third time's the charm: Chuck Grayeb makes his case to be Peoria mayor

Yahoo

22-02-2025

PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) — After more than 20 years on Peoria City Council, Chuck Grayeb is running for the city's top job on a tough-on-crime platform.
It's the 2nd District councilman's third time running for mayor of Peoria. Grayeb previously ran — and lost — in 1993 and 1997.
Nearly 30 years later, he said his decades of government experience set him apart from the other two candidates, At-Large Councilman John Kelly and incumbent Mayor Rita Ali.
'I think my experience can make a difference in terms of pulling our city out of the ditch that it's currently in. We have many, many intractable issues here. Seemingly intractable, but they need to be resolved,' he said.
City voters will go to the polls on Tuesday, Feb. 25, for the primary election. The two people who get the highest vote totals will then square off for a winner-takes-all in the April general election.
Grayeb worked as a teacher in the early 1970s at Peoria High School and, later, as the Dean of students in the early to mid-1980s at Manual High School. From 1985 until his retirement in 2005, he worked with adult education with the Peoria Public Schools.
He first ran for mayor in 1993 and failed to make it out of the primary. Jim Maloof was the winner that year. He ran for an at-large seat in 1995 which he won and held until he opted not to run in 2007.
His second attempt at mayor was in 1997 when he lost to Bud Grieves. Grayeb came back to the council as the 2nd District representative in 2013 and has held the seat since.
The city must tackle its issue with street crime, both by minors and adults, he said.
'We have the revolving door going on. Too many people commit too many serious offenses and are back out on the street preying on folks in our neighborhoods in the city of Peoria. It's unacceptable,' he said. 'If you want change, you're going to get it with me, and we're going to go after the people who are preying on our law-abiding citizens.'
Among those changes was mandatory detentions for certain crimes, which isn't the case under the SAFE-T Act reforms that went into effect a couple of years ago. Last month, the council sent a list of legislative priorities to General Assembly, one of them being modifying the SAFE-T Act.
They asked that some crimes that require mandatory imprisonment should have mandatory detention pending trial. Now, crimes eligible for detention must go before a judge, who will decide after a mini trial of sorts whether that person should be held or not.
Even a person charged with murder could, in theory, be released, though so far in the Tri-County area, that hasn't happened.
Grayeb says the key to the city's growth is curbing crime.
'If people don't feel that our city is safe, they're not going to invest here. I have met with people who are going to do investment, but one of the things they told me was, 'Councilman, we're not going to do it with all these distractions with the encampments Downtown and the crime.' So I got to focus on that if elected mayor,' he said.
Keeping streets safe goes beyond crime, too, he said.
'We need to have more robust traffic enforcement. We need to beef up the size of our police department, which we're trying to do right now and get more people in,' said Grayeb.
Developing Downtown Peoria, specifically the Central Business District, is another big priority. Grayeb says it's been through rough times and that he will slash red tape to attract investors.
He said Peoria is in competition with its neighbors and if the city doesn't make things easier for business to invest, then 'they are going to go elsewhere.' Eliminate the 'red tape,' and things will get better.
'I know that we have certain codes that are related to public safety. Fine. Have to enforce those. Those are not negotiable. But some things require that which isn't public safety related. I think we could be a little more relaxed on it and work with developers to do it in more of a segmented way. Instead of all at once,' he said.
He believes having more than 6,000 people living in Downtown will help its evolvement into a 'neighborhood unto itself.'
On the topic of bringing a casino to Peoria, Grayeb is definitely on board. He pointed out that East Peoria, under the same agreement that City Hall says requires the casino to be here if on land, will get half the gaming revenue generated.
Peoria, he said, would pick up more of the hotel and restaurant taxes if the boat comes over here.
'We love the people of East Peoria, we love the mayor of East Peoria. And he loves us. While we may have differences of opinions on this particular aspect, we will continue to work together as two great people on each side of the Illinois River,' he said.
He also is in favor of using local but established community-based organizations that work every day in the trenches getting city dollars to help with poverty and anti-crime initiatives.
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