About Paul
I was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the oldest of three children. My father was a high school teacher in a Pittsburgh suburban school district and my mother worked full time in various office jobs to help support the family. In 1968 my father was offered a job as superintendent of special education for southwest Cook County which was comprised of twenty-five school districts in the south suburbs. The move was quite traumatic for our family as all of our relatives and close friends were in Pittsburgh. We knew no one in Chicago.
Being in education, my father carefully researched the various school districts in the south suburbs and my parents chose Flossmoor because of the excellent elementary and high school opportunities. Sound familiar? In speaking with people, most seem to have moved here for the same reason.
I remember seeing H-F for the first time. I remember being so excited about going to a modern, progressive high school that had so many clubs, activities, and what was at the time, and still is today, a very beautiful campus. My high school years at H-F were some of the best school years of my life! I quickly fell into what today would be thought of a somewhat “geek like” high school existence joining the concert band, WHFH radio program, and Viking Escadrille which was an afterschool club for airplane nuts.
When I graduated from H-F in 1972, and after a brief stint at the University of Illinois Chicago, I transferred to Wabash College. It is a small liberal arts college in Crawfordsville, Indiana. Wabash reconnected me to experiences that I had at H-F such as caring teachers and a strong community environment. I jumped into the college atmosphere joining the Wabash College Band, college radio station, and college computer club.
After college and at the encouragement of my father who had always wanted to be a lawyer, I enrolled at the John Marshall Law School in downtown Chicago and graduated in 1980. During my law school days, I lived at home with my parents in Flossmoor Hills, commuted downtown on what was then called the Illinois Central (I still remember the old train cars with the rattan seats that flipped flopped back and forth depending on which direction the train travelled), and worked part time back at my high school employer, Cherry Hills Country Club, washing dishes.
I met my wife, Mib (Mary Irene Bramlette) who also grew up in Flossmoor, during the summer of my junior year in college. We met at a discotheque that was in University Park at the time (does anyone remember the Poison Apple?) and we married in 1982.
I was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the oldest of three children. My father was a high school teacher in a Pittsburgh suburban school district and my mother worked full time in various office jobs to help support the family. In 1968 my father was offered a job as superintendent of special education for southwest Cook County which was comprised of twenty-five school districts in the south suburbs. The move was quite traumatic for our family as all of our relatives and close friends were in Pittsburgh. We knew no one in Chicago.
Being in education, my father carefully researched the various school districts in the south suburbs and my parents chose Flossmoor because of the excellent elementary and high school opportunities. Sound familiar? In speaking with people, most seem to have moved here for the same reason.
I remember seeing H-F for the first time. I remember being so excited about going to a modern, progressive high school that had so many clubs, activities, and what was at the time, and still is today, a very beautiful campus. My high school years at H-F were some of the best school years of my life! I quickly fell into what today would be thought of a somewhat “geek like” high school existence joining the concert band, WHFH radio program, and Viking Escadrille which was an afterschool club for airplane nuts.
When I graduated from H-F in 1972, and after a brief stint at the University of Illinois Chicago, I transferred to Wabash College. It is a small liberal arts college in Crawfordsville, Indiana. Wabash reconnected me to experiences that I had at H-F such as caring teachers and a strong community environment. I jumped into the college atmosphere joining the Wabash College Band, college radio station, and college computer club.
After college and at the encouragement of my father who had always wanted to be a lawyer, I enrolled at the John Marshall Law School in downtown Chicago and graduated in 1980. During my law school days, I lived at home with my parents in Flossmoor Hills, commuted downtown on what was then called the Illinois Central (I still remember the old train cars with the rattan seats that flipped flopped back and forth depending on which direction the train travelled), and worked part time back at my high school employer, Cherry Hills Country Club, washing dishes.
I met my wife, Mib (Mary Irene Bramlette) who also grew up in Flossmoor, during the summer of my junior year in college. We met at a discotheque that was in University Park at the time (does anyone remember the Poison Apple?) and we married in 1982.
After briefly living in Crete, Mib and I moved back to Flossmoor to be closer to our parents and relatives and to rejoin the community that had given us so much during our lives including wonderful educations and a sense of community that does not exist in most towns today.
I opened a law office in Flossmoor in 1986 where I continue to practice family and business law with my partner, Thomas C. Edwards and two associate attorneys at our offices on Governors Highway.
Community and charitable service has been a part of my life since childhood. My parents were active in the community and my father served on the Flossmoor Library Board for many years. After some encouragement from from my parents, I attempted to run for the H-F school board in 1984. If anyone remembers, that was the year that all of the school board candidates were removed from the ballot over a technicality and everyone was forced to run as write-in candidates. As it turned out, the person who had challenged the ballots lost and the only person to win as I recall was John Flanagan. The lessons that I learned were that local politics can be as intense as any state or federal race and to always expect the unexpected.
I volunteered and worked for eight years on the board of the Harold Jones Memorial Center in Chicago Heights, a community center that has provided assistance and services to low income residents of Chicago Heights since 1924. Still wanting to try and give back to the community that has given me so much. I tried again. I ran for a Village trustee seat in 2000 and lost to John Beele, a caring and thoughtful man who in truth, was a more effective candidate.
Not willing to give up, in 2003 I ran again for a Village trustee seat, worked very hard to gain the trust of the community, rang almost every doorbell in Flossmoor and was elected in a close race that included some other very talented people.
Since 2003, my work on the Village Board and now as Mayor has always been to try and keep the ideals of the community that I knew growing up. A community that has great schools, nice homes, great public services and programs for residents of all ages, wonderful parks, and an overall high quality of life. That is the vision that I will continue to maintain if I am re-elected Mayor of Flossmoor.
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