Phil Mason has lived in Homewood since 2018, but for more than 25 years before that he lived in Glenwood, right next door.
Most of his career has been in law enforcement. He worked with the Cook County Sheriff’s Department for 26 years. After retiring, he took a job with Cook County Department of Emergency Management and Regional Security as a planning and preparedness manager.
He was appointed to the Homewood Board of Trustees in May 2024 after serving on the village’s Economic Development Committee since 2021. He is seeking a four-year term on the board.
“My experience working in Cook County showed me that the communities that thrive are the communities that have the most active citizenry, those individuals that are really vested in their community,” he said. “Homewood reminds me so much of the community that I was raised in on the south side of Chicago, where we knew all of our neighbors. I wanna protect that and I want that to grow.”
Mason said the village’s efforts to engage with residents have been good, and he cited an app the staff is developing as something that should further improve residents’ access to their government. He added, though, that the village has to remain open to changing its approach if necessary.
“If feel of the community is that they don’t feel heard, then that means that we need to reexamine the ways in which we’re allowing the community to be heard. Maybe the ways that we are presenting for them are not meeting the need as well as we’d like to believe they are.”
