Dave Kaptain is the mayor

Mayor

In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....

 of Elgin

Elgin, Illinois

Elgin is a city in northern Illinois located roughly northwest of Chicago on the Fox River. Most of Elgin lies within Kane County, Illinois, with a portion in Cook County, Illinois...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

. Kaptain won the April 2011 election by receiving 54.35% of the mayoral votes, defeating incumbent Ed Schock

Ed Schock

Edward "Ed" Schock is an Illinois politician and former elementary school principal. He began service on the Elgin City Council after winning election in 1993, and he was re-elected in 1997. In 1999, Schock successfully contested incumbent Kevin Kelly for the office of Mayor of Elgin. He was...

.

Kaptain graudated from School District U-46

Elgin Area School District U46

Elgin Area School District U46, often referred to as "U-46", is a unit school district headquartered in Elgin, Kane County, Illinois. Covering , the district serves portions of eleven communities in the northwest suburbs of Chicago in Cook, DuPage and Kane Counties. School District U-46 serves over...

 schools and received a bachelor's degree

Bachelor's degree

A bachelor's degree is usually an academic degree awarded for an undergraduate course or major that generally lasts for three or four years, but can range anywhere from two to six years depending on the region of the world...

 from Bradley University

Bradley University

Bradley University, founded in 1897, is a private, co-educational university located in Peoria, Illinois. It is a small institution with an enrollment of approximately 6,100 undergraduate and postgraduate students and a full-time faculty of approximately 350....

 in Peoria, Illinois

Peoria, Illinois

Peoria is the largest city on the Illinois River and the county seat of Peoria County, Illinois, in the United States. It is named after the Peoria tribe. As of the 2010 census, the city was the seventh-most populated in Illinois, with a population of 115,007, and is the third-most populated...

. He worked for 32 years for the Fox River

Fox River (Illinois River tributary)

The Fox River is a tributary of the Illinois River in the states of Wisconsin and Illinois in the United States. There are two other "Fox Rivers" in southern Illinois: the Fox River and a smaller "Fox River" that joins the Wabash River near New Harmony, Indiana.-Wisconsin:The Fox River rises near...

 Water Reclamation District, including as a chief chemist, before retiring from there. He was also the Elgin Community Network's executive director.

He was on the Elgin city council

City council

A city council or town council is the legislative body that governs a city, town, municipality or local government area.-Australia & NZ:Because of the differences in legislation between the States, the exact definition of a City Council varies...

from 2005 until becoming mayor. After winning the election for mayor, Kaptain said that part of his approach would be to visit the homes of community members in Elgin to confer with them about city governance matters and to encourage higher voter turnout.