Board member Harry Litchfield announced his resignation just days after state Sen. Vince T. Demuzio, a Democrat, held a press conference to declare that the board had too many Republican members.
Illinois law requires that no more than five of the board's nine members belong to the same party.
Political affiliation is determined by how members vote in the primary election before their appointments. According to Mr. Demuzio's records, six members voted in the 1996 GOP primary before Gov. Jim Edgar, a Republican, appointed them to the board in early 1997. Mr. Litchfield's six-year term was scheduled to expire in January. Despite Mr. Litchfield's announcement, Mr. Demuzio maintains that the board is still unfairly stacked with Republicans. That's because Sandra Pellegrino, who was appointed as a Democrat last year, voted Republican in the 1998 primary, Mr. Demuzio said.