Rep. Bassi is in her sixth term as State Representative of the 54th District, having first been elected in November 1998.  To date, many of the bills that she has actively worked on have been signed into law, including charter school legislation, additional protection for kids in schools, anti-pollution and recycling acts, protection for victims of domestic violence, increased benefits for senior citizens, and improvements in mass transit.

Her other legislative accomplishments include: school violence prevention; crackdown on gun violence; increased penalties for sex offenders and drug users, specifically targeting “club drugs” such as Ecstasy; increased funding for local schools; expanded pharmaceutical coverage under the Circuit Breaker/IL Rx programs, stricter permit and inspection regulations for carnival and amusement rides, and GPS tracking for victims of domestic violence.

Rep. Bassi currently serves on six House committees: Elementary & Secondary Education, Infrastructure (Minority Spokesperson), Appropriations-Elementary & Secondary Education (Minority Spokesperson), Mass Transit, Revenue and Finance, State Government Administration. She is also an active member of COWL (Conference of Women Legislators) and a member of the Task Force on Alzheimer’s and the Task Force on Re-Enrolling High School Drop-outs.

In 2008-2009, Rep. Bassi was one of nine Republicans who served on the 21-member House Special Investigative Committee to Impeach Governor Rod Blagojevich.

Since her election in 1998, Rep. Bassi has received many awards, including Legislator of the Year from the Suburban Area Agency on Aging, and has been selected numerous times as the Champion of Free Enterprise by the Illinois Chamber of Commerce and the Friend of Agriculture by the Illinois Farm Bureau.

In addition to her regular legislative duties, Rep. Bassi served during her freshman year as a member of the U.S. Trade Mission to the Republic of South Africa, where she participated in the opening of the new Illinois Trade Office in Johannesburg.  The purpose of this mission was to help Illinois businesses develop new trading relationships and business agreements in South Africa and elsewhere on the continent.

Following her first term in office, she was awarded a fellowship to the Bowhay Institute for Legislative Leadership Development.

Rep. Bassi grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and Des Moines, Iowa, where she graduated from St. Joseph’s High School in 1962.  She graduated from Rosary College (now Dominican University) in River Forest, Illinois in 1966 with a B.A. degree in French. She completed her M.A.T. at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana in 1973. Rep. Bassi taught high school French and English for 10 years before retiring from teaching to raise a family.

She is married to Roger Bassi since August, 1973 and they have three children: Carrie, 34, married and the mother of Suzie’s first grandchild, is a physical trainer in Chicago; Steve, 32, married, is teaching high school in Connecticut; and Greg, 30, a lawyer, is clerking for a federal judge in New Mexico and soon to be a lawyer with Winston & Strawn in Chicago.

Rep. Bassi and her family moved to the 54th District in 1974, where Suzie has been actively involved in the community ever since. In 1987 she was elected to the District 15 Board of Education and re-elected for another four-year term in 1991.

Rep. Bassi is currently a member of the following organizations:

• COWL – Conference of Women Legislators
• Palatine Business and Professional Women’s Organization
• Palatine Area League of Women Voters
• Palatine Township Republican Organization
• Northwest Community Hospital Auxiliary
• Friends of Harper College
• Women in Need Growing Stronger (WINGS), Board member