Out of limelight, write-in candidates collected support in Clerk, 4th Ward races
By Bob Seidenberg
With municipal elections spaced four years apart, it’s not always easy pinpointing what issues influenced voters.
But this past election probably had one as clear as you’re going to get, with Seventh Ward residents finally getting the chance to show what they felt about the council’s approval of Northwestern University’s request to stage concerts as part of the Ryan Field rebuild.
Residents strongly backed attorney Parielle Davis over her opponent Kerry Mundy, a former chair of the city’s Civil Service Commission, 1,443 votes to 1,042 votes, in the election for 7th Ward Council seat.
In the race, Mundy had the backing of the current councilmember, Eleanor Revelle, as well as former Seventh Ward council members Jane Grover and Elizabeth Tisdahl (who later went on to become mayor).
As Vice President of the Most Livable City Association (MLCA), Davis had helped lead efforts to oppose the rezoning of Ryan Field for large-scale commercial events.
She received strong support throughout the ward, final precinct totals show, even winning a small majority in precinct 1 at the eastern edge of the ward, 345 to 333, which Revelle had won in 2021.
She put the election away, though, in Precinct 2, which includes the single family homes around the stadium — and expected to be the area strongest impacted by the concerts — receiving 503 votes to 249 votes for Mundy.
In the mayor’s race too, Jeff Boarini, the challenger, received his greatest support in Precinct 2, receiving 491 votes to 279 votes for incumbent Daniel Biss. Biss had cast the tie-breaking vote in support of NU request to stage concerts at the stadium.
The ward was the only one he won overall — 1,295 votes to 1,221 votes for Biss. In 2021, still wearing the luster as a two-term state legislator, Biss received 926 votes to 370 for Lori Keenan, a long time resident of the ward.
Campaigning, Boarini said, Ryan Field was clearly the number one issue, not necessarily the rebuild of the stadium itself “but the commercialization and then the method in which it was accomplished,” he said.
Write-in votes
It’s hard enough running as write-in, convincing friends and neighbors to write in your names on the ballot, in a race which turnout County-wide was less than 20 percent.
But then candidates have to wait several weeks before the votes they received are checked and officially posted by the Cook County Clerk’s office.
Write-in candidate Vanessa Johnson-McCoy received 1,290 votes or 7.26 percent of the vote against incumbent Stephanie Mendoza in the City Clerk’s race, where the voting is city wide.
Margaret “Meg” Welch received 258 votes or 13.05 percent of the total vote against incumbent Jonathan Nieuwsma in the race for the Fourth Ward Council seat race.
Both Johnson-McCoy, with over 20 years of professional experience in Human Resources, and Welch, a manager with over 20 years experience with the Social Security Administration, brought strong credentials to their races.
In the 2021 election, write-in candidates received six votes in the city’s Third Ward, and nine votes in the Fifth Ward.
So the two were considerably above the curve and would appear to have considerable more to build on should they run again.
