Gapers Block published from April 22, 2003 to Jan. 1, 2016. The site will remain up in archive form. Please visit Third Coast Review, a new site by several GB alumni. ✶ Thank you for your readership and contributions. ✶
Ben Kolak of the Scrappers Film Group contributed to this report.
It was Rahm's night, and he spent it surrounded by friends and family. Riding a hefty 56-44 margin (in a runoff where less than 40 percent of registered voters went to the polls), Mayor Emanuel sealed the deal on a victory he thought he'd won last February. So it was a new, "nicer" mayor who gave a gracious acceptance speech, but mostly he basked in the glow of "Rahm Love" -- and even threatened to give some back.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Spring is supposed to be time for decluttering your closets. Me, I'm de-cluttering my politics. Mainly by boiling it down to asking candidates, "Whose side are you on?"
Yes, there are other questions. Are you a force for real reform, or a go-along-get-along with the rigged political structure? Will your policies lead to a more equal society or a more unequal one? Do you work for short-term fixes or long-term solutions? Are you fighting the growing surveillance state, or silent while we slide towards 1984? Are you down with war, or doing real work for peace? Will you fight to stave off environmental disaster, or will you be just more political dead weight as crises loom?
But, mainly - coursing through all of the above -- for whom will you govern? In tough fights, will you stand with those who speak truth to power? Whose side are you on?
In the Chicago mayor's race, hard decisions are coming down the pike. Taxes will need hiking no matter who wins. So fairness is paramount.
In Elizabeth Kolbert's great and tragic book The Sixth Extinction, Svante Pääbo, a Swedish biologist and one of the founders of paleogenetics, muses on what drove modern humans as opposed to archaic humans like Homo Erectus and the Neanderthals to journey to Madagascar:
It's only fully modern humans who start this thing of venturing out on the ocean where you don't see land. Part of that is technology, of course; you have to have ships to do it. But there is also, I like to think or say, some madness there. How many people must have sailed out and vanished on the Pacific before you found Easter Island. I mean, it's ridiculous. And why do you do that? Is it for the glory? For immortality? For curiosity? And now we go to Mars. We never stop.
Kolbert goes on to explain that Pääbo thinks it should be possible to identify a freak mutation in our DNA that makes this type of strange, even beautiful, human insanity possible. I think he is onto something here. I can think of far too many people I know who would be among the first to go to Mars if they could.
Mayoral Candidate Jesus "Chuy" Garcia leads a GOTV speech in front of supporters. Photo by Manny Ramos.
On the last day of early voting, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia made a final get out the vote effort at Mt. Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church. Mt. Pilgrim was filled with both excitement, and a sense of urgency. Garcia didn't stand alone; he was accompanied by key players in the African-American community.
"You are with us because you know my administration will reflect the diversity of our great city," said Garcia in front of a crowd of supporters. "No more lower bond wages in Chicago due to fiscal mismanagement in Chicago, No more attacks on pensions, and the retirement security of our workers," Garcia said as Dr. Cornel West and Rev. Jessie Jackson cheered him on.
On Saturday, April 4, the faithful gathered, among them Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, Jesse Jackson from Operation PUSH, Dolores Huerta, iconic leader of the United Farm Workers in California, and Cornel West, the New York intellectual and self-described rabblerouser. At New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church on the West Side, they made one last push to get out the vote for Jesus "Chuy" Garcia -- and celebrate how far the progressive movement has come in Chicago.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
There have been seven debates so far in this mayoral race, with one more scheduled Tuesday at 7pm on WTTW-Channel 11. Nielsen ratings show the encounters are drawing a relatively small TV audience: 98,000 viewers on public television and about 322,000 on NBC's first head to head debate. But three of those four viewers live outside the city of Chicago, so if you measure only registered voters in Chicago (and factor in 2011's turnout of 42 percent), the direct impact of the debates is negligible -- unless you add in the other media coverage. We asked reporters who have both moderated and covered the debates about the long tail of mayoral debates. In other words, who's watching?
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
A Mexican and a Jew go to a Southside Irish Parade. Sounds like the beginning of a bad bar joke, doesn't it? So what do they do when they get there? Run from one side of the road to the other, handing out high fives like crazed lunatics. If you want to run for office, you have to throw yourself out there and do all kinds of silly things. Only in Chicago... in a close mayoral election. Happy St. Patrick's Day.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
It's not surprising that some of Mayor Emanuel's sympathizers and supporters are confusing people's substantive disputes with the mayor as the effect of poor marketing on his part. It's exactly this insular worldview that has gotten the mayor in hot water.
The problem many Chicagoans have with Mayor Emanuel is not that their feelings were hurt because he's a mean-o.
People who have had their schools close, or seen friends, relatives or neighbors lose their jobs, or lose their mental health care, because of the mayor's policies, would not feel better because that news came to them by singing telegram.
Only a pronounced alienation from the reality of working class life in Chicago could cause someone to think the mayor's problem is one of tone and not substance.
Chicago is waiting for the early bus in the cold. It goes hard on you and it nickel-and-dimes you. You have to be hard to survive and creative to get on. Chicagoans have earned not only being listened to, but a part in running things themselves. Not just quietly obeying imported technocrats and unaccountable "social entrepreneurs."
The key battlegrounds in the mayoral race are shaping up to be in Chicago's black communities. To find out what's on people's minds, we spent a day in Gordy's Barbershop, 1407 E. 75th St., listening to more than a few opinions on what the candidates should be addressing.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Last Saturday, we went "Running with Rahm" - a marathon attempt to hit seven campaign offices in a day (with a stopover to call on Willie Wilson). We caught up with him at the 27th and 45th ward offices and discovered the old Democratic machine is anything but dead.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
It felt like the final precinct would never be called.
Cramped into a small bar in Albany Park, watching returns on a most unusual Election Night, pecking at smartphones, a motley crew dressed largely in red waited on vote totals from an unknown precinct to be added to the totals. Those totals didn't seem very hopeful, but this was a night where the most powerful mayor in the country had been humbled.
Dueling campaign night headquarters. Rahm vs. Chuy. Only two blocks apart, across a chasm of differences.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Current 15th Ward Ald. Toni Foulkes was able to secure about 44 percent of the votes in the 16th Ward municipal election, while Stephanie Coleman seized about 36 percent of the vote, sending the 16th Ward into a runoff.
"You always want to win the first time," Ald. Foulkes said, "However, I got my troops behind me, and we're excited." Foulkes thinks she has a good chance in winning the municipal runoffs. "If you look at my last race we had 46 percent of the votes in the general, but we walked away winning with 69 percent."
Ald. Foulkes chose not to run in the 15th Ward because the new ward map moves 40 percent of her constituents into the 16th Ward. She was expected to possibly fall behind to Ald. JoAnn Thompson, but Thompson passed away unexpectedly on Feb. 10.
Stephanie Coleman, daughter of former 16th Ward Ald. Shirley Coleman, is in a position to make a push. Coleman, 27, is one of at least seven Millennial candidates running for City Council. She is attempting to follow the footsteps of her mother, but looks to appeal to the youth and young adults.
Sadly, this runoff is not due to new ideas of a younger generation facing an experienced veteran. No, it is due to the poor voter turnout that was the 2015 municipal general elections. There are roughly 1.4 million registered voters in the city of Chicago. The voter turnout on Tuesday night floated at about 33 percent, significantly lower than the 2011 elections.
Some believe the frigid temperature had an effect on voters coming out; others say it is because of higher early voting numbers.
Ald. Foulkes disagrees with that latter. "People really need to come out and vote," she said. "It is very important, people always tell me they are going to vote, but never do."
Chuy Garcia's Valentine's Day began and ended with a kiss, and included 10 campaign stops in between. The object of his affection: his wife of 38 years, Evelyn.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
A recent poll for the mayor's race shows Mayor Rahm Emanuel polling at 49.2 percent, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia at 23 percent, Willie Wilson at 14.4 percent, Ald. Bob Fioretti at 8.6 percent and William "Dock" Walls at 4.9 percent. The only really surprising part of this poll is Emanuel polling above 40 percent since quite a few polls showed him polling below that.
The big question people have is, why is Willie Wilson polling higher than Bob Fioretti?
Early voting has begun, and Election Day is only eight days away. To celebrate, we accompanied the mayoral candidates on one of the great rituals of Chicago politics — el stop campaigning — set to the tune "Get Out and Vote" by Milwaukee's own Johnny Standley.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Ald. JoAnn Thompson (16th) died Tuesday morning from complications from a heart-related ailment and attendant surgery. The Sun-Times article speaks to Thompson's background, overcoming homelessness and alcoholism to become one of Chicago's most surprising aldermen.
Thompson had been locked in a difficult reelection campaign, most notably with Ald. Toni Foulkes (15th). Foulkes was drawn out of her district by the last redistricting, leading to a rare situation where two incumbents were challenging one another.
William 'Dock' Walls is the wild card in the mayor's race. A single-digit finisher in his first two attempts to win the mayor's office in 2007 and 2011, he forcefully inserted himself into the Chicago Tribune debate and speaks to the issue of "Two Chicagos" in the others. So we accompanied him last week to the South Side to see the neighborhood where he grew up and talk with some of its residents.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
This is a story of life, love, and property damage. It is a story involving crystallized water, piled some 19 inches deep. The story forces us to confront greed, manipulation, logistics, and physics. The characters include the legendary and the ordinary, from Rahm Emanuel to a bus driver whose name we'll likely never know.
On Tuesday nights, the Chicago Media Bowling League takes to the lanes at the legendary Fireside Bowl. Gapers Block fields a team in the league, and I happen to be on the team. The main reason I am on the team is because I have my own ball. His name is Floyd.
Yes, this is a story about a bowling ball, and yes, this is also a story about a mayoral election. First, though, this is a story about a city and a snowstorm.
Industrial music pioneer Martin Atkins has lived in Chicago for 15 years. A drummer for everyone from Public Image Ltd. to Nine Inch Nails to his own Murder Inc. and Pigface, the Bridgeport resident is now drumming up support for Maureen Sullivan, a candidate for 11th Ward alderman to replace retiring Ald. James Balcer.
Last Monday, Jan. 19, Willie Wilson held a Martin Luther King Day rally at the House of Hope on 114th Street in Pullman. Wilson had predicted that over 12,000 people would turn out; the crowd was more like 500. A procession of ministers took the stage to support Wilson's bid for mayor, and the candidate once again offered up his Sermon on The Stump about Moses warning his people not to return to the land of Egypt. But the highlight, as always, was the gospel choir from Wilson's syndicated TV show "Singsation!"
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
His day begins with phone calls at 5am and often doesn't end until midnight. From el stops to "Fridays with Fioretti," we followed mayoral candidate Bob Fioretti last week to see what a typical day on the campaign trail is like for the 2nd Ward alderman.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
But you might live in one of the wards where there is only one candidate on the ballot -- and you do not like the candidate. So you might be thinking you will just write somebody in.
Guess what? You might not even be able to do that.
With deep roots in the Harold Washington campaign, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia is relying on a robust field organization to build a new progressive coalition. Volunteers are signing up at a rate of 25 to 50 a day, and the campaign had 250 people on the street going door to door last weekend. We went to the field office at 63rd and Woodlawn to watch the operation in action on Jan. 14.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
The Chicago mayor's race is playing out like no other on Facebook, Twitter and the websites of the major candidates. Mary Naset is the digital director for Rahm Emanuel's re-election campaign and presides over a social network that includes 83,000 Facebook fans and more than 103,000 Twitter followers. For comparison, his opponent Bob Fioretti has around 8,100 Facebook fans and Jesus "Chuy" Garcia has around 6,700. We sat down with her to find out what 's all the fuss about.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
On Sunday, Jan. 4, Willie Wilson went to church - four times. Only a day before giving his mayoral campaign $1 million from his personal bank account, Wilson made the rounds of the black churches that are the backbone of his campaign, giving each a generous donation, as is his custom, and talking about his reasons for running. By his own reckoning, he has given some $18 million to Chicago churches over the last 20 years and, as host of the Gospel Music showcase "Singsation!" featured many of their choirs on his TV show.
Stump Connolly caught up with him at one of his favorites, the Rev. Robert Patterson's Spirit of Truth Missionary Baptist Church, 3443 W. Harrison.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Clem Balanoff files 63,000 nominating signatures for Jesus "Chuy" Garcia on Nov. 24, 2014, the last day of filing for the 2015 Chicago mayoral elections. Ten candidates are now in the race.
Next week, we catch up to present day!
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
And then there were five: Rahm Emanuel, Bob Fioretti, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia, William "Dock" Walls, and Willie Wilson. Those are the candidates who will be on the ballot for mayor in February.
Emanuel, Fioretti, Garcia, and Walls have all been around politics, some in loftier positions, some for longer than others. Wilson, though, has no political experience. He is a 66-year-old South Side businessman.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel and various aldermanic candidates vie for the top position on the ballot on Nov. 17, 2014, the first day of filing petitions for the Chicago municipal elections next February.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
The kick-off rally for Jesus "Chuy" Garcia took place at the Alhambra Palace in the West Loop on Nov. 23, to the tune of "Everyday People."
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Back in September, 2nd Ward Ald. Bob Fioretti launched the first serious challenge to Mayor Emanuel in a South Side gymnasium -- with a boatload of consultants on board.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Ald. Bob Fioretti of the Second Ward has the platform of "True TIF Reform" for his mayoral campaign. I spoke with him over the phone on Friday to discuss TIFs and how to reform them.
One of your platforms is "True TIF Reform." What projects under Mayor Emanuel have led to you developing this platform?
A meeting -- I think it was the Finance Committee meeting, I do not serve on the Finance Committee -- and I watched what happened with a TIF on the Far West Side where the aldermen had not done anything to improve the infrastructure. And many African-American aldermen complained about the lack of use in terms of the infrastructure and at that point I had come to the realization as I watched what happened our TIF program is broken. I mean, it's there to help blighted areas and instead we see most of the money being directed to the South Loop, West Loop, Downtown area. And, accordingly, short-changing our neighborhoods like Pullman, Riverdale, Roseland, West Pullman, South Side communities where blight is, as I said before, prevalent and economic development is scarce.
Rahm Emanuel opens his re-election campaign with a rally at the Cinespace Studios in Lawndale Dec. 6, 2014. The event is not on the mayor's public schedule, admission is by ticket only, and lines from every speakers are posted on Twitter moments after they are spoken.
Stump Connolly, chief political correspondent of The Week Behind, will be covering the Chicago mayoral race with his new pocketcam and offering periodic video reports exclusively on Gapers Block as the campaign unfolds.
Amara Enyia was the first candidate to declare for the mayoral race. By declaring so early -- in February -- she picked up a lot of press that she might not have otherwise received, from heavy hitters like Kari Lydersen and Ben Joravsky. Her bio is Obamaesque, but to hardcore progressives, her platform is even better.
Alas, on Tuesday, Enyia officially withdrew from the race. Her paperwork was challenged, and reading between the lines of her withdrawal statement, it seems unlikely that she would have survived the challenge with sufficient signatures.
The demise of her campaign reflects a sad reality in Chicago. The economic conditions on the South and West Sides, combined with a hostile electoral landscape, continue to stunt efforts to improve the city. But in Enyia's failure to get on the ballot, there may also be indications of how people who are fed up need to evolve their tactics to bring change to the city.
Petitions for municipal office were due at 5pm on Monday, Nov. 24. Aldermanic candidates had to submit 473 valid signatures.
But... if someone filed a petition with just a single signature -- their own -- they might officially be on the ballot anyway.
And someone else, who might have filed 10 times the number of valid signatures, might get challenged, and it might be weeks before they can officially be on the ballot -- or they might get thrown off altogether.
With the entry of Jesus "Chuy" Garcia into the mayoral race, the calculus has changed again. Garcia, a sitting Cook County commissioner, former alderman, and former state senator, is seasoned and well-connected. Those connections date back as far as Harold Washington, who was mayor when Garcia was elected to the City Council.
For the past several months, Chicago has been electrified by the prospect of a clash between two of the strongest personalities in city politics: the brash, business-first mayor Rahm Emanuel, and the outspoken, social justice-oriented union president Karen Lewis. For spectators in the media, and in the city's neighborhoods, the clash between these two contenders, both bold in presentation and opposing in ideology, promised to be the electoral matchup of a generation.
But Monday's announcement by Lewis's team showed that this contest is not to be. Lewis, who has flirted with a formal announcement and has been recently beset by serious health concerns, declared what many of late had feared: that the fiery labor leader won't be throwing her red CTU cap into the race.
For six months in Chicago, there may be a rare, once-a-decade opportunity to get some answers. If that sentence seems magniloquent, that's because I had to start big since the subsequent sentence is, "That opportunity is the 2015 Chicago municipal elections."
That opportunity is the 2015 Chicago municipal elections. Chicago is defined by confluence; in the first instance, literally, as sitting at the confluence of Lake Michigan, the Chicago River, and the Chicago Portage, the connection between the Great Lakes and Mississippi watersheds. Soon after, the nation's railroad flowed together there; now, it's the confluence of the nation's air travel and trucking. Today, it is also a confluence of some of the country's biggest challenges.
Income inequality, gentrification, rising housing costs, under-resourced schools and creeping privatization, under-served mental health services, police brutality, street crime, segregation, environmental justice, exploitation of undocumented workers, police militarization, un- and under-compensated care work, wage theft, unemployment, over-crowded jails, hyper-criminalization, lack of government transparency, and crumbling infrastructure. These issues intersect on the orange-lit streets of the Great American City. Chicago is a beautiful city and livable city. It is also suffering.
First, the news you already know: Karen Lewis is likely running for mayor. Toni Preckwinkle isn't.
Since the news broke on July 15 that Preckwinkle is out of the race, some dominant themes seem to have emerged. The first, probably best epitomized in Ben Joravsky's "five stages of grief" article, has been lament over the person who was seen as most capable of beating Rahm Emanuel stepping out of the race.
Following closely behind is a reassessment of Lewis. It was easier to imagine what a theoretical Preckwinkle campaign might look like. It's harder to imagine that with Lewis. Preckwinkle was a multi-term alderman and is now Cook County Board President, who has expressed many views on many issues over time. Lewis, as President of the Chicago Teachers Union and having never held public office, has had little occasion to talk about things like potholes, tourism, and appropriate police deployment. There's also the question over what form Lewis's campaign might take, given that it would likely take form outside of existing entrenched political structures.
I took the Green Line out to Garfield Park to meet Amara Enyia at one of her favorite spots, Inspiration Kitchens. The restaurant, located right by the Garfield Park Conservatory, provides jobs and training to homeless individuals. Enyia explained to me that the menu (which looked delicious) is kept affordable so that residents of the neighborhood can actually afford to eat there. As we chatted in this sunny space over lemonade and iced tea, Enyia explained her vision for the city to me.
Enyia is sick of status quo in Chicago politics -- in which resources are focused on the wealthy and many communities are left in poverty--and she has decided to do something about it. Earlier this month, she held a rally to launch her candidacy as a progressive alternative to Chicago's current mayor, Rahm Emanuel.
The business model for Inspiration Kitchens is right in line with Enyia's view of how the city should function -- a local business that lifts up community members, uses local and sustainable ingredients, and provides a positive space for the neighborhood.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's plunging popularity was reflected in a recent Sun-Times poll, in which just 29 percent of respondents reported that they would support Emanuel if the election were held today. The results confirmed what was already obvious to most Chicagoans--a vast majority of the city dislikes our mayor.
What still remains to be seen is whether a candidate will emerge who has the ability to successfully rally that energy and unseat him.
The Chicago Sun-Times released a poll on Saturday showing 29 percent of Chicagoans surveyed would vote for Mayor Rahm Emanuel in the upcoming 2015 election.
Other results from the poll showed 27 percent of those surveyed didn't know which potential candidate they would vote for, while 26 percent said they would vote for Cook County Board president Toni Preckwinkle, 10 percent for Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis, 5 percent for Ald. Robert Fioretti (2nd Ward) and 3 percent for former 9th Ward Ald. Robert Shaw.
Emanuel responded to the poll by saying on Wednesday, "There's ups and downs....You stay true to your principles. You stay true to who you are and you don't change. You stay committed to making sure there's results and you stay true to what you believe in."
The Tribune released a story the same day saying an Emanuel campaign aide had emailed the Tribune with story ideas that could paint Preckwinkle in a negative light. She has maintained she is focused on running for reelection for her seat and continuing to improve Cook County.
Preckwinkle recently appeared on WTTW's "My Chicago" and was asked by host Mark Bazer if her and Emanuel get along. She responded with a long pause before saying, "We work together."
It's now been 11 days since the carbon monoxide leak which sent over 80 Prussing Elementary School students and staff to the hospital. While officials from Chicago Public Schools have partially answered some questions, and CPS CEO Forrest Claypool has informed that he will be visiting the school to field more questions on Nov. 16, many parents remain irate at the CPS response to date. More...
It's not surprising that some of Mayor Emanuel's sympathizers and supporters are confusing people's substantive disputes with the mayor as the effect of poor marketing on his part. It's exactly this insular worldview that has gotten the mayor in hot... More...
It's not surprising that some of Mayor Emanuel's 
Current 15th Ward Ald. Toni Foulkes was able to secure about 44 percent of the votes in the 16th Ward municipal election, while Stephanie Coleman seized about 36 percent of the vote, sending the 16th Ward into a runoff. 
Ald. JoAnn Thompson (16th) died Tuesday morning from complications from a heart-related ailment and attendant surgery. The 
If having a lot of choices is your thing, you may be jealous of me. The 38th Ward, where I live, will have 
Amara Enyia was the first candidate to declare for the mayoral race. By declaring so early -- in February -- she picked up a lot of 
First, the news you already know: Karen Lewis is likely running for mayor. Toni Preckwinkle isn't.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's plunging popularity was reflected in a recent 
