April 27, 2022
For Immediate Release
Contact: Chaundra Van Dyk
Chicago Project Manager
cvandyk@changeil.org
City Council members’ inaction blocks map the people helped shape
CHICAGO, IL – While not surprised, we are beyond disappointed today to see that a majority of Chicago’s elected officials turned their backs on the very people they were elected to represent, their constituents, by refusing to vote to approve a Chicago ward map. In doing so with time running out, they are knowingly stopping Chicagoans from having the option of voting June 28th on the only ward map with aldermanic support that the people of the city helped design.
Every Chicagoan now clearly should understand that the 34 council members who refused to approve their ward map did so to make sure the people of Chicago have no say in shaping their communities for the next 10 years. These council members are disrespecting the people by putting on the ballot their map, the one created through a broken, closed-door process designed from the start to block residents’ input and their needs and wants. The 34 council members and Mayor Lori Lightfoot had a model of a fully transparent process, the one conducted by the Chicago Advisory Redistricting Commission. They had the opportunity to rise above the broken system of Chicago business as usual. Instead, the 34 council members supporting the “Harris map” drawn by Mike Madigan’s lawyer chose to hide behind that closed map room door and bar the people of Chicago from seeing and choosing from all of the maps.
As disappointing as this is, the work of the CHANGE Illinois Action Fund and the commission it supported will not stop. We are committed to bringing in the light. Time does remain before May 19th and we do welcome any effort by the mayor or council members to get a map to the ballot or approved that includes input from the people of Chicago. In the meantime, we will continue to educate Chicagoans about the map options on their ballots.
We are especially proud of the 13 members of the Chicago Advisory Redistricting Commission and The People’s Map they created in full public view. That commission drew the first-ever Asian majority ward and a map with 37 majority minority wards that, above all else, kept more Chicago communities whole than any other map proposed. The commissioners listened to the people and produced what they wanted, a compact map that kept many, many communities whole. Commissioners demonstrated that it can be done and how it should be done.