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Meet the candidates for the seats representing parts of Lakeview, Lincoln Park, Roscoe Village, Uptown and Ravenswood.
LAKEVIEW — Six candidates are seeking the Town Hall (19th) police district council seats. The district includes parts of Lakeview, Lincoln Park, Roscoe Village, Uptown and Ravenswood.
Meet them below.
A member of the Roscoe Village Neighbors’ board of directors, Richman manages the safety and security program and is a liaison with the 19th District CAPS. He holds safety seminars about calling 911, engages in a police appreciation day, and is petitioning to reopen the Belmont and Western police station.
Alds. James Cappleman (46th) and Scott Waguespack (32nd) and former 43rd Ward Ald. Michele Smith have endorsed.
Candidate questionnaire responses
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
I am running to do my part to help ensure the residents of the 19th District feel safer. I want to make sure everyone who has any interaction with the police, no matter what their gender, race or sexual orientation is treated fairly. I am also running so I can use my ability to communicate and listening skills to work with the police so they can improve at their job.
I want to help build trust between the residents of the 19th District and the police. I want to focus on mental health issues and improve lives and safety for the homeless. I want to be a true ambassador/advocate for the 19th District and relay the message to the residents of our district and the police. Additionally, I want to improve on social justice initiatives and police accountability.
A former member of the USAF Security Forces and Army National Guard, Palecek is president of 46th Ward Democrats, a member of Veterans for Change, and worked on 36th Ward alderperson Gil Villegas’s primary challenge against then-state congresswoman Delia Ramirez. She has organized mutual aid events in her community. She says her mission is to build a community that is “stronger and safer, together, for a brighter future for everyone.”
MWRC commissioner Daniel Pogorzelski, 46th Ward committeeman Sean Tenner, Independent Voters of Illinois–Independent Precinct Organization, Northside Democracy for Change, 40th Ward Dems, Veterans for Change, and VoteVets have endorsed.
Candidate questionnaire responses
I believe that a portion of police funding should be reallocated into restorative justice programs, mentorship for at-risk youth, and addressing root causes of crime, including food and housing insecurity, and inaccessibility of mental health care. A lot of factors can impact whether that funding stays as part of the police budget or is considered separate.
There are some scenarios in which police need to accompany mental health professionals; for instance, in any situations that are violent or involve dangerous weapons, they must be present to secure the scene, doing so in conjunction with mental health professionals in a trauma-informed manner. However, police can often escalate mental health crisis calls, as they are not adequately trained on trauma and mental health. Police should not ever be dispatched on nonviolent crisis calls.
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
This position allows me to combine my passion for serving the community with my experience in public safety. I have always been committed to service and protecting the community, from the time I joined the Air Force at a young age. Sadly, I became a military statistic, having been sexually assaulted by a military police officer. I also saw the heroic actions of law enforcement firsthand when I was deployed to protect the Capitol after the January 6 insurrection. From my military experience, I know firsthand the successes, problems and dangers of our system of policing, and I am determined to reform it.
Through my community organizing experience, I have had the joy of helping so many neighbors in need. I have learned a tremendous amount in the process, and hope to use that knowledge to lead in empowering our community to work together to implement street outreach and group violence prevention, ensure police accountability, improve police training, development and improvement of restorative justice programs, and reallocation of police funding toward restorative justice, poverty alleviation, and fundamental physical and mental healthcare.
A market research and brand strategy consultant, Garcia created an initiative through his employer that provides $50,000 grants to local nonprofits. He says the three-person slate’s goal is to push “innovative, research-based strategies that will increase safety in the neighborhoods. We will bring the power to the community, ensuring to include and elevate marginalized voices, and use people power to drive our government officials to make changes in our public safety system.”
He is running in a slate with Samuel Schoenburg and Jennifer Schaffer. Alds. Andre Vasquez (40th) and Matt Martin (47th), 43rd Ward democratic committeeman Lucy Moog, 46th Ward aldermanic candidate Angela Clay, the ONE People’s Campaign, and Indivisible Lincoln Square have endorsed the three-candidate slate.
Candidate questionnaire responses
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
As a market researcher for the past 10 years, I have been soliciting the perspectives and opinions of a wide range of audiences in the masses to help clients meet their business goals. Subject matter for my projects have stretched across sensitive subjects such as HIV diagnoses & treatments to the value that fraternities may or may not bring to a college campus. I take passion in listening to what people think and do so via non-traditional communication channels like online surveys and focus groups.
This District Council position needs my skillset and passion for socially impactful work. It requires someone who can meticulously listen to the residents in my district, understand their needs and concerns related to public safety and policing, and then represent their collective voice when working with city officials and police leaders. I am confident my work experience will set me up for success in this office.
My lived experience and passion for giving back also make me a strong candidate. I’ve created a pro bono initiative through my employer that grants local Chicago non-profit organizations $50k worth of services to help better our community. Using my skills to help my community has been a rewarding experience, and I look forward to keeping on doing so within the District Council position.
I am also a person of color living in a predominantly white district. I come from a family of immigrants and am a proud Mexican-American. The police district covered by this position is the largest in the city, spanning across six of Chicago’s wards. I live in the 46th Ward, which happens to be the most ethnically diverse ward in my district. I intend to fight for and proudly represent marginalized communities once in this position. Too often, our (POC’s) needs are muffled, but my goal is to loudly amplify our voice so that our demands do not go unnoticed or ignored. Even more importantly, we know POC and, especially Black Americans , are disproportionately mistreated by police. I want to use this position to demand racial justice and more fair policy making so that we all have positive and productive interactions with policing in our community.
A leader of her temple’s social justice team, Schaffer worked with the ECPS Coalition to pass the ECPS ordinance. She says the slate will work to “build strong relationships with all people in the community so we can create a shared vision and effectively advocate our elected officials to enact innovative, researched based policies to modernize our public safety system.”
Schaffer is running in a slate with Samuel Schoenburg and Jennifer Schaffer. Alds. Andre Vasquez (40th) and Matt Martin (47th), 43rd Ward democratic committeeman Lucy Moog, 46th Ward aldermanic candidate Angela Clay, the ONE People’s Campaign, and Indivisible Lincoln Square have endorsed the three-candidate slate.
Candidate questionnaire responses:
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
I am running for the District Council because I have a clear vision of how to improve public safety in our community. I want to help create a public safety system that is more expansive and inclusive of professionals that are vital in creating safe communities. I believe we must have mental health care workers respond to nonviolent mental health care crises in addition to having appropriate responses to homelessness and drug related calls.
Additionally, my vision of an expanded public safety system includes supporting violence intervention workers and other data driven crime prevention strategies so we are cultivating safer communities where less crime occurs. By modernizing public safety in these ways we would be making police more available to respond to and solve violent crimes that occur in the 19th District. Additionally, I would advocate for police to be able to take their necessary days off and get the training they need to be most responsible, fair, and effective in the community.
In all discussions around safety, the voices of marginalized people must be elevated. We know that we cannot achieve meaningful, sustainably safe communities until we protect the most vulnerable among us. I am running alongside Maurilio Garcia and Sam Schoenburg. Our strongly aligned values and months of working as a team is a huge asset in this new position and will allow us to immediately start working towards creating a safer 19th District.
An attorney, Schoenburg is involved in social justice efforts with Cabrini Green Legal Aid and the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs.
He is running in a slate with Samuel Schoenburg and Jennifer Schaffer. Alds. Andre Vasquez (40th) and Matt Martin (47th), 43rd Ward democratic committeeman Lucy Moog, 46th Ward aldermanic candidate Angela Clay, the ONE People’s Campaign, and Indivisible Lincoln Square have endorsed the three-candidate slate.
Candidate questionnaire responses:
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
I am running for District Council to put the community’s voice at the center of public safety decision-making, and to help make policing more accountable, fair, and effective. This first class of District Council members will shape the future of this new position. I and the two other candidates I’m running alongside, Jenny Schaffer and Maurilio Garcia, are committed to making sure the 19th District Council get off to a strong start and does the job it was created to do. Our strongly aligned values and months of working together as a team will be a huge asset in this new position and allow us to immediately start working to create a safer 19th District.
In particular, my co-candidates and I want to modernize our public safety approach to include expanded emergency services with mental health and substance abuse crisis teams. We further want to ensure needed policing reforms from the CPD consent decree are implemented at the District level, and also that 19th District officers have the resources they need—such as their own mental health supports, maintained days off, and up-to-date training—to do their jobs responsibly and effectively.
Finally, as a gay person living in the heart of Northalsted (formerly Boystown), a mainstay neighborhood of Chicago’s LGBTQ community, it’s important to me that members of the LGBTQ community are safe, feel safe, and have their public safety concerns heard and addressed.
Currently chief of staff to Cook County commissioner Scott Britton, Kaviar was a deputy press secretary for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office from 2016 to 2018, where she led outreach around the creation of CPD’s Strategic Decision Support Centers and the Community Policing Advisory Panel, and worked with police on community engagement. She says, “Community safety must be a community-based solution.”
40th Ward Democrats and the Northside Democracy for America have endorsed.
Candidate questionnaire responses:
What do you consider the primary role of a police district councilor to be?
Why are you running for Police District Council?
I am a social justice champion, with a passion for making inclusive change and the policy knowledge to get it done. I am running because everyone deserves to feel and be safe in their communities, and to be treated with equal dignity and respect by the police. My campaign motto is Kaviar C.A.R.E.S, because together we can create a collaborative, accountable, responsible, and equitable system of safety.
My family roots instilled the importance of giving back and building up my community. My parents and grandparents all worked in schools. My mother is a Caribbean immigrant who struggled to ensure a better life for her children. My grandfather was a Jewish WWII veteran who enlisted at age 17 and taught me the importance of fighting for justice and to repair the world.
The police have a social contract with the community they are sworn to protect and serve. While we can not police our way out of violence and must make long-term investments in addressing root causes of crime, we need alternatives to immediate community safety that include a mental health emergency response, victim support, and restorative justice practices. We also must shine a spotlight of transparency on police officers to ensure they are protecting against crime effectively and serving the community equitably.
For the past decade, I worked in public safety, health, and social services policy. It would be an honor to use that insider experience to activate a 19th Police District Council that builds trust with residents, strengthens community safety, and holds the police truly accountable.
I believe that police accountability is central to the police district council’s role. I support not just more police accountability, but also increased data transparency, and stronger rules to ensure police misconduct is acted upon swiftly. Indeed, the “A” in my Kaviar CARES slogan stands for “accountability” and I have listed policy ideas for this on my website, JulieKaviar.com
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