The City That Votes

This episode, we are going to discuss one of the Board of Commissioners’ most important duties – serving as the Chicago Electoral Board, which hears and decides on objections to a candidate’s nomination petitions to get onto the ballot in the City of Chicago. As the Chicago Electoral Board is currently meeting to hear cases ahead of the June 28th Primary, I speak with our General Counsel Adam Lasker to give us an update and brief overview on the process.

We are very pleased to introduce you to our new Commissioner at the Chicago Board of Elections, June A. Brown. Commissioner Brown grew up in Alabama and her work in voters' rights was informed by her exposure to the inspirational leadership of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. On this episode, we discuss her life and her decades-long commitment to public service and voting rights.

This episode is dedicated to that great decennial hot topic: the City of Chicago’s remapping process. Every ten years, legislators redraw the lines and many voters end up in different districts, wards, and precincts. For the first time since 1992, the Chicago City Council did not come to an immediate agreement on a new ward map before the December 1, 2021 deadline. So what does this mean for Chicago’s voters? I speak with our Executive Director Charles Holiday Jr. and Al Chase, Supervisor of Software Development and our in-house redistricting specialist.

You may have noticed that Chicago's election system is set up a bit different than other places across the country. The Board is purposely separate from Chicago’s City Hall, and separate from Cook County government as well. For our second episode, we sit down with our current two Commissioners - Chairwoman Marisel Hernandez & Secretary William Kresse - to discuss their experience and the history of how the Chicago Board of Elections came about in the first place.

Welcome to The City That Votes, a new series from the Chicago Board of Elections taking you behind the polling place curtain for a look and listen at how our election system works in the Windy City. Our first guest is Audra Lewicki, Community Services Manager, who oversees the division responsible for hiring and training our city’s elections judges & coordinators, the people who check you into the poll book and process your ballot.