Even in a reform themed election year, Cook County Commissioner Earlean Collins proved the power of incumbency last week as she decisively led a field of four to extend her hold on the 1st District county board seat.
With a strong showing on the city portion of the district, Collins racked up more than 16,000 votes. Her closest challenger was Oak Parker Ade Onayemi who tallied the highest totals in the suburban side of the district but still fell 6,000 votes shy of Collins.
An upbeat Onayemi told supporters at an election night fete at Harrison Street’s LaMajada that they’d run a good race and that he wasn’t through with politics.
“This is not the last they’ll hear from me,” Onayemi said in an election night interview with Wednesday Journal
Onayemi is well known to Oak Parkers through his long service on the District 97 Oak Park elementary school board. His blue and yellow lawn signs dominated the village’s landscape in recent weeks. But local support was not nearly a match for Collins’ West Side strength. In the city precincts Collins rolled up more than 11,000 of her votes. Onayemi could muster fewer than 2,900 city votes.
“I’m very disappointed, but we gave it a good shot. We got our message out, I believe,” said Onayemi. He said the county and state still need better leadership. “There has been very poor leadership in the last few years and people need to heed the warnings because it can be very difficult to reverse the failures of the system. Until we get rid of those elected officials associated with that system, it’s not going to change.”
As for the two other candidates in the race – Chris Harris and Derrick Smith – neither proved much of a threat on election night.
Forest Park’s Harris trailed the pack and cited his political similarities to Onayemi as a drag on his vote totals but as a clear statement on the need for change in the district. “Sharing very similar platforms with Ade, and on the campaign trail sharing many conversations … I think this is a definite mandate on the 1st District.”
As for preliminary polling results in Forest Park, Harris, a first-time candidate, did find those numbers pleasing, saying he heard plenty of “great feedback” encouraging him to stay involved in politics.
“I can’t say I’m completely discouraged,” Harris said.
Smith and Harris rounded out the field with roughly 5,400 and 2,800 votes respectively.
Collins, who has faced accusations of invisibility in the district, had not turned up at her campaign victory party on election night according to one supporter interviewed by the Journal. The gathering, at her district office on Madison Street near Austin Blvd., was breaking up about 9:15 p.m. with no sign of the candidate. Attempts by the Journal to reach Collins on election night were unsuccessful.
CONTACT: tdean@wjinc.com
