Oak Park has its new Village Board of Trustees.
Chibuike Enyia, Jim Taglia and Jenna Leving Jacobson earned spots on the village board as they came out on top of a field of five, outpacing sitting trustee Lucia Robinson and challenger Joshua Vanderberg. Enyia was the election’s top vote-getter with 6,713 votes, Leving Jacobson was second with 6,055 and Taglia earned the last spot with 5,499.
Robinson and Vanderberg received 4,452 and 3,143 votes respectively.
The full board of trustees will be Enyia, Leving Jacobson, Taglia, Brian Straw, Corey Wesley, Susan Buchanan and newly re-elected Village President Vicki Scaman. They will begin governing together at their first board meeting on May 6.
Scaman congratulated all the candidates on a competitive campaign.
“You had five really thoughtful people that were prepared,” Scaman said. “I congratulate all three of them and I thank the other two for running and I hope to keep them highly engaged in our community. Our community is lucky to have Lucia and Josh’s service.”
Enyia, who works as the community engagement manager for the Oak Park Public Library, first won his seat on the board in 2021. He was the only sitting trustee to win re-election this cycle.
On April 1, Enyia had only recently returned from a trip alongside his entire immediate family to Nigeria, where his teenage children were able to meet family members that he hadn’t seen since he was a small child. Though he said he was still quite jet-lagged on election night, he was humbled to find out he’d been the top vote-getter in the race.
“We’re a special community, I know that communities across the U.S. don’t always have our same shared values, but here those values are lived out every day and I try to make sure that people in the community understand that that’s what drives us,” he said. “I wanted people to remember, that no matter what’s going on nationally, we care about our Oak Parkers and we want to see the best for them. From our youngest to our oldest community members. That is what I think struck a chord with people and I was excited to see that.”
Taglia is a seasoned figure in Oak Park politics, serving for several years on the Oak Park Township board before being appointed to the village board in 2017 and winning re-election in 2019. Taglia, who serves as co-president of the Pro-Chem-Co manufacturing corporation, lost his bid for the board in 2023.
“I’m honored to be selected by the residents of Oak Park,” Taglia told Wednesday Journal. “I have a deep affection for the village.
“I’m looking forward to giving it my all.”
Leving Jacobson was the only person to win election to the board without any previous elected experience, although she entered the race with a background in community activism, including through her work with the Oak Park-Austin Area Moms Demand Action group. She works as a Spanish instructor at Dominican University.
She said that she was able to earn voters’ trust by showing them she could be an empathetic leader, capable of making responsible decisions while still leading with her heart.
“Government is one of the ways we can take care of each other, and that’s going to guide the way I make decisions,” she said. “If and when we have to make tough choices, that’s my core perspective and I can communicate that. Because that’s why I entered the race. That’s why I worked so hard in the campaign.”
That “core perspective” will be essential as the village navigates the drastic shifts brought on by U.S. President Donald Trump’s election last year.
“We all want to protect each other in the face of fascism at the national level,” she said. “’I’m pretty optimistic that a shared sense of values and broader goals will allow us to be productive on the sort of day-to-day decisions that will come before us.”
