So, how much does it cost to get elected in Oak Park? Well, it turns out the answer varies.
All the candidates in Oak Park’s 2025 village board and village president races have submitted their campaign finance reports to the Illinois State Board of Elections, whose deadline for submitting reports on campaign fundraising and spending from New Year’s Day to March 31, was the eve of suburban Cook County’s municipal elections.
Reports for all candidates were due by April 15.
The reports reveal that incumbent Oak Park Village President Vicki Scaman raised more than twice as much as challenger Ravi Parakkat over the course of her successful reelection bid, while top trustee race vote-getter Chibuike Enyia spent the least out of the field, according to state records.
Printing, signage, mailing and social media advertising represented a significant portion of each candidate’s expenditures. According to state records, a significant portion of each candidates’ marketing budget also went to print and digital advertising with Wednesday Journal’s parent organization Growing Community Media.
Vicki Scaman
Scaman, who retained her seat at the head of the board table with 62.8% of the vote, reported raising just over $46,000 between Jan. 1 and Election Day. That total represents a big jump over her fundraising performance during her first village president bid in 2021, in which she raised just under $27,000, according to state records.
Her performance at the ballot box also grew, as her margin of victory increased by six percentage points compared to 2021.
Her largest single contribution came from Illinois State Senate President Don Harmon’s electoral committee, which transferred her campaign $7,800 on March 21, according to state records. The Chicagoland Operators Joint Labor-Management PAC, Harmon’s top benefactor in recent years, also gave Scaman $5,000 on March 14, according to state records.
She reported spending $31,727 during that time, a larger sum than any other candidate on the ballot. Scaman’s largest single expense was her campaign manager’s $6,500 stipend, but the money she invested into events also stood out from the rest of the field. Her campaign hosted multiple events with four-figure space rental costs and twice hired live bands to perform at those events, according to state records.
Ravi Parakkat
Parakkat’s campaign reported raising $7,500 from Jan. 1 to March 31 and told the state board of election that it had spent $13,417 during that time, according to state records.
While running for village trustee in 2021, Parakkat raised $13,970 during that period and spent $9,050, according to state records.
In a thank you message to supporters earlier this month, Parakkat said his campaign had raised $22,500 and spent $20,800 since he announced his intention to run for the village’s top job.
Chibuike Enyia
Enyia, who first won election in 2021, stood out on April 1 as the top performer in the village trustee election, earning 7,757 votes in the official tally. His performance made him just the second Black trustee to earn reelection in village history.
He didn’t need a historic fundraising season to achieve that, bringing in fewer donations and reporting lower expenditures than the rest of the field.
According to state records, Enyia reported raising $8,570 and spending $7,100 between Jan. 1 and March 31.
Jenna Leving Jacobson
Leving Jacobson earned a place on the village board with 6,966 votes, the only first-time candidate to win office in Oak Park’s municipal election this year.
She reported raising $9,684 and spending $9,289 between New Year’s Day and Election Day, according to state records. Close to half of those expenditures went to yard signs and printing costs alone.
James Taglia
Taglia, who’d spent several years as a village trustee before losing a reelection campaign in 2023, was welcomed back to the board with 6,215 votes.
Taglia, an executive at a manufacturing company, self-financed his campaign, according to state records. He made three sizable contributions to his campaign committee between Jan. 1 and March 31 totaling $19,000 on top of a $10,000 donation he paid to his committee the previous quarter.
He reported no contributions from anyone else during this campaign, according to state records.
Taglia reported spending just under $29,000 during that time. Taglia spent more on his online advertising than some of his opponents did on their entire campaign during the three months ahead of the election, with his committee investing $9,124 into ad buys with Facebook alone, according to state records.
One of his other largest expenses was fees for consulting and videography work done by a San Jose based company called Amari LLC, who billed his campaign for a total of $6,370.
Lucia Robinson
Incumbent trustee Robinson fell short of her reelection ambitions, finishing about 1,100 votes short of third-place Taglia.
She reported raising $10,056 and spending $9,683 between Jan. 1 and March 31.
She’d reported a fundraising total of $11,375 and $8,053 during the last three months of her 2021 campaign, according to state records.
Josh Vanderburg
Like Taglia, prospective newcomer Vanderburg reported to the state that he self-financed his campaign.
Vanderburg, a successful tech entrepreneur, reported that he’d financed his campaign via $13,375 in personal contributions, according to state records.