Nine candidates are running for Chicago's highest office, which includes Kam Buckner, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia, Ja'Mal Green, Brandon Johnson, Sophia King, Roderick Sawyer, Paul Vallas, Willie Wilson and Chicago's current mayor Lori Lightfoot. The crowded field of mayoral candidates range across the political spectrum. WBBM wanted to know: where does each candidate stand on the top issues our audience cares about most?
We asked candidates' responses to five of the top issues facing the city: education, crime, transportation, infrastructure and health.
The 2023 Chicago mayoral election will be held on February 28, 2023. If no candidate receives a majority of votes, a runoff election will be held on April 4, 2023.
Education: What will you do to ensure that students receive equal opportunities and resources, regardless of income, so they can succeed in school and beyond?
Lightfoot: "We have worked closely with CPS to make robust investments and policy changes over the last four years to make sure that high-quality public schools are available to families across all of our neighborhoods—and I am excited to continue this vital work over the next four years."... Read her full response here.
Wilson: "Equity is a centerpiece of my campaign. I will be intentional when it comes to ensuring students have equal opportunities and resources. I will assemble a leadership team to ensure equity in educational resources."... Read his full response here.
Johnson: "Student-based budgeting (SBB) and the former SQRP rating policy have had a devastating impact on our schools. SBB, in particular, has contributed to principals whose budgets are strapped to choose between keeping a veteran teacher or having a librarian and a functioning
library."... Read his full response here.
Green: "We will transition schools from an enrollment-based funding formula to a needs-based formula. Each and every school in our city should offer the same level of high quality education that we have shown possible in our wonderful selective enrollment schools, like Walter Payton and Lane Tech."
Buckner: "With key leadership changes and strategic investments, Chicago’s public education system can be a valuable tool to bridge equity gaps that have plagued our city for generations."... Read his full response here.
Garcia: "Our students are our future, and they deserve better. Whether you look at the longstanding trend of declining enrollment, or pandemic losses which exacerbated existing disparities in CPS, this is a crisis situation that requires the full attention and dedication of our next Mayor."... Read his full response here.
Vallas: "We need to ensure that the money allocated for schools follows children into the classroom. Right now, only about 60 percent of funds reach down to the individual children in their classrooms and that needs to change."... Read his full response here.
King: "We cannot achieve equity in our schools if the funding formula is based on property taxes and enrollment. Given that investing in public education and ensuring equity is the most important thing we can do to secure the future of Chicago, we must use our tax dollars to create a public education system that helps every child reach their full potential regardless of the zip code in which they live."... Read her full response here.
Sawyer did not provide a response to this question.
Crime: What will you do to combat crime within the city?
Lightfoot: "The most important responsibility of any mayor is public safety. My goal is to make Chicago the safest big city in the country by creating lasting peace, not just episodic periods of peace in certain neighborhoods.".. Read her full response here.
Wilson: "I will work with our communities to solve this crime. I will take the handcuffs off the police and put them on the criminals. This is personal for me. I lost a 20-year-old son to murder. I understand the pain that so many mothers and fathers experience in Chicago on a daily basis."... Read his full response here.
Johnson: "Our sense of safety has been shattered in Chicago. The failures of the past have been repeated over and over. Meanwhile, carjackings, property theft, and shootings are skyrocketing — harming every neighborhood. It’s time for a new approach."... Read his full response here.
Green: "I have put forth a fifteen page plan called E.P.I.C., focusing on economic opportunity, prevention, intervention, and CPD reform. More about the E.P.I.C. Plan can be found at gogreenchicago.com."
Buckner: "The current administration hasn’t proven a commitment to addressing violent crime across Chicago – at a time when the city demands a plan to solve these issues, the Mayor is bringing nonsense “solutions” like closing city pools in the summer and instituting a curfew. The biggest reason why I’m running for mayor is to bring a true commitment to prioritizing public safety to City Hall."... Read his full response here.
Garcia: "Public safety is the issue that I hear most about on the campaign trail, and it’s not particularly close. Chicagoans feel less safe because they are less safe. They have lost trust in the Mayor’s ability to make our city safer and there is no trust between our communities and law enforcement."... Read his full response here.
Sawyer: "I have a robust public safety program posted on my website that makes the city safer on Day One of a Sawyer Administration, and I'd love for readers to check it out. We need to address the systemic issues that cause crime in Chicago, but we also need to make people feel safer immediately, because the "crime anxiety'' is a drag on every other issue in the city - our schools, our economy, our population, etc."... Read his full response here.
Vallas: "Confronting the city’s crime problem and ensuring our residents’ safety is my top priority. Our current situation is the direct consequence of a wholesale failure of leadership that has failed to provide police with the strategy, staffing, resources, and support needed for effective and collaborative community-informed policing."... Read his full response here.
King: "In order to have a strong Chicago, we need a safe Chicago. I have laid out an extensive plan to create both Safety and Justice, we do not have to make false choices. We can uplift our police and hold them accountable. While arrests for violent criminals are of course necessary, we simply cannot only arrest our way out of crime."... Read her full response here.
Transportation: CTA riders continue to complain about the agency’s lack of resources. What would you do to improve transportation in Chicago?
Lightfoot: "As we move from the pandemic, the CTA, like other urban transit systems, is grappling with a range of circumstances, some outside of its control, but which are all impacting the delivery of services. We have taken significant steps to make CTA bus and rail service safer and more reliable across all of our neighborhoods."... Read her full response here.
Wilson: "This is a matter of leadership. I will ensure that we have a world class public transit system. It begins with ensuring the CTA is safe. I discussed my CTA safety plan in the previous question. I will make sure that we have staffing levels to meet the needs of our citizens."... Read his full response here.
Johnson: "A safe, reliable transit system is fundamentally important if Chicago is to grow jobs and employment. Chicago’s transit infrastructure is a tremendous asset, but we need to do better at connecting residents with jobs and educational opportunities. We will need to address funding shortfalls for transit, but at the same time, we can be doing a lot better with the resources we already have."... Read his full response here.
Green: "We need to make CTA functional once again. This will take a monumental investment into our system, including providing better pay and benefits for employees, having a more dedicated cleaning operation to keep our buses and trains clean, and a Peacekeepers Force on the trains to ensure safety."
Buckner: "At the heart of public safety is access to safe, reliable public transportation. The current administration has not prioritized investing in infrastructure, making our streets safer, or maintaining CTA service levels, and the community has suffered. Ghost buses run rampant, security is lacking, schedules are inconsistent; these issues lead to a myriad of other problems."... Read his full response here.
Garcia: "Good, reliable public transit is an equity priority. It’s a matter of climate and economic justice. And in Congress, improving transit across Chicagoland has been a priority of mine. I am Illinois’ senior-most member of the Transportation & Infrastructure Committees. I wrote key portions of the watershed Infrastructure, Investment & Jobs Act to bring home billions in federal dollars to expand access to transit and make things run smoother in our city."... Read his full response here.
Sawyer: "The CTA is in extremely bad shape. Some of it is due to COVID, but much of it is due to mismanagement. Our transit system needs dramatic help in terms of management, technology, and security."... Read his full response here.
Vallas: "The first thing we need to do is make sure that riding the CTA is safe. I will ensure that we have a well-resourced CTA Mass Transit Unit by using the funds spent for private security on the CTA to hire more Chicago Police Officers. The $100 million spent this year could have paid for almost 300 additional police officers, bringing the CTA police levels to 500."... Read his full response here.
King did not provide a response to this question.
Infrastructure: If elected, what three steps would you take to improve city infrastructure?
Lightfoot: "Our city has to heavily invest in modern, sustainable infrastructure to make it safer and easier for Chicagoans to walk, pedal, and drive across our neighborhoods. That’s why we invested in the $3.7 billion Chicago Works plan to improve our city’s infrastructure and create jobs for Chicagoans."... Read her full response here.
Wilson: "First, I would conduct an audit to determine our immediate needs regarding infrastructure. I would establish a Task Force of experts in infrastructure to make recommendations on infrastructure improvements. I would ensure that each ward has a pothole repair truck. Too many of our citizens are getting flat tires and causing damage to their vehicles."
Johnson: "Replace lead pipes. Make 10 percent of Chicago streets safe for cycling by reducing speed limits, adding speed bumps and traffic calming bump-outs. Use community outreach to launch a citywide assessment of public buildings and empty schools to discuss repurpose possibilities. There are many facilities across the city that can serve as SROs and affordable housing units at cost to address the crisis of the 65,000+ unhoused in
Chicago."
Green: "1. We must incentivize the building of a floor above single story commercial structures to create more affordable housing.
2. Revitalize the CTA, and make it Safe, Clean, and Fast.
3. Work with state and federal partners to rapidly improve our road network."
Buckner: "1. Lead Service Lines: I’m committed to removing all lead service lines from our city – and have committed to do so in my environmental platform. My administration will create and implement a comprehensive plan that splits the city up into priority zones and utilizes federal dollars that are already in place to do this without placing a further debt burden on Chicagoans."... Read his full response here.
Garcia: "One can learn lots about our city’s long history of racism, disinvestment, and segregation by looking at our infrastructure.
1. It has now been a decade since the Department of Environment that I voted to create was disbanded. I will bring back the Department."... Read his full response here.
Sawyer: "1) I would like to significantly alter and reduce the TIF program. I would work with all necessary partners to end TIFS in affluent areas. (How long will we extend the TIF in Fulton Market?) I would use that money to invest significantly in equitable infrastructure across all 77 Chicago communities, especially in historically disinvested areas."... Read his full response here.
Vallas: "I have set forth an extensive Community Economic Development platform which can be found at www.paulvallas2023.com/economic. This document contains details that connect to the city’s larger infrastructure needs."... Read his full response here.
King did not provide a response to this question.
Health: What are your thoughts on the current COVID-19 policy? How would you handle another COVID-19 wave?
Lightfoot: "When COVID-19 hit Chicago, it was incredibly important for us to act quickly to protect the health and wellbeing of every single Chicagoan, but also to reduce the disproportionate burden we knew Black and Brown communities would bear."... Read her full response here.
Wilson: "When COVID-19 started the city was unprepared. The city did not have face masks for citizens nor the first responders. I gave away free of charge more than 30 million face masks to seniors, first responders and every ward in the city. Under my Administration we will be prepared for the next pandemic."... Read his full response here.
Johnson: "The COVID-19 pandemic is still with us. Should there be another COVID-19 wave, my administration will be ready to work collaboratively and cohesively with the CDPH, city agencies, community organizations and all levels of city, state and federal government to
implement the necessary mitigation."
Green: "I believe that public health issues, including pandemics such as COVID-19, need to be addressed through a data-driven, science-based approach with consideration to ensuring equity and prioritizing health."
Buckner: "We led the charge on a comprehensive Covid response plan in 2020 in Springfield, with a strong point of view from the Legislature and Governor. Though the Mayor dragged her feet on getting started, she eventually got on board which helped our city tremendously. Ultimately, the city was slow to get testing sites and vaccines up and running, especially for communities of color (ZIP codes like 60616 were the hardest hit and had no resources)."... Read his full response here.
Garcia: "From a mental health crisis, to losing so many kids from CPS, the pandemic has had deep impacts on our city in almost all regards. While I do acknowledge that the Mayor, like all Mayors, was dealt a difficult hand here, she has not been up to the challenge. She has not built coalitions with Springfield, private industry, and our many community organizations to deliver adequate relief to Chicagoans."... Read his full response here.
Sawyer: "The thing we needed before this happened was a plan - and we didn't have one. I don't criticize our current mayor for not having a COVID plan - no mayor before her did. But now that we have seen this possibility, we must have a plan we update every year or two so we can meet another pandemic much better equipped."... Read his full response here.
Vallas: "I believe that the city’s existing COVID-19 policy is adequate to meet current public health needs. It is critical going forward to follow the science and not bend to political imperatives. While public health imperatives were clearly the top consideration, the city’s response to COVID-19 and the policies that were implemented were lurching and routinely reflected the influence of special interests. That often resulted in confusion, conflicts, and mixed messages."... Read his full response here.
King did not provide a response to this question.
We’ve included an unedited response of the candidates' answers to all of our questions. The responses are lengthy, ranging from precise budget breakdowns to numerical step-by-step promises. The responses are directly from each candidate.
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