To inform voters and to help the baiduhai Editorial Board make endorsements, the board posed a series of questions to the candidates running for alderman. See their answers below. See how other candidates answered here.
Name: Jessie Fuentes
Ward: 26th
Current job: I am now a full time candidate. I recently served as Co-chair to the Violence Prevention of the Illinois Latino Agenda and Director of Policy and Youth Advocacy at the Puerto Rican Cultural Center. I also served as the Dean of Students at Roberto Clemente Community Academy and the Dean of Student Affairs at Dr. Pedro Albizu Campos Puerto Rican High School.
Previous political experience: I was on the 2013 -14 Local School Council (LSC) at Roberto Clemente Community Academy. Although I have not held political office or an official party position, I have actively been involved in the campaigns of U.S. Representative Delia Ramirez, State Representative Lilian Jimenez, and State Senator Cristina Pacione-Zayas.
Education: I earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Justice Studies and a Master’s Degree in Community and Teacher Leadership from Northeastern Illinois University.
Spouse’s occupation: Licensed social worker – social work administrator
Sources of outside income: I own a property, where my sister and her family reside.
The rise in violent crime remains a top priority for City Hall. Homicides, shootings and carjackings are all unacceptably high. Tell us how city government can be innovative in combating crime, and explain what measures you would propose if elected.
I’ve dedicated my career to education, community development, criminal justice reform, and affordable housing. As the former Director of Policy and Youth Advocacy at the Puerto Rican Cultural Center, I advocated for and created a $4 Million violence prevention program that currently serves the Humboldt Park and Hermosa communities. Having been a lifelong resident of the 26th ward, I have witnessed firsthand the changes that our community has gone through. From the 90’s when there was a very heavy gang presence to today, a community that is recovering from the pandemic.
Given my experience, having dedicated my career to enhancing the quality of life of our youth, I will fight for public safety strategies that keep our communities safe and deal with the root causes of crime. I will invest in our young people through culturally competent afterschool programs and providing living wage jobs to help bring peace to our streets. I will secure funding for violence prevention programs which work to stop crime before it happens, not after the fact. I will work to reopen shuttered mental health clinics. I will make sure our neighborhood public schools have the same resources that selective-enrollment schools have, with quality principals, social workers, and case managers.
In the immediate future, I will work with the Chicago Police Department Police Superintendent to bring a community based approach to policing to the ward. A major issue in the 26th Ward is a divide and distrust between our youth and police officers. I have also explored ideas in working with parolees that can work with my office and the police department, to provide enhancements to existing interventions programs.
The CTA, one of the nation’s largest transit systems, remains a troubled agency grappling with issues ranging from violent crime and ghost buses and trains, to flagging ridership. Give us your thoughts on what specific measures CTA should take to make train and bus service safer, more reliable and more equitable for Chicagoans.
The CTA should be a safe, clean and environmentally friendly way to commute. If Chicagoans felt it worked as it should it would reduce traffic in our city, thus reducing emissions. I will work to address the issue of vacancy of CTA employees, if they are understaffed that will be evident in service and cleanliness. I will also address the concerns of bus and train operators who have safety concerns.
I will support and serve as a champion for the ordinance for Bring Home Chicago, to provide permanent affordable housing for people experiencing homelessness and reduce the number of unhoused people living in our CTA system, in our parks and on our streets.
In 2012, the Emmanuel administration shuttered many of the city’s public mental health facilities. Since then the number of unhoused people living in our train system and in our parks has increased. I would fund opening public mental health facilities by working with the city council and the state of Illinois to institute a real estate transfer tax of over $2 million. I would then allocate 75% of those funds to reopening closed public mental health clinics and open a 24 hr crisis center.
Ten years ago, enrollment at Chicago Public Schools was 403,000 students. In September, enrollment stood at 322,000 students. Enrollment at CPS has dropped for 11 consecutive years. What specific measures should CPS undertake to reverse the trend of ever-dwindling enrollment?
I am an educator and worked at two high schools in the 26th ward. I understand the issues that students and parents face today in our community. The pandemic and remote learning, antiquated schools, parents that don’t trust public schools and enroll their kids in charter or private schools. We need to do better for our children. Our children deserve better principals, school counselors, teachers and social workers, and I will fight for a better funding formula model because what we currently use is outdated. I will fight for full funded neighborhood public schools and ensure every child has access to the staff and the resources necessary to thrive in the classroom and in life.
We must undo zero-tolerance policies that create the school-to-prison pipeline. I will fight for funding for additional staff to develop and sustain restorative justice and healing-centered systems for students. I will also work to reinstate art and music programs and make sure we have a well rounded academic curriculum that is culturally competent. I will also make sure we have more community involvement when it comes to our local school council elections, because they affect who our leaders are within our schools.
Disinvestment on the South and West sides is a decades-long problem with myriad causes. Give us at least one innovative idea that you believe could play a role in reversing South and West side disinvestment, and explain why the idea is realistic and feasible.
I believe in the power of entrepreneurship to uplift our communities and create generational wealth. Small businesses provide our residents with jobs and opportunity; they are the lifeblood of our local economy. Our small businesses must be supported through and beyond Covid-19 recovery, with additional resources to ensure they are here to stay and avoid displacement.
I will be an advocate for culturally competent lending practices to combat racial and ethnic disparities in lending and working with financial institutions committed to lending to disadvantaged groups to increase financial literacy and access to capital.
Additionally, we will reduce the number of commercial vacancies in Humboldt Park. Increase outdoor placemaking, outdoor dining, and outdoor public art. Creating a 26th Ward small business resource hub for local businesses to stay up to date on grants and other support. I will also advocate for an increase in funding for small business support programs and grants aimed at helping women and Latino-owned businesses start or grow their businesses.
Do you support giving Chicagoans property tax relief? If yes, please explain how you would accomplish it. If no, please explain why not.
Absolutely. Our community has faced heavy gentrification, causing property values to rise exponentially and long term residents to be displaced. I will work with our county and state colleagues so we can provide a long term resident tax incentive. Homeowners of 15 or more years would qualify for a tax freeze. I will demand an assessment of our system and assist with homeowner’s appeals and provide information for those who have not appealed. There should be no reason our residents have to appeal year after year, their bill should be correct the first time around. I will advocate for programs for those who are in need and fall delinquent on their property taxes by creating a property tax relief fund. Lastly, I will never vote for a property tax increase.
Give us your take on the city’s use of tax increment financing districts. Do you feel they have been useful, or do you feel that the problems associated with them outweigh their usefulness? What if any reforms would you want to apply to the city’s usage of TIFs?
TIF funds have been disproportionately allocated to more affluent parts of the city. In order to reform and ensure that we are utilizing TIF funds for public and affordable housing, we must advocate for a new legislature that puts a stop to TIF transfers to neighboring TIF districts. We have seen that these transfers only work to develop downtown and certain neighborhoods. This has been a historic challenge. TIF funds have been relieving the burden on developers on the backs of taxpayers, but the system must change. The TIF system is broken and needs to be reassessed and reevaluated.
Lead in drinking water is a major health concern for the city. It is estimated that in Chicago there are roughly 400,000 homes and small apartment buildings with lead service lines. So far, the city has replaced less than 300 lead service lines. Do you feel the pace of lead service line replacement should be expedited, and if yes, what is the best, most feasible way to accomplish that?
Yes, it should absolutely be expedited. The only way that can be done is by increasing capacity to do so. Testing and possibly water filters should be provided to Chicagoans. The federal government, even an agency like FEMA should provide the resources, like filters, needed. Clean water should be a right. There also has to be education behind this for Chicagoans, and information provided on how their water lines can be replaced. I am committed to building consciousness on the dangers in our water and options available from the city. I will fight for every resident of the 26th ward to get a lead test.
If you are an incumbent, please explain what is it about your service on the City Council that makes you most qualified for the job. If you have never served on the council, please explain what is it about your background that makes you most qualified.
I have over a decade of experience working in education, criminal justice reform, affordable housing, community development and sustainability within this community. I am a community organizer, educator and community member. Our families deserve quality constituent services, transparency and accountability, and a seat at the table.
I was a child of Humboldt Park, overcoming poverty, violence and generational trauma, earning my education and becoming an educator in our community. I have prepared myself to serve the residents of the 26th Ward.
Through personal resilience, community support, and restorative justice I was able to turn my most challenging life experiences into tools to uplift others facing similar life circumstances. My candidacy is proof that one’s life circumstances do not have to dictate their destiny and that is how we create safe communities, investing in ourselves.
We deserve an alderperson who will invest in public safety strategies that work, expand affordable housing and protect long time homeowners and tenants from displacement, and bring support and resources for our local small businesses. I have made it my life’s work to advocate for our community and will continue that work once elected to serve the 26th ward.
What is the most pressing issue facing the people of your ward, and how would you address it?
Housing and public safety. Our families deserve a safe and healthy community and a quality education. Ensuring that we are all safe in the 26th Ward means that we must address the root causes of crime and house our people.
I would address these issues by working to lift the ban on rent control and rent stabilization, bring more affordable housing to our community and making sure that the affordable housing that is already planned for comes to fruition. I will also bring affordable home ownership opportunities to the 26th ward.
I will address the public safety issue by investing in our young people through culturally competent afterschool programs and provide paid summer jobs. I will support funding for mental health resources and reopening closed public mental health clinics. I will be a champion for Treatment not Trauma and support increased funding for community direct service organizations to receive more support as they do public safety work in our district, through a restorative and healing-centered lens.
Sum up why should voters elect you and not your opponent(s)? (Please limit this to policy and approach, not a biography recitation.)
Voters should join the movement our campaign has built because I have dedicated my entire career to bettering our community, by working with youth and advocating for policies that improve our quality of life. I work to build community and break barriers.
I’m a lifelong Chicagoan and resident of the Northwest side. From a young age, I faced the effects of parental substance abuse, mental illness and job instability, and by the age of fifteen, I was working to ensure that my sister and I had food on our table, a roof over our heads and access to other basic needs. The generational trauma led me to deal with my own struggles of resentment, anger and I was thrown into the juvenile justice system, as experienced by far too many young Chicagoans.
Through personal resilience, community support and restorative justice,and the services and programs Dr. Pedro Albizu Campos Puerto Rican High School offered I was better equipped to change my path. I know this community and understand the issues families face. I know what is to be displaced and be impacted by the criminal justice system. I am the living example that when we invest in our young people, hope and transformation is possible.
I will fight for affordable housing, fully funded schools, programming that builds safe communities, resources for homeowners and small businesses and quality constituent services. As I’ve been saying throughout this campaign, “I don’t want to govern on behalf of people, I want to govern with people.” I look forward to the possibility of serving as your alderperson and continuing this work with the residents of the 26th ward.