Oak Lawn Mayor Candidate's Petitions Rejected

OAK LAWN, IL — The nominating petitions filed by a candidate on the last day of filing for Oak Lawn’s mayoral race have been rejected because the candidate did not have enough valid signatures.

Long-time Oak Lawn resident Tom Karones, 91, squeaked in under the wire on Dec. 21 when he filed his candidate papers with the Oak Lawn village clerk to get his name on the ballot for the April 2021 election. Terry Vorderer, currently the fourth district village trustee, has declared his candidacy for mayor.

Karones said he decided to run a few days before the filing deadline because he didn't like the fact that the mayoral and village trustee races were uncontested. Karones only turned in around 100 signatures, based on the 1-percent spelled out in the Illinois Election Code to run on a non-partisan primary, such as that held in the city of Chicago every four years. Candidates running for Chicago elected offices must win 50 percent plus 1 of the primary vote, or be forced into a runoff.

Independent municipal elections require that the required number of signatures on a nominating petition must be equal to the required number of signatures on a nominating petition must be equal to 5 percent and no more than 8 percent (or 50 more of the minimum, whichever is greater) of the total number of persons who cast ballots in the last regular election., according to the Illinois Election Code of the total number of persons who cast ballots in the last regular election.

In 2017 — the last regular municipal election — 9,289 votes were cast in the Oak Lawn mayoral election, requiring 465 valid signatures of registered voters needed to get on the 2021 election.

“A review of your nomination papers indicates that they contain only 114,” Village Clerk Jane Quinlan said in a letter to Karones. “Therefore, I am unable to certify your name for inclusion on the ballot for the April 6, 2021 election.”

Karones plans to run as a write-in candidate for mayor and is looking to put together a whole slate of write-in candidates to run with him.

The last day to file a notarized declaration of intent to run as a write–in candidate with the Cook County Clerk's office is no later than 5 p.m. Feb. 4. Only eligible candidates who filed declarations of intent with each local election authority will be counted. In other words, your write-in vote for Bart Simpson or Jill Munroe from "Charlie's Angels" won't be counted. The county clerk's office will provide a list of eligible write-in candidates to each precinct on the day of the consolidated election so votes cast for them can be counted.

Vorderer is leading the Oak Lawn First slate, which includes clerk candidate Claire Henning, incumbent trustees Alex Olejniczak (Dist. 2). Tom Phelan (Dist. 6) and Jamie Pembroke, who is running for Vorderer's seat in Dist. 4.