Waukegan Mayor Ann Taylor

The April 1 race for Waukegan mayor will likely have four candidates on the ballot following a Waukegan Board of Elections ruling.

On Dec 17, the Election Board overruled two sets of objections to nominating petitions filed by incumbent Mayor Ann Taylor that had conflicting home addresses.

Among the arguments made by objectors Keith Turner, a candidate for Waukegan mayor, and Waukegan resident Margaret Carrasco were that Taylor had improperly listed her residence as being in Waukegan, while extensive documentation they presented shows that Taylor and her husband live in Libertyville, which is more than 10 miles from Waukegan.

However, the three-person Election Board found that Taylor “provided evidence that her residence is located within the municipal boundaries of the City of Waukegan.”

In making its ruling, the Election Board – which consists of 5th Ward Alderperson Edith Newsome, City Clerk Janet Kilkelly and 1st Ward Alderperson Sylvia Sims Bolton – found that “In general, courts will find that minor errors in a candidate’s address are not sufficient to remove the candidate from the ballot.”

Neither Turner nor Carrasco, the three Election Board members ruled, ”challenge(d) the Candidate’s actual residence in the City of Waukegan or assert(ed) that Candidate lives within the Village of Libertyville.”

The board ruled “(Turner) merely asserted that (Taylor’s) postal address includes the designation “Libertyville.”

Taylor, who filed as an independent in the election, is seeking a second term. A former city alderperson first elected in 2015, she won the mayor’s office in 2021 with 55.6 percent of the vote, a 735 vote margin, over ex-Mayor Sam Cunningham.

Keith Turner

Both Turner and Carrasco also sought to have Taylor’s name removed from the ballot due to her petitions exceeding the maximum number of signatures allowed under law (362), which the Election Board also rejected.

Taylor did not respond to a Chronicle Media request for comment on the Election Board’s rulings as of press time.

Turner and Carrasco both ripped the board’s rulings in detail in separate phone interviews.

Carrasco called the board’s findings “a fraud.”

“The whole thing was a sham,” she said.

Turner stressed that his reason for filing the objections was technically not that Taylor wasn’t a Waukegan resident.

“It’s really rather common knowledge,” he said of Taylor’s home address being in Libertyville. “The objection (was) that she didn’t use her legal address” on her nominating petitions.

Turner alleged that Taylor’s nominating petitions contained “sixty-seven false, perjurious, and fatally flawed statements” that are cause for those petitions to be disqualified.

Taylor, he stated, “incorrectly stated that her address is 5510 Fairmount (sic) Rd., WAUKEGAN, Lake County, Illinois, 60048, when in fact her legal address is in Libertyville rather than Fairmount (sic) Road in Waukegan.”

Turner included a copy of a page on the Lake County assessor’s website showing the property tax information for Ann Taylor and her husband as being on Fairmont Road in Libertyville, not in Waukegan. He also included a page from the the Lake County clerk showing voter registration information indicating that Ann Taylor’s registered voter address is 5510 Fairmount Road, Libertyville.

A copy of Taylor’s filing with the Illinois State Board of Elections also shows conflicting addresses, with her committee address listed at a Waukegan address and her candidate information listing her Libertyville address.

A fourth Election Board exhibit shows a warranty deed on a property belonging to Taylor and her husband as being at the Fairmont address in Libertyville.

Carrasco also alleged that the sheets that Taylor’s husband, Wayne Taylor, circulated and signed “fail(ed) to certify that the correct address of LIBERTYVILLE when applicable and not WAUKEGAN.”

“She could not provide one iota of evidence to the contrary,” Turner said of Ann Taylor.

However, after three hearings, the Waukegan Board of Elections ruled that Taylor provided “sufficient evidence that (her) ‘place of residence’ in both reality and for the purposes of the Election Code, is in the City of Waukegan.”

Section 10-4 of the Election Code, the Election Board found, “merely requires that a candidate provide their ‘place of residence’ on their nomination papers.”

A look at Google maps shows that while Waukegan is within the boundaries of Libertyville Township, it is more than 10 miles and a 20-minute drive from Waukegan. A review of municipalities within that 10-miles radius of Waukegan shows that all those villages elect their own mayors, village clerks and trustees, and have their own election authorities.

“Ten different legal documents show that she lives in Libertyville,” Carrasco said, adding that during testimony before the Election Board, “Her husband admitted they live in Libertyville.”

Asked why the Dec. 17 ruling had not shown up in media coverage, Keith Turner opined that local media does not report in depth on local issues, saying the local Waukegan paper “never reports anything that shows the mayor in a negative light.”

“This is not over. This is just the beginning,” Carrasco said. “This is going to be the hottest race in Illinois.”