‘Poorest Suburb’ Has Highest Voter Turnout

FORD HEIGHTS, IL - Of the five Cook County municipalities with contested mayoral or president races in the April 4 election that had the highest voter turnout, one clearly does not fit in with the others.

The voter turnout in southeast suburban Ford Heights was 42.9 percent, well above the suburban Cook County average of 17.4 percent.

The median household income in Ford Heights? An estimated $21,6000, according to CityData.com. It’s median house or condo value is $53,634. Both well below the suburban Cook County average.

Ford Heights - dubbed as recently as 1987 as the “poorest suburb in America” - bucked the trend of low income suburban municipalities in voter turnout. The next four on the list of highest voter turnout for municipalities with contested top official races, according to Cook County Clerk David Orr, were Evanston (35.7 percent), Flossmoor (34.3), Barrington Hills (31.2) and Brookfield (30.2).

All on the complete opposite side of the income spectrum of Ford Heights.

The five led the list of 47 municipalities that had contested mayoral or village president races. The average turnout among those 47 was 27 percent, according to Orr. 15 of those municipalities had a turnout of more than 30 percent and 10 had turnout higher than 34 percent.

The voter turnout comes in percentages, and Ford Heights had less than 3,000 residents as of the most recent U.S. Census.

But still, it was the only Cook County municipality to beat 40 percent in voter turnout. In their village president race, they supported Annie R. Coulter, an independent, among a pool of three candidates.

Coulter - who in 2015 was a library trustee candidate in a village with no library - had a winning vote tally this year of 286.

Image via Google Maps screenshot