April 20, 2026
When a Broken Copier is a Good Sign
“I think I broke the copy machine again,” my legislative aide Jekot said to me, as I passed by the copy room on my way to a community event. She was knee-deep in printer paper, preparing agendas and notes for our next Downtown Action Series meeting. “This is why I always make these copies two weeks in advance.”
A lot of our work in the Ward 2 office looks like this. Councilmembers may be most visible when we’re taking formal votes or attending official events, but the real work of serving our constituents takes place behind the scenes, and it’s much more mundane. It’s about responding to emails and phone calls on time, sending out Doodle polls to schedule meetings, typing up agendas and notes, following up promptly on the next steps we committed to, and yes–lots and lots of copies.
This type of elbow-deep administrative work is critical because our best work is done in collaboration - with other government agencies, with city staff and, most importantly, with neighbors.
For me, the work is most enjoyable and productive when it’s led by neighbors and our office plays a supporting role. Sometimes, groups of residents have already come together to improve things in their neighborhood and they call us in for help. For example, residents living near the Southport industrial area of the West Side have united to demand a better quality of life - less noise, dust and pollution from the industries next door, less truck and railway congestion along Highway 52 and Barge Channel Road, better pedestrian access and safer evacuation routes in case of an emergency. My office is there to help make connections with other government officials or agencies, to draft legislation, and to make sure residents are at the table when decisions are being made or ideas are being discussed.
At other times, there’s a clear community need but no organized group is working on it. In those cases, I try to bring neighbors together to work on the problem. When a number of constituents living near Exchange Street contacted me separately with concerns about broken streetlights, crumbling pavement and an overall lack of care for their corner of downtown, we launched the Exchange Street Public Input Group (or PIG, as we lovingly call it). The Exchange Street PIG has now been meeting for three months; they’re planning street beautification projects and applying for city funding for improved lighting. At the same time, another PIG has been meeting for almost a year to give input on our Tree Preservation Ordinance which will help preserve and expand our tree canopy when we undertake road or sidewalk work.
This kind of collaborative work is hard. The problems we’re tackling are complicated–if they were easy, someone would have solved them already– and they matter deeply because they affect people’s daily lives. Making progress requires coming face to face with one another and with the problems we’re trying to solve over and over again, often for months or even years, building trust by doing what we say we’ll do, celebrating small wins and regrouping from setbacks, maintaining our sense of urgency because it will only happen if we push for it, taking full responsibility because no one else will do it for us.
It may not be glamorous work, especially when the copy machine breaks down, but the results are real–and all the more rewarding because we’ve gotten them together.