Dolton Trustee Jason House was leading incumbent Mayor Tiffany Henyard Tuesday night in his bid to unseat her after one term, unofficial vote results showed.
With all 17 precincts reporting, House had 3,896 votes, or 88%,to 536 votes for Henyard, according to the Cook County clerk’s office. The winner of the mayoral primary will face Independent candidate Casundra Hopson-Jordan in the April 1 election
While a closely watched race and one that was expected to draw a large number of voters to the poll in the Democratic primary, turnout was a bit more than 24% of Dolton’s 16,506 registered voters, according to the clerk’s office.
Trustee candidates running with House were also faring well. Three trustee seats were in play in the primary.
Incumbent Trustee Brittney Norwood was leading a field of seven trustee candidates with 3,554 votes, while Trustee Kiana Belcher had 3,414 and former trustee Edward “Ed” Steave with 3,335 votes, according to unofficial results.
Steave lost his bid for reelection last year.
The trustee candidates running with Henyard were well behind, with Joslyn King at 653 votes, Linda Terrell at 618, and Vanessa R. Wesco with 536 votes, unofficial results show.
Charles Rayburn, running for trustee unaffilliated with either slate, had 375 votes.
Incumbent Village Clerk Alison Key, running on the House slate, had 3,490 votes in her race, compared to 871 for challenger Tannika Hughs.
House initially supported and ran with Henyard in 2021. Also running with Henyard were trustee candidates Kiana Belcher and Brittney Norwood, and clerk candidate Alison Key, all of whom were elected.
Henyard would describe the group as a “dream team.”
House’s seat as a trustee was up for election, so he would have been off the Village Board if defeated in his mayoral bid.
Trustee Andrew Holmes was reelected last year, as was Trustee Tammie Brown. Stanley Brown was elected to his first term and is not up for reelection.
Henyard has been under federal investigation since at least last spring, when subpoenas were delivered to Dolton Village Hall and Thornton Township offices. Henyard is township supervisor but faces a challenge in getting elected to a full term, having been blocked from being part of the Democratic primary for the job.
House and other trustees have alleged financial mismanagement on the part of Henyard’s administration, and hired former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to act as a special investigator, probing village finances, amng other tasks.
Presented to the public in two segments, Lightfoot’s report showed the village went from having healthy budget balances to a multimillion-dollar deficit since Henyard was elected mayor.
Her report also uncovered expensive trips taken by Henyard and her allies, including visits to a conference in Las Vegas that was intended to bring back business opportunities for Dolton. Henyard said there was no evidence the two Vegas trips produced any tangible economic benefits for the village.
Henyard’s relationship with trustees she ran with quickly soured after their election, with trustees accusing her of being secretive in how public funds were being spent. The mayor and trustees openly squabbled during Village Board meetings, and Henyard did not attend the last two board meetings prior to the primary election.
Along with her relationship with fellow board members, Henyard’s support among Dolton residents also took a nosedive.
In June 2022, Dolton voters approved two referendum questions; one that established a recall mechanism to remove the mayor from office and the second to recall Henyard. Both measures passed with 56% of the vote.
Henyard had challenged the constitutionality of the recall questions in a lawsuit, and a state appellate court would later declare votes cast in the recall were invalid.
