A trio of Lake County women from the business, not-for-profit and educational worlds were rewarded for their professional journeys through life as part of the celebration of Women’s History Month by the Lake County and Hispanic chambers of commerce.
After the three women — educator Sylvia Johnson Jones, Heart of the City Executive Director Rena Lee and insurance agent Silvia Chacon — were feted as they heard a fourth woman, Waukegan Mayor Ann Taylor, talk about her journeys.
Waukegan’s first woman mayor, elected in 2021, Taylor said she is an immigrant brought to Waukegan with her parents at a very young age. The first member of her family to go to college, she said she never lacked for support from her parents.
“My father said you can be anything you want to be,” Taylor said. “He said, ‘If you want to be president, you can be president.’”
Chacon, Jones and Lee were honored for their achievements at the inaugural Women’s History Month Luncheon of the Lake County Chamber of Commerce and the Hispanic Chamber of Lake County Thursday at the College of Lake County’s Waukegan campus.
Shaunese Teamer, the executive director of the Lake County chamber, said the organization plans to make the luncheon an annual event honoring women members for their accomplishments.
Chacon, an American Family Insurance agent with her own agency in Waukegan and the company’s top agent for the past 19 years, arrived in Waukegan from Mexico in 1988. She was a banker before going into insurance. Like Taylor, she said she had family support.
“I was always encouraged to do all I could do,” Chacon said after the event.
Lee, the executive director of Heart of the City in Waukegan, uses soccer as a way to help area youths succeed in life, as well as sports with an emphasis on education.
“It’s important to empower young people throughout the county,” Lee said after the event. “When you help them build self-esteem, it’s amazing what they can do.”
Jones, the executive director for community and workforce partnerships, career and job placement center for the College of Lake County, is also an appointed member of the North Chicago School District 187 Board of Education and active in the NAACP. A two-time cancer survivor, Jones said after the event she is proud of her co-honorees.
“There is so much to admire about their lives and empowerment,” Jones said. “It’s amazing what they have done.”
Both Taylor and Patricia Braithwaite, a program manager with City of Hope hospital, made it clear in their remarks the first step a person takes on a career path is not necessarily how they will eventually make significant contributions.
While in college, Taylor said she met her future husband and, “hit the jackpot.” Eventually they started a family business serving some of the world’s largest medical device and pharmaceutical companies. Issues in her neighborhood led to an interest in the workings of government.
Determined to bring her business judgment to City Hall, Taylor was twice elected to represent the 9th Ward on the City Council and in 2021, challenged and defeated then-Mayor Sam Cunningham.
After her victory in April and inauguration the following month before a large crowd at the Genesee Theatre, her thoughts were with her parents and how they impacted her throughout her life.
“My mother didn’t live to see me elected mayor,” Taylor said. “My father was too ill to be at my inauguration. When I went to see him that night and tuck him in, I told him about it and there were tears in his eyes.”
Like Taylor, Braithwaite came to her current job later in life. Laid off at 60 when her employer downsized, she said she did not immediately begin a job search. She became contemplative.
“In terms of what I did, I changed,” Braithwaite said, “I no longer wanted to be a nurse.”
Getting an interview at City of Hope, a cancer treatment center in Zion, Braithwaite said she was unsure how the interview went. It was not for a nursing position. It was on the business side of the organization.
“I got a call,” Braithwaite said. “She said, ‘I want you to be part of my new team.’ When you are empowered in life, it allows you to build more of what you need. It is your internal search engine.”
