Patricia Jones still can remember the cigar smoke that hung heavily in the air as she sneaked with her father into the basement of their Mississippi church to discuss the end of segregation.
It was more than 30 years ago, but when Jones talks of the drama of being a small girl surrounded by adults arguing over social justice, it ignites a spark in her voice that all but erases the distance of the memory. At the time, Jones was a wide-eyed optimist who believed her father would help change the world.
That wide-eyed optimism is still alive, but today, Jones looks to herself to make the changes. And she is as confident as ever that they are possible.
Jones is the supervisor of Waukegan Township, a job defined by uphill battles. In the three years since she took over the position, Jones has tackled those battles with the fortitude her father found in his fight for civil rights a generation ago in the Deep South.
“My theme is self-sufficiency,” said Jones, who was appointed as supervisor in 1993 following the death of Supervisor Milton Staben. “I want to make a difference.”
Jones, 45, oversees the largest of Lake County’s 18 townships–some 78,000 people living in Waukegan, North Chicago and sections of Beach Park, Park City and Gurnee. But her goal has been to change the lives of a select few, and from there have an effect on the community at large.
So it goes that Jones is behind yet another project to help residents of Waukegan get back on their feet. Come September, 18 homeless women and children will have somewhere to sleep. They will have somewhere to attend job training, somewhere to rest if they need to undergo dependency counseling, and somewhere to escape while they try to reconstruct their lives.
The notion for the new home, which will be called the Staben House, piggybacks on the idea that led to the creation of the Staben Center in 1993. That center serves 31 homeless men, and has been heralded throughout the county for its success in keeping its residents from returning to the streets.
Last month saw the largest graduating class at the center–16 men–who all found permanent employment, arrested their drug or alcohol addictions, and saved enough money to live on their own.
“I really want to change the mindset,” Jones said. “It’s important to continue the process of limiting the dependence on the check each month.”
In becoming involved in county government, Jones put herself in a position much like that which greeted her upon her arrival in Waukegan from Leland, Miss., in 1954: She is one of few black people.
When Jones moved to Illinois, she went from a school made up almost exclusively of African-American students to one with a great deal of diversity. It was in Waukegan where Jones first met someone of Hispanic background, and it was in Waukegan where she first realized what it felt like not to be in the majority.
But Jones didn’t let differences get in her way. She soon became an active member of her high school drama department, and it wasn’t too long afterward that she took on her first political post in student government.
When years later she accepted the position of Waukegan Township supervisor, Jones became the first black woman ever to serve as a Lake County supervisor. While that evokes feelings similar to those she had when she came to Waukegan, Jones said she sees it as a chance to open people’s eyes and to stress the merits of diversity.
“I have an opportunity to show equality is necessary for anything,” she said.
Jones also hopes to use herself as an example of someone who grew up in Waukegan and then decided after several years of living elsewhere to return home. One of the keys to retaining vibrancy in the city, she said, is drawing people back to Waukegan after they have spent time away studying or at other jobs.
“I returned here to reconnect,” said Jones, who earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Western Illinois University in Macomb before going on to study and then work as a counselor at Northern Illinois University, based in DeKalb.
“It is important that we show others that it is important to return to their community.”
