Champaign City Council Member Marci Dodds announced that she plans to resign on March 23 after serving on the city council since 2005.

“District 4 is the geographical and metaphorical heart of Champaign and it has been my honor and deepest privilege to represent the people who make up that heart,” Dodds said in a release. “It has been a pleasure to work with my fellow Council Members and Mayor Feinen, as well as former Council Members/Mayors.”

According to the release, the city council has 60 days to find a replacement for Dodd, whose term ran through May 2017. The council will begin the discussion of filling her seat in a post council study session on Tuesday.jo

Dodd represented city council District 4, covering much of the area between South Mattis Avenue and South Neil Street. Any potential replacement must reside in District 4 and have been a Champaign resident for at least one year.

Dodds cited her resignation as a result of her and her husband’s plans to move to Chicago.

“Cody and I are not moving away from Champaign; we are moving towards an exciting new chapter in our lives. We have, and will always maintain, deep ties to this vibrant and wonderfully diverse city.”

According to the City of Champaign’s website, Dodds graduated from Brandeis University with a degree in Philosophy and Psychology, and later attended the University of California Los Angeles for their graduate writing program after earning a master’s degree in Writing.jo

Dodds and her husband moved back to Champaign – where she was born – in 1990 to start Periscope Records. Dodds worked as a freelance music journalist until she earned a degree in nursing in 2010 and started working at Carle Foundation Hospital.jo

She and her husband have three children.

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