GEOFF BENNETT: It was another deadly weekend in Chicago.

At least 14 people were shot and three people were killed by gun violence in that city.

More than 70 people have been murdered in Chicago already this year.

As John Yang reports, crime has become the top issue in tomorrow's mayoral election.

JOHN YANG: Miracle Boyd...

MIRACLE BOYD, Chicago Resident: Think of, like, the violence that's been happening.

JOHN YANG: ... and Carrie Hogan, two lifelong Chicago residents from two different neighborhoods and two different perspectives.

MIRACLE BOYD: Sometimes, I do get numb.

JOHN YANG: Boyd grew up on Chicago's gritty South Side.

Just 21 years old, she says she has already seen far too much gun violence.

MIRACLE BOYD: My brother was shot entering my freshman year of high school.

JOHN YANG: Her father, brother and uncle have all been shot.

One, she said, was mistaken identity, another a case of wrong place, wrong time.

Many of those she grew up with have also been victims of gun violence.

MIRACLE BOYD: I can count on more than both my hands how many classmates have died, because it's more than 10, since elementary school all the way through high school.

I wouldn't like to say that some of our high schools and some of our youth are cursed, but that's what it is seeming to be.

CARRIE HOGAN, Chicago Resident: I literally dropped to the ground.

I was laying on the sidewalk thinking, I don't want to be the next person on the news that's killed by a stray bullet.

JOHN YANG: Hogan is an attorney who lived in a North Side neighborhood for nearly two decades and saw it change.

After a family member was shot during a botched carjacking, Hogan and her two chocolate labs packed up and moved to a sleek neighborhood in the center of the city.

CARRIE HOGAN: I'm living in a condo, so I have a door person now.

I have 24-hour security.

It just seems safer.

It might be an illusion, but I feel safer here because there are more people around and the neighborhood is lit up.

JOHN YANG: Ask each of them their top issue in tomorrow's nonpartisan mayoral election, and it may sound as if they are in agreement.

MIRACLE BOYD: Public safety is a number one issue.

And if we could address public safety, then we could address crime.

CARRIE HOGAN: For me, crime affects everything.

It's the only issue that matters in this election.

JOHN YANG: But, for Carrie, the answer is more police.

CARRIE HOGAN: You have less police generally, and then the police that are left don't feel empowered to really do anything.

And so that is a perfect formula for crime.

JOHN YANG: And from Miracle's point of view, the police are irrelevant.

MIRACLE BOYD: The police show up after the crime has already been committed.

They don't show up to prevent.

HEATHER CHERONE, WTTW: Public safety means very different things to very different people in Chicago.

JOHN YANG: Heather Cherone is a reporter for WTTW, Chicago's PBS station.

She says sentiments about crime in the city is as much about perception as reality.

HEATHER CHERONE: We are seeing crimes and high-profile crimes in neighborhoods that are not used to being in the headlines for those reasons.

And that, I think, can add to sort of people's sense that, well, I used to feel safe here, but I don't feel safe anymore.

And that is really in many ways disconnected from what the reality of crime is.

JOHN YANG: Shootings spiked in Chicago during the pandemic.

More than 800 people were murdered in 2021 alone.

While the number of homicides dropped last year, reports of violent crimes continue to rise, up 12 percent since 2019, the year of the last citywide election.

A recent poll found that nearly two-thirds of Chicago residents say they feel unsafe from gun violence and crime.

LORI LIGHTFOOT, Mayor of Chicago, Illinois: I'm not going to rest until we are the safest big city in the country.

JOHN YANG: That could spell trouble for Mayor Lori Lightfoot as she runs for a second term.

She faces a crowded field.

Eight challengers are trying to make her the first incumbent in decades to be defeated for reelection.

LORI LIGHTFOOT: What we don't need is somebody who doesn't support the police and, in fact, wants to divert resources from the police to other projects.

JOHN YANG: The candidates are drawing sharp contrasts over public safety in the city's police department, which remains under a consent decree imposed after the 2014 fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald.

PROTESTERS: Laquan!

JOHN YANG: Lightfoot points to her record as mayor, hiring more than 950 police officers last year and removing more than 12,000 guns from the city's streets.

LORI LIGHTFOOT: We are bending the curve on violent crime.

JOHN YANG: Every one of Lightfoot's challengers has pledged to replace the police superintendent she appointed.

Teacher-turned-Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson... BRANDON JOHNSON, Chicago Mayoral Candidate: Well, what's up, Chicago?

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) JOHN YANG: ... says he would reallocate funds in the police department and focus on the root causes of crime by investing in schools and housing.

BRANDON JOHNSON: Over 40 percent of the violence that happens in the city of Chicago happens in 6 percent of the neighborhoods, where I live.

JESUS "CHUY" GARCIA, Chicago Mayoral Candidate: Let's get Chicago back on track.

JOHN YANG: Congressman Jesus "Chuy" Garcia says he would increase staffing and improve data collection.

JESUS "CHUY" GARCIA: People need to feel safe to do business.

JOHN YANG: And current front-runner Paul Vallas, the former CEO of Chicago Schools, promises to hire 1,800 new officers with a focus on community policing.

PAUL VALLAS, Chicago Mayoral Candidate: The community policing is critical, because you can't have half of the high priority 911 calls not being responded to.

JOHN YANG: That's an approach Carrie Hogan says turned this one-time Lightfoot voter onto a new candidate this year.

Why did you decide on Paul Vallas?

CARRIE HOGAN: We have to give power back to our police.

We have to put more police back on the streets.

We have to start policing our city again to keep it safe.

So, Paul Vallas is the person that I think has the most rational, reasonable policies in that regard.

JOHN YANG: In the closing days of the campaign, Miracle Boyd and the gun violence prevention organization she works with held a forum for Chicago's youth to engage directly with the candidates.

MIRACLE BOYD: Our communities are suffering.

Our youth are dying of gun violence.

JOHN YANG: Of the four candidates polling in double digits, only Johnson showed up.

BRANDON JOHNSON: I believe a better, stronger, safer Chicago is possible, and we can build that together.

JOHN YANG: Johnson's plan for community-based interventions resonated with Boyd, and was a big reason she says she's voting for him.

MIRACLE BOYD: He's actually been in the communities, been on our talks, been on Zoom with us.

The citizens of Chicago is calling for treatment, not trauma, and not police to show up.

JOHN YANG: While voters have been casting ballots for a month, it may be weeks more before they know which candidate will be tasked with trying to lower crime in Chicago and to restore faith in the police department.

If no candidate wins a majority of votes tomorrow, the top two finishers advance to a run-off election in April.

For the "PBS NewsHour," I am John Yang.