Candidate's Offbeat Campaign Fliers, Resembling Parking Tickets, Not Funny To Some

(CBS) -- Imagine finding an orange-colored notice on your windshield. It looks like a parking ticket, but as thousands of Chicago drivers found out, it's not.

CBS 2's Chris Martinez reports.

From a distance, it looks like the real deal. Robert Villa certainly thought it was.

"My first reaction -- what did I do wrong?" he says.

By the time he took  a closer look, his thoughts were already racing.

Many 12th Ward neighbors had similar reactions.

It turns out the orange slip is a political flier, paid for by supporters of Pete Demay.

"I'm excited people are talking about it," the aldermanic candidate says. "People are shocked and dismayed when they see a ticket on their car and generally relieved and interested in the issue once they finally read it."

They've had the opposite effect, angering thousands of people for no reason, according to the alderman Demay wants to unseat.

"If you want to get peoples' attention, you want to put out something positive that you are going to work towards improving the quality of life, not the other way around," incumbent George Cardenas says.

Demay says he has no regrets. He's been tentatively removed from the ballot following a petition challenge. Demay says he'll run as a write-in candidate, if he is not reinstated.