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| Following Monday’s mayoral debate at Breath of Life Christian Center in Raleigh-Frayser, City Councilwoman Wanda Halbert lends an ear to several forum participants who sought more information on certain issues. (Photos by Wiley Henry) |
An installment of the Tri-State Defender series crafted to paint a more complete picture of the candidates for Mayor of Memphis.When City Councilwoman Wanda Halbert announced her candidacy for mayor in the Oct. 15 special election, it wasn’t her first leap of faith.
On that hot, sunny day on Aug. 3 in front of City Hall, Halbert faced the media with her sons Kelvin André Burrus and Stephon Woods and drew upon the kind of optimism that led her into politics nearly a decade ago.
Before Halbert first stepped into the political ring, she raised concerns about what she believed to be gross injustices and inequities in public schools against African-American children, particularly African-American males.
“When we would go and talk to our school board representatives, no one would listen to us,” said Halbert, then a PTA mom at Rozelle
Elementary where her sons were attending.
An unofficial spokesperson for many disgruntled parents, Halbert soon realized that someone of her ilk could mediate for those whose concerns weren’t being adequately addressed.
“I decided that we needed more parents and less politics,” said Halbert, who won a seat on the Memphis Board of Education in October 2000, serving into 2007.
“I didn’t realize I was getting into politics. I thought I was just serving as a voice in the community,” said Halbert, 42.
“I didn’t know that this was all it took to serve in public office ... to have the ability to represent your constituency and to stand firm for what you believe in.”
The pursuit of justice and equality became the cornerstone of Halbert’s campaign for a seat on the City Council. She was elected in October 2007 to represent District 4.
Memphis was founded in 1919 and rechartered in 1893, but a female has yet to serve as its chief executive officer. Former mayor Willie W. Herenton broke the racial barrier in 1991 with his historic election.
“I was a teenager and working at the Black Business Association when the People’s Convention was formed, which created the concept of electing the first African-American mayor for the city of Memphis,” Halbert said.
“When I was there, I heard them talking about modeling Memphis after Atlanta under Maynard Jackson’s leadership where he created black millionaires.”
One of Halbert’s planks in her mayoral platform is to grow African-American millionaires. With a population of nearly 700,000 people – the majority of them African American – very few are prosperous, she said.
Because the majority population is devoid of economic power and wealth, they continue to be disenfranchised, said Halbert, a director assistant for FedEx.
Halbert said the denial of economic empowerment could lead to crime, inadequate education and a high infant mortality rate. It will take wealth, she said, to unlock the door to prosperity.
“Memphis has too many natural resources for us not to be able to spread the wealth. It doesn’t matter if people are black, white or poor, they need to know there is hope and there is a tomorrow.”
A message of empowermentHalbert has been spreading her economic empowerment message at several mayoral forums. On Monday evening at Breath of Life Christian Center in Raleigh-Frayser, several would-be voters applauded Halbert’s message.
Halbert also responded to specific questions about education, poverty, infant mortality, consolidation and crime.
Schoolteachers receive much of the criticism for poor education, Halbert said. “The regular everyday voice is numbed. The city of Memphis gives $100 million annually, but we’re not getting what we deserve in return.”
Poverty affects the quality of education, Halbert said. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s poverty statistics for 2007, 18.8 percent of residents in the Memphis area lived in poverty. The median income was $45,725. With Shelby County added, the poverty rate was 26.2 percent.
“I want to see Memphis invest in reinvigorating the neighborhoods,” she said.
Poverty also leads to infant mortality, said Halbert, inferring that Shelby County under the leadership of County Mayor A C Wharton Jr., a contender for Memphis mayor, has “invested a great bit of money on the county level, but only to inform (the public about infant mortality).”
When the conversation turned to consolidation, Halbert said she wouldn’t support it as proposed. “I don’t believe it’s a fair system when the other governments will be allowed to keep their government structure when Memphis has to give up its own.”
Consolidation has been a hot button issue since Herenton first announced the idea more than a decade ago and tried to convince the suburban mayors to support it. He revisited the idea last October.
“The way consolidation is offered, it’s very dangerous,” said Halbert, referring to the latest push by Wharton, Mayor Pro-Tem Myron Lowery (who is running for Memphis mayor) and Shelby County Commissioner Deidre Malone.
Recently, Wharton, Lowery and Malone introduced resolutions to create a 15-member charter commission that would draft a consolidated metro charter for voters to approve or vote down in November 2010. Voters inside the city and outside will decide a third time if consolidation passes.
It’s a disadvantage to Memphians, Halbert said.
‘We have to do some soul searching’After the forum ended, the mayoral candidate talked a little more about crime and other subjects.
Crime in Memphis has received considerable attention in local and national media. According to the FBI, Memphis has been listed as high as No. 1 and No. 2 in violent crimes.
“We have to do some soul searching,” said Halbert, noting that the city’s distinction as a crime magnet causes white flight and despair. “To be honest with you, when I walk down some of the streets in Memphis, I’m afraid too, and I’m not white.”
Halbert says she doesn’t get upset when people are afraid of crime. “Once we begin the cleaning process under some new leadership and we show the opportunity for growth and enhancement, then we’ll be just like Atlanta.”
Memphis police director Larry Godwin, appointed by Herenton in 2004, has become a focal point in the discussion about crime. Some candidates say they would fire him if elected mayor.
Halbert said if she’s elected mayor she would require that all city directors reapply for his/her job, including Godwin, whose leadership she openly criticizes.
Halbert and Godwin have been at odds over an incident in June involving her son, Kelvin André Burrus, whom police issued a misdemeanor citation for marijuana possession following a disturbance.
Halbert was called to the scene. Because Burrus wasn’t arrested, Godwin ordered an internal investigation to ascertain whether Halbert had interfered.
After concluding its investigation, the department issued a statement saying Halbert responded as a concerned parent and did not attempt to influence the officers.
Halbert said Godwin had retaliated because of her stinging criticism of him and the police department. She said the case is ongoing and that she’d seek redress from the Justice Department.
“The issue with the police director is unfortunately about the fact that I discovered some injustices of the police system,” she said. “It is not fair that citizens have been denied employment opportunities in the police department based on juvenile, false, dismissed and expunged arrest records. It’s illegal.”
If elected mayor, Halbert said she would provide opportunities for ex-offenders to become productive citizens. “I have never met a perfect human being – and that includes myself. It’s not our place to condemn individuals for the rest of their lives, with exception to certain offenses.”
Though crime ebbs and flows in Memphis, Halbert said people shouldn’t be so negative. “Memphis has too many natural resources and abilities. This is a golden opportunity for us to expound on them and share them with the world.”
She said voters are listening to her message.
About Wanda Halbert Wanda Halbert grew up in the Rozelle/Glenview neighborhood around McLemore and Willett. She is the oldest of three children that her parents raised in a home in the Tullahoma and Shelby Drive area.
“My parents are still together living in a house where we grew up,” said Halbert. They’ve been married for over 40 years.”
Halbert is the driving force behind her two sons: André, a local recording artist, and Stephon, a junior at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
“They are products of Memphis City Schools,” said Halbert, a graduate of Kirby High School in 1985. Halbert later attended State Technical Institute at Memphis and the University of Memphis.
Quote: “I receive a tremendous amount of support across the spectrum particularly from white women. Women are less inclined to get bogged down in the racial turmoil. We are more inclined to bring everyone together.”
