The new council’s sole Black female member is D.C. Council member Anita Bonds (D-At Large). She is aware of the unique circumstances. “It does bother me because many District residents look like me,” Bonds told the AFRO at the Ward 7 Holiday Party held at the Chateaux Nightclub in Northeast. “We want to make sure that we as Black women have a seat at the table.”

“I will run again,” she said, referencing the 2018 election. “I am the only Black woman on the council and we need representation.” There are five Black males on the Council.

The District’s population is 48 percent Black and 44 percent White according to statistics compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2014. The city is also 52.6 percent female, with raw population numbers breaking out as follows: 166,613 Black females, 138,512 Black males, 116,731 White females, and 114,740 White males.

On the new council, there are four White males – D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) and Council members Jack Evans (D-Ward 2), Charles Allen (D-Ward 6), and David Grosso (I-At Large). The White females are D.C. Council members Brianne Nadeau (D-Ward 1), Elissa Silverman (I-At Large), and Mary Cheh (D-Ward 3), and the Black males are Vincent Gray (D-Ward 7), Trayon White (D-Ward 8), Brandon Todd (D-Ward 4), Kenyan McDuffie (D-Ward 5), and Robert White (D-At Large).

In 2007, there were no Black females on the council until the May 1 election of Muriel Bowser (D) of Ward 4 and Yvette Alexander (D) of Ward 7, replacing D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty and Gray who was then D.C. Council chairman.

During the 1991-1993 council period, there were four Black female council members: Charlene Drew Jarvis (D-Ward 4), Linda Cropp (D-At Large), Wilhelmina Rolark (D-Ward 8), and Hilda Mason (Statehood-At Large). Anita Shelton, president of DC Women in Politics, an organization that advocates and trains women to enter the District’s political arena, told the AFRO that the gentrification of the wards taking place since the late 1990s has hindered progress for Black women in the city. “As more Whites move into this city, they limit the electability of Black women,” Shelton said. “African-American women are already fearful about running and many of them who are qualified for elected office say it is too expensive.”

Shelton said it is disturbing that the two Black female candidates, who were incumbents, both lost in the June 14 Democratic Party primaries and notes that two of the White women, Nadeau and Silverman, were elected by a small percentage of votes. Shelton said that “African-American women in the city deserve more than one council member.”

Kathy Henderson, an advisory neighborhood commissioner for district 5D05 in Ward 5, who has run for the D.C. Council in the past, told the AFRO that the lack of gender diversity is no surprise to her. “Black males were allowed to vote in this country before women were,” Henderson said. “When there are situations involving men and women in politics, things tend to end up going for the man. Look at the recent presidential election.”

Henderson said Black women having to progress politically in the District is “reflective of the state of the country.”

“Women do the same amount of work and even more but earn less,” she said. “There are some people who have no interest in helping women move forward. That is why we need to have more Black women on the council other than Bonds.”

Anise Jenkins, executive director of Stand Up! for Democracy, a pro-D.C. statehood organization, was flabbergasted when it was pointed out to her that Bonds will be the only Black female council member.

“That makes me very sad,” Jenkins told the AFRO. “That means that our views will not be put forth on the council as much if we had more representation. We need to change that next time.”

Read this article online at the AFRO.