Mary Sheffield, the Detroit City Council president, was elected mayor on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. She will become the first woman to lead the city when she is sworn into office.
Ms. Sheffield, 38, an ordained minister and a Democrat, will be Detroit’s first new mayor in 12 years. On the campaign trail, she emphasized her work alongside Mayor Mike Duggan, who endorsed her. She called for carrying on many of Mr. Duggan’s policies while working to bring more investments to struggling neighborhoods.
Ms. Sheffield defeated Solomon Kinloch Jr., the pastor of a large church and a fellow Democrat.
Detroit changed significantly during the tenure of Mr. Duggan, who took office when the city was in the midst of the country’s largest municipal bankruptcy. In the years since, homicides have gone down, basic city services have been restored and, for the first time in decades, Census Bureau estimates have shown small year-over-year population growth.
Serious challenges remain. Poverty is widespread, vacant lots outnumber houses in many neighborhoods and the city’s population, roughly 640,000, remains less than half of Detroit’s peak in the 20th century.
Mr. Duggan, a longtime Democrat, did not seek a fourth term as mayor and is instead running for governor of Michigan as an independent.
Ms. Sheffield, a City Council member for 12 years, racked up endorsements and donors, and finished well ahead of other candidates in an August primary election. She argued that her experience on the council would help protect Detroit’s improvements and spread investment beyond the revived downtown into more residential areas.
“While I acknowledge our progress, I am running for mayor because I believe there is more work to do to ensure that opportunity reaches every neighborhood of our city,” Ms. Sheffield said in a recent debate hosted by WXYZ-TV. She added: “This is a critical moment in Detroit’s recovery where we can move forward with progress, or we can gamble with our future.”
On the campaign trail, Mr. Kinloch described Detroit in more dire terms, arguing that Duggan-era policies had not led to meaningful improvements for many residents. He said it was “a failure of institutional politics and institutional leadership” that so many Detroiters were dealing with poverty, blighted neighborhoods and fears of crime.
He said he understood what it was like to hear that “the city is coming back,” but to be frustrated that the progress “has not reached your block.”
Mitch Smith is a Chicago-based national correspondent for The Times, covering the Midwest and Great Plains.
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