Sharon Pratt Dixon
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Sharon Pratt Dixon (later Sharon Pratt Kelly; b. 1944) is a former mayor of Washington, DC.
Sharon Pratt was born January 30, 1944 in Washington. She received both undergraduate and law degrees from Howard University, following the career path of her father, a superior court judge, and was a professor in law at Antioch College before returning to Washington in 1977.
In 1983 she was made Vice President of Community Relations at Pepco, the local power utility, becoming the first woman and first African-American to serve in that role. The same year, she won the Presidential Award from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Pratt directed the failed 1982 mayoral campaign of Patricia Roberts Harris and married Arrington Dixon, a Democrat on the DC city council. Her political energies, however, were drawn to national rather than local politics. She was a member of the Democratic National Committee from the District of Columbia from 1977-90, the first female to hold that position. She served as Treasurer of the DNC 1985-89.
Pratt was sworn in as mayor of Washington on January 2, 1991, the first African-American woman to serve as mayor of a major American city. Early in her term, she married James R. Kelly III, a New York businessman, and changed her name to Sharon Pratt Kelly.
Mayoral Administration
Upset with the decline of her hometown, she announced she would challenge incumbent mayor Marion Barry in the 1990 election at the 1988 Democratic National Convention, a race also joined by three DC Councilmen. As an unknown without previous experience in District politics, she was free to criticize Barry and the "three blind mice," and promised to "clean house with a shovel, not a broom." Kelly received the endorsement of the Washington Post, and after Barry was arrested on drug charges and dropped out the race, she won handily.
Once in office, however, the aloof Kelly proved ineffective. Her vows to slash the city employment rolls won little support among city employees, high crime and ongoing failures of city services disillusioned the electorate, and suspicion of questionable accounting tactics and the city's deteriorating finances found strong disfavor in the United States Congress. In the second year of her term, Barry loyalists mounted a recall campaign which although unsuccessful weakened her administration, which backed away from reform in light of union opposition.
In the 1994 Democratic primary, Kelly finished a distant third, losing to Marion Barry.
| Preceded by: Marion Barry | Mayor of Washington, D.C. 1991–1995 | Succeeded by: Marion Barry |