BMORENEWS.com

Former DC Mayor/City Councilman for Ward 8 Marion S. Barry, Jr. and BMORENEWS' Doni Glover

Champion for Minority Business

(WASHINGTON, DC - July 9, 2008) - It’s not everyday that one gets the opportunity to meet or greet greatness. A couple of weeks ago, I had the distinct pleasure of sitting with former DC Mayor-now City Councilman Marion S. Barry, Jr.

Truly, it was a refreshing pleasure.

To be in his presence is to really get a bona fide taste of DC, its politics, and most of all, its people.

As a Baltimorean, I will be the first to state that Washingtonians are more politically sophisticated and astute than people in my home town. The fact that they have been able to keep a black as mayor alone is more than enough evidence.

Barry, a skilled politician, started off with the grassroots of Anacostia, and to his credit, maintains that connection to the everyday people there still today.

Beginning in 1971 when he was first elected to serve on Washington, DC’s first school board, his next step would be winning a seat on the DC City Council in 1974. Reelected to the Council in 1976, he became the city’s second elected Mayor in 1978. He would served as Mayor for three terms until 1990.

Hit with a drug conviction, Barry returned to politics in 1992 and won a seat on the City Council. By 1994, he would win the Mayorship again.

After a brief sabbatical from politics, he took a Ward 8 City Council seat in 2004, and is currently in reelection mode - as announced on BMORENEWS.com on June 23, 2008.

A staunch champion for the people, few young people today know that his history is as rich as his accomplishments. For instance, back in the 1960’s, Barry led the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). He made a name for himself by fighting racial prejudice and discrimination. Few today know that he also took a bullet in 1977 as he attempted to defend the district Building during the Hanafi Mulsim Siege.

All this to say, Barry is not only a DC icon; he is an American icon.

Of all the things I have ever heard or read about him, I think it is his love for and commitment to black people that warms my heart the most.

No, he is not perfect. No one is. However, when I think about the fact that there is a place called Prince George’s County right next door to DC and how it is dubbed the richest black jurisdiction in the nation for black media incomes - I am reminded that Barry had a lot – if not everything to do with that. When I hear the name Bob Johnson and BET, I am reminded that their names might be meaningless today had it not been for Barry.

After all, everybody knows that Barry insisted on economic power for his people - all the way down to school children. If I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a thousand times: Mayor Barry made sure that every young person who wanted to work a summer job got one. Hands down. Period. End of story.

And clearly, he helped a lot of adults secure gainful employment - including good government jobs with benefits - as well.

So, to sit down in the midst of lunch hour with this legend was an incredible pleasure, an honor, an even more – a walk in American history.

BMORENEWS.com would like to take the opportunity to wish Mayor Barry well on his reelection campaign. Surely, he is still a face to watch and a powerfully grounded force for the people.

Tags: marion barry, Politics, Washington DC