Know Your History: E. Denise Simmons

E. Denise Simmons was the mayor of Cambridge, Massachusetts during the 2008-2009 term, and she was the first openly lesbian African-American mayor in the United States.

A Justice of the Peace and Notary Public, Simmons came to public office with 12 years of experience with the city-funded citizen rights organization Civic Unity Committee, which she served as executive director. Among the work performed while in this role was her successful fight to increase the diversity within the Cambridge public school faculty. In 1992, Simmons ran for and won a spot on the Cambridge School Committee. She quickly won praise from across Cambridge for her tremendous work ethic, and for her efforts to find ways to build consensus with her colleagues. Over the next several years, Simmons gained a reputation as a calm, thoughtful voice on the school committee, and as a person who always kept her door open to anyone who wished to speak with her.

In 2001, Simmons ran for and won a seat on the city council. She immediately set out to make local government more accessible to a wider range of people, and through efforts such as holding “town hall” style meetings, Simmons worked to get more people involved in their own governance. Simmons – being Black, a woman, and a member of the GLBT community – worked hard to make sure that each of these constituencies were given a voice inside City Hall. Simmons was a member of the City Council when Cambridge City Hall became the first municipality, in 2004, to issue same-sex marriage licenses. She also promoted efforts to help local minority business owners network and establish themselves in Cambridge. Simmons also helped initiate community conversations about the role of race and class in contemporary Cambridge society.

Her election to mayor of Cambridge by the Cambridge City Councilors on January 14, 2008 was unanimous. Simmons brought the same sensibilities to the mayor’s office that she brought to her previous endeavors – notably, she took pains to create an open-door atmosphere to her constituents. She opened the “mayor’s parlor” to the people of Cambridge, where she convened meetings on everything from environmental policy, to the coordination of the city’s various social services providers, to a senior citizens’ advisory group. Simmons developed a reputation as a work horse, with an emphasis on constituent services.

Simmons was mayor during the summer of 2009, during which time Cambridge was thrust into the international spotlight due to the arrest of Harvard University Professor Henry Lewis Gates, Jr. As a result of the attention this incident generated, Simmons was sought after as a spokesperson for the city, and she was careful to avoid inflaming an already volatile situation. Simmons was interviewed on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” CBS’s “The Early Show,” CNN’s “State Of The Union” with John King , among several other national media outlets. Simmons won praise from her constituents for giving measured, thoughtful responses in public, as well as for her diligent work to contain the situation behind the scenes. Simmons noted that she had a lengthy record of leading public discussions on how race and class impact contemporary Cambridge, and this work would continue long after the Professor Gates arrest faded from the headlines.

In February 2010, Councilor Simmons announced that she is running for an open state senate seat in the Middlesex, Suffolk and Essex district that was vacated by Anthony Galluccio.

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