Mary Pat Clarke - in The Council

In The Council

Currently, as a member of the Baltimore City council, Clarke is the Chair of the Education Committee, vice-Chair of the Judiciary and Legislative Investigation Committee, a member of the Budget and Appropriations Committee and the Land Use and Transportation Committee (highways & franchises subcommittee). Remembered for such daring efforts as spending the night once in a now demolished public housing project to bring attention to deplorable living conditions for poor people in the city, Clarke has enjoyed support from blacks and whites in all of her races. It was Clarke who set the standard, in Baltimore politics, for integrated slates while running for office. She and her New Democratic Club forged alliances with Baltimore's black democratic clubs in the 1970s resulting in the election of several African Americans to the City Council, as well as her own. In the council, she forged alliances with her black colleagues, such as the one with Kweisi Mfume resulting in a Baltimore City mandate for smaller class sizes in the 1980s.