A white candidate, a mostly black district, a big question
Two candidates ask whether a white opponent can represent the St. Petersburg council district.
By ADAM C. SMITH, Times Political Editor
Published September 9, 2005
ST. PETERSBURG - The most crowded and unpredictable election looming in St. Petersburg features a sticky underlying question: Can a white person truly represent a predominantly black district?
The issue has emerged in the five-person race for the City Council seat now held by Earnest Williams. Williams is the front-runner, but it's possible for the district to wind up with its first white representative in more than three decades.
Darden Rice, a 35-year-old organizer for the Sierra Club environmental advocacy group and part-time waitress, is the only white candidate in a primary where fewer than 4,000 votes could decide the outcome. She and an enthusiastic band of volunteers are canvassing the district where African-Americans account for more than 54 percent of registered voters and nearly 60 percent of residents.
Two other candidates in the race question whether Rice, or anyone who is white, can understand district residents.
"It is very important that we have candidates that can represent the entire district," said Maria Scruggs-Weston, a former state law enforcement officer who handily won that district in her unsuccessful bid for County Commission last year.
Scruggs-Weston, 47, said she was "very concerned" about some leaders in the local Democratic Party helping a white candidate win a predominantly black precinct.
Candidate Dwight "Chimurenga" Waller, 54, president of the International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement, was more blunt.
"It's essentially an apartheid strategy where they will use minority rule in a majority black district," he said of Rice's candidacy.
Rice calls such comments unfair. She notes that the district is the most racially, economically and professionally diverse in the city.
"It is our strength, not our weakness," Rice said, adding that she'll have to earn widespread support among African-Americans to win. "I have lived in District 6 for 10 years and have as much a right to represent our community as anyone else.
"I would never dare suggest that someone, because of his or her race, gender or party, would not have the same right to bring oneself forward as a candidate."
Karl Nurse, an old Southeast resident who helped recruit Rice for the race, said that to question Rice's candidacy solely because of her race is itself racist.
"It's racism to say we will vote based on the color of a person's skin," said Nurse, who heads the Council of Neighborhood Associations. "Imagine someone saying, "We can't elect (black County Commissioner) Calvin Harris because he's running in a district that's 91 percent white.' "
Former St. Petersburg NAACP president Darryl Rouson said he understands the racial concerns but said, "I do not personally believe you must be black to represent the interests of black people and do so effectively."
Rouson, who has given campaign contributions to Rice and to Cassandra Jackson, another first-time candidate in the District 6 race, can envision a scenario that would propel Rice to victory.
"If they're voting along racial lines and she gets a solid white vote, and her opponents split the black vote, she could walk away with this," said Rouson.
The primary is Sept. 27, but registered voters in the district that includes much of downtown and neighborhoods including Bartlett Park, Old Southeast, Lake Maggiore Shores and part of Lakewood can start casting their votes at elections offices on Monday. The top two vote-getters face off in a citywide general election Nov. 8.
Jackson, 45, a Republican activist and former member of the Pinellas Housing Authority, said she has no concerns about a potential white council member representing the district.
Williams, 58, said Rice has been largely invisible in the district and that he'd never heard of her until recently. While declining to directly criticize Rice's candidacy based on her race, he said he's heard others do just that.
"I can't say that, but people have said that to me," Williams said. "The district was designed for representation by African-Americans, and they want to see that representation continue."
In fact, the African-American majority in the district has been dropping. Nurse ran for the seat in 1993 as the only white candidate among five. At the time, nearly 70 percent of the registered voters were African-American, and Nurse said he faced radio ads urging black voters to oppose the white candidate.
Nurse finished in third place, with 18 percent of the vote. Williams came in fourth place that year.
The color of her skin is not the only side issue Rice has had to deal with. She is also the niece of state Rep. Everett Rice, R-Treasure Island. The tie to the longtime former sheriff would be a plus most anywhere in the county. In District 6, though, members of the Uhuru Movement are fierce critics of the Sheriff's Office and have attacked Rice for her family connection.
Jeanie Blue, an African-American Bartlett Park resident backing Rice, brushed off the racial implications of white leadership for predominantly black neighborhoods.
"It's not like that hasn't occurred before," Blue said. "It just depends on whether the person can be fair and look after the interests of all the people. That's what's important, and that's what Darden represents."
