City’s first Black female city counselor to start Monday

Attorney Sheena Hamilton will make history Monday when she steps into her new role as city counselor, becoming the first Black woman ever to do so in St. Louis.

Hamilton was most recently a partner at Dowd Bennett, where she served as a client manager for multiple Fortune 100 companies and government or quasi-government offices. Her extensive experience includes clerking for Judge Catherine D. Perry of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, served as an adjunct professor for Saint Louis University School of Law and served on several law-related boards.

“I will say that it is not something that I had planned and probably not something that I would have seen in my future, but it is a really important time in the city of St. Louis, which makes this job really unique at this sort of inflection point and it makes the opportunity to serve really attractive,” she told The St. Louis American.

Hamilton succeeds interim city counselor Matt Moak, who was appointed by Jones when she became mayor in April. He will stay on and serve in the city counselor’s office.

The city counselor serves as the chief attorney for St. Louis and oversees two deputy city counselors, 38 attorneys and 20 support staff. 

Hamilton’s appointment by St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones follows a couple of key selections for her cabinet:Dr. Mati Hlatshwayo Davis as the city’s health director andJennifer Clemons-Abdullah as the city’s corrections director. Hlatshwayo Davis is the second Black woman to fill the role of health director, the first being Melba Moore who served as acting health director from 2015 to 2018.

The city counselor’s appointment was then followed by the appointment of two other Black women to Jones’ administration — Fredericka S. McGlown as director of the St. Louis Agency on Training and Employment (SLATE) and Betherny Williams as Streets Department director. Williams will be the first Black woman to lead the Streets Department. Both women are scheduled to start within the next two weeks.

“I have been very deliberate and intentional on the appointments that I've made in key positions, and these leadership positions reflect [that],” Jones told The American. “And I'm hopeful that the legacy will be that these women work across departments to lift up the services that we offer, to offer a more robust menu of services, no matter what department they're in, and that they lead with integrity and also lead with professionalism.”

Jones said as a Black woman in leadership she knows that Black women bring all their life experiences to leadership positions.

“So, I am hopeful that these women will lead from a place centering equity and centering issues that they directly experience as Black women like sexism, racism, misogyny and try to break down those barriers that have prohibited people from succeeding in their city,” the mayor said.

While Hamilton is the first Black woman to serve as the city’s chief lawyer, Judge Ronnie L. White made history in 1993 when he became the city’s first Black city counselor serving under the city’s first Black mayor, Freeman Bosley Jr.

White had served three terms in the Missouri House of Representatives before working for the city and then in 1995 he was appointed by Gov. Mel Carnahan to the Supreme Court of Missouri, making him the first Black person to serve on that court.

Hamilton also follows the first woman to become city counselor, Patti Hageman, who is white. She was appointed by Mayor Francis Slay in 2001 and served his administration for 13 years.

Hamilton intends to start out by getting to know everyone and their roles. She believes her biggest challenge will be dealing with the city charter and the reorganization desired by community groups and activists.

“That really is going to be a huge undertaking and a big task,” Hamilton said. “So that's one where I [think] there will be a lot of people that you have to talk to and get to know what the issues are from the people who are kind of boots-on-the-ground and analyze those issues. That'll be a big project.”

Jones echoed that sentiment.

“I think the biggest challenge for all of our appointees is we are going to be looking at our city government through a different lens and making sure that we lift the needs of racial equity and put that at the center,” Jones said.

“This is a big ship, and it's going to be hard because change is not always welcome and change is hard. And so I am committed to making sure that we leave our government better than we found it.”