About Roxanne

Roxanne Qualls (born March 3, 1953 in Tacoma, WA) was the three-term Mayor of the City of Cincinnati from December 1993-November 1999. Prior to that she served for one two-year term on Cincinnati City Council after she was first elected in 1991.

Background

Roxanne Qualls grew up across the river from Cincinnati in the community of Erlanger, Kentucky. Her parents settled in Erlanger after her father retired from the Air Force when Roxanne was seven years old. Prior to arriving in Kentucky, Roxanne had lived in Taiwan, Japan, and New Hampshire.

Roxanne attended grade school at St. Henry's Grade School in Erlanger, Kentucky and then attended Notre Dame Academy in Park Hills, Kentucky for high school. While at Notre Dame Academy, she excelled in public speaking and debate as a member of the school's chapter of the National Forensics League and was a member of the National Honor Society. She attended Thomas More College, majoring in history, and then attended the University of Cincinnati in the Department of Urban Planning and Design at the College of Design, Architecture, and Art.

Prior to serving in elective office, Roxanne served as the first Director of the Northern Kentucky Rape Crisis Center (1975-1977, now known as the Women's Crisis Center), the Executive Director of Women Helping Women (1977-1979, now known as the Hamilton County Rape Crisis and Abuse Center), owned a small business specializing in house painting and renovation, an Associate Director (1983-1985) and then Director (1985-1991) of the Cincinnati office of Ohio Citizen Action (formerly known as Ohio Public Interest Campaign). While director of Ohio Citizen Action's Cincinnati office, Roxanne worked with neighborhood groups and environmental organizations to pass the City of Cincinnati's air code, lobbied the city to establish the Office of Environmental Management, and advocated for the establishment of the city's recycling program. Her office released an annual analysis of the Environmental Protection Agency's Toxic Release Inventory. She was a member of the Lower Price Hill Task Force, an effort to target the environmental causes of Lower Price Hill children's health problems.

City Council

Roxanne Qualls first ran for the nine-member at-large Cincinnati City Council in 1987. She placed 14th.  She ran again in 1989 and placed 10th. She was elected in 1991.

In her first term on council, Roxanne served as chair of the Intergovernmental Affairs and Environment Committee. She promoted employee health and safety. She successfully advocated that the city adopt Occupational Health and Safety Administration standards for city workers and develop an effective loss prevention program. The almost immediate consequence was a 22% drop in employee injury and illness rates. She led the city's planning efforts to develop a long-term transportation policy that integrated mass transit, including light rail. She worked to establish the Toxic Sweep program that trained city inspectors to recognize threats from hazardous and toxic waste. In addition, she emphasized increased cooperation between the City of Cincinnati and Hamilton County and organized regular meeting between her committee and the Hamilton County Commission on issues of shared concern.

Mayor

In 1993, Roxanne became Mayor of the City of Cincinnati by achieving the highest number of votes of any council member. Cincinnati's voters returned her to the Mayor's office in 1995 and in 1997 where she served until term limits forced her out of office.

As Mayor, Roxanne emphasized openness and accessibility, collaborative public-private partnerships, and community and economic development.

Upon taking the office of Mayor in 1993, Roxanne established Mayor's Night In where every Tuesday evening for two hours anyone could come and see her about anything issue or concern. She established the Mayor's Business Expansion and Retention Program and the Mayor's Business Breakfasts. Mayor's Night In and related constituency work reached out to over 5000 individuals and 240 businesses and resulted in legislative initiatives, constituency services, and jobs and business expansion and retention.

She emphasized partnerships with the communities and the private sector to achieve shared goals. The partnership with the Greater Cincinnati Home Builders Association resulted in Citirama, a center city home show that has created new neighborhoods and brought people back to the city. A partnership with the Board of Realtors produced the Ambassador program that familiarized real estate agents with the assets of Cincinnati so as to be better able to "sell" the city. The US Conference of Mayors recognized this programs as a "Best Practice" in 2005. She established the Home Ownership Partnership, a coalition of over 32 lending institutions and community development organizations to improve Cincinnati's rate of home ownership.

Believing that successful community and economic development is built on a foundation of safety and security, Roxanne developed the Zero Tolerance Initiative: A Campaign to Take Back Our Neighborhoods, a comprehensive effort to combat blight and neighborhood deterioration. The US Conference of Mayors recognized it as a "Best Practice" in 1999. She initiated Cincinnati's suit against gun manufacturers for failing to incorporate safety features into guns and for facilitating the illegal distribution of guns. She supported the hiring of more police officers and the Community Oriented Policing (COP) program that took police officers out of cars and put them on the street in neighborhoods. And, she proposed the Permitting Drug Abuse ordinance to hold property owners responsible for knowingly permitting drug trafficking on their property.

Successful community and economic development also requires a willingness to invest in the physical, cultural, and social infrastructure of the city.

As Mayor and as a member of the Executive Committee and later as President of the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana-Regional Council of Governments, she oversaw the Major Investment Study that resulted in the significant redesign and reconfiguration of Fort Washington Way; and, she successfully lobbied for federal dollars to fund the region's light rail major investment study. With then County Commissioner, Bob Bedinghaus and members of City Council, she helped form the joint City-County Planning Committee to develop the Master Plan for Cincinnati's Central Riverfront and to determine the location of the two stadiums. In 1998, she insured the expansion of the city's premier riverfront park system by working with council to insure that money was budgeted for the construction of the Theodore Barry International Friendship Park.

Roxanne was recognized for her strong supports of Cincinnati's arts and cultural assets. She was one of three founders of Artworks, a youth employment program that teaches young people work skills by producing public art. She supported the construction of the internationally recognized Contemporary Arts Center, the Aronoff Performing Arts Center, and the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, and supported funding of small arts organizations.

Roxanne was an unsuccessful candidate for Congress in 1998. When she completed her last term in office, Roxanne pursued her dual passions of policy and urban design and planning. She served as a Fellow in the Institute of Politics at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government (Spring 2000); She was a 2001 member of the Loeb Fellowship at Harvard's Graduate School of Design; and she graduated in 2002 from the Kennedy School with a Master's in Public Administration.

Roxanne became a Visiting Professor at Northern Kentucky University in 2004 where she teaches in the Masters in Public Administration Program. She teaches Executive Management, Urban Policy, and Citizens and Governance. In 2005, she became Director of Public Leadership Initiatives.

Awards and Honors

• Post-Corbett Award Special Award in Arts Education for ARTWORKS, 1997
• National Homebuilders Association, Public Official of the Year, Region C, 1997
• Project Interchange Seminars in Israel, American Jewish Committee, Women Leaders Exchange, 1997
• Honorary Doctorate, Cincinnati State Technical and Community College, 1996
• Ohio Public Employees Lawyers Association, Award for Outstanding Service, 1996
• National Association of Social Workers, , State and Cincinnati Region, Public Official of the Year 1996
• YWCA, Women of Achievement Award, 1994
• Cincinnati Women's Political Caucus, Outstanding Achievement Award, 1994
• Soroptomist Club, Making a Difference for Women, award, 1993
• Girl Scouts Great Rivers Council Woman of Distinction, 1992

Continuing Education

• Malcolm Weiner Fellow, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University 2003
• Loeb Fellowship Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, Class of 2001
• Fellow Institute of Politics, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 2000
• Institute for New Mayors, Institute of Politics, Harvard University, 1993
• Mayors Institute on City Design, Harvard University, 1996
• Mayors Institute on City Design, University of Virginia, 1997

Board Memberships