Irma L. Anderson was the elected mayor of the city of

Richmond, California Richmond is a city in western Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city was incorporated on August 7, 1905, and has a city council.

serving between 2001 and 2006. She ran for re-election as the incumbent Democrat in the 2006 mayoral race and lost to

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation f ...

challenger councilperson

Gayle McLaughlin Gayle McLaughlin (born 1952) is an American politician from Richmond, California. She was first elected to the Richmond City Council in 2004 when she was a member of the Green Party of California. She won two consecutive four-year terms as the ...

by 192 votes. Before serving as mayor she was a member of the city council from 1993 through 2000. She was the first black woman to serve on the Richmond city council''Contra Costa Times'' profile
December 18, 2006. and arguably claimed to be the first

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

woman A woman is an adult female human. Prior to adulthood, a female human is referred to as a girl (a female child or adolescent). The plural ''women'' is sometimes used in certain phrases such as "women's rights" to denote female humans regardl ...

elected mayor of a major

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

city (although Doris A. Davis served as mayor of slightly smaller

Compton, California Compton is a city in southern Los Angeles County, California, United States, situated south of downtown Los Angeles. Compton is one of the oldest cities in the county and, on May 11, 1888, was the eighth city in Los Angeles County to incorporat ...

in 1973)."Woman, 70, wins Richmond race"
San Francisco Chronicle via sfgate.com, November 8, 2001; retrieved December 12, 2011. Anderson earned both RN and BSN degrees from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

. She also earned an MPH at the school of public health of

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

and was a high school

valedictorian Valedictorian is an academic title for the highest-performing student of a graduating class of an academic institution. The valedictorian is commonly determined by a numerical formula, generally an academic institution's grade point average (GPA) ...

. In 1954, Anderson came to Richmond, California with her husband, the late Rev. Booker T. Anderson Jr. (who served as Mayor of Richmond from 1973 to 1974). Anderson has two sons named Ahmad and Wilbert. Ahmad ran for Richmond City Council in 2020. Anderson's career changed from nursing to politics working for the

Contra Costa County ) of the San Francisco Bay , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = United States , subdivision_type1 = State , subdivision_name1 = California , subdivision_type2 ...

Health Department where she began as a nurse and advanced to Director of Public Health Nursing. As mayor, Anderson worked with the

West Contra Costa Unified School District The West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD; formerly known as Richmond School District) is the school district for western Contra Costa County, California. It is based in Richmond, California. In addition to Richmond, the district co ...

developing after-school programs throughout the city of Richmond.

References

External links

Richmond City CouncilU.S. Conference of Mayors
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Irma A. Cornell University alumni Mayors of Richmond, California Richmond City Council members (California) Women mayors of places in California African-American mayors in California African-American nurses American nurses American women nurses Living people UC Berkeley School of Public Health alumni Year of birth missing (living people) 20th-century American women politicians 21st-century American women politicians 21st-century American politicians 20th-century American politicians 1930s births 20th-century African-American women 20th-century African-American politicians 21st-century African-American women 21st-century African-American politicians African-American women mayors

See also

References

External links