Valerie McDonald-Roberts
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Valerie McDonald-Roberts is an American politician. She is the Allegheny County Recorder of Deeds and in 2006 was an unsuccessful candidate for Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania.
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[edit] Community and political experiences
She has served on the Pittsburgh school board from 1989 to 1993, including one year as president. The next year, in 1994, she was elected to Pittsburgh City Council, becoming the first African-American women to hold that position. During her time, she was President Pro-tempre and chairperson of the Financial and Budget Committee [1]. Her main issues while serving on the City Council board included urban redevelopment, education, minority rights, and budgetary issues [2] and [3]. In 2001, she was elected Allegheny County Recorder of Deeds, a government office meant to record, archive, organise financial documents to be available to the public [4]. Roberts has also been involved in her community in other ways as well. Valerie McDonald-Roberts has been a Girl Scout Leader for nearly twenty years, a member of her local St. Paul's Church in Point Breeze for most of her life, and a Sunday school teacher [5]. She has also been a member of various local community organizations, including the Urban League of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Library and Science Center, and Zoological Society of Pittsburgh [6].
[edit] Education
B.S. Medical Technology from the University of Pittsburgh
M.S. Forsenic Chemistry from the University of Pittsburgh [7]
[edit] Campaign for Lieutenant Governor
On November 14, 2005, Ms. Roberts announced her candidacy for Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania. Her primary opponents included the incumbent Catherine Baker Knoll, William Hall III, a building contractor, and Gene Stilp, an anti-pay raise activist. While fairly popular and politically powerful, Knoll was considered by some political analysts as potentially vulnerable partly because of concerns over her age and competence [8]. Knoll had have the advantage of being endorsed by the State Democratic Committee, while few elected officials endorsed Roberts [9]. Some progressive and liberal circles and groups, annoyed by Knoll's social conservatism, supported Roberts. Supporters of Ms. Roberts said she not only offers geographical, racial, and gender balance to a Rendell-Roberts ticket but had the ability and courage to bring about changes and reforms in Harrisburg. Her main campaign issues and themes were health care and education [10]. Mrs. Roberts received important endorsements from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Daily and Sunday Review, Pittsburgh City Councilman Bill Peduto, Penn State Democrats, and Pennsylvania's two main pro-choice groups, Pennsylvania National Organization of Women and Pennsylvania Planned Parenthood.
On primary day, Roberts came in second to Knoll, with 139,585 votes to Knoll's 438,287.
