Speaker Bio - John Fetterman
Six-foot, shaven-head, 325 pound Mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania in Allegheny County, is 39 years old.
John was born in York, PA where he was a high school offensive tackle. His parents still live there. He has assorted degrees, including a Masters from Harvard in Public Policy. You can say that his political career began with his efforts to engage the youth of the small town of Braddock. He volunteered with the Americorps’ youth programs. Mid-2001, he started his own program to help area drop-outs earn GED’s and find jobs. He officially moved to Braddock in 2003.
In 2005 he ran for Mayor, defeated the two-term incumbent and life-long resident of Braddock, and won by one vote after a recount - a vote from one of the younger Braddock voters, he says. His salary is $150 a month. His passion is creating a wholesome environment for the younger, and especially “dislocated” residents of Braddock. He has converted overgrown lots to gardens, built basketball courts, rescued the city’s only skyscraper, the eight story Ohringer Building, and converted it to an artist colony. He opened a youth center and, he says, he is comfortable bridging the gap between the old and young.
Fetterman’s mayoral website, which he launched and funded himself, says he has three goals for the betterment of Braddock: improve the quality of life for the younger residents, attract “the kind of outside energy, ideas and interest from the artistic, urbanist, and creative communities,” and “subvert the $2.4 billion Mon-Fayette Expressway designed to run through the middle of Braddock.” Braddock is technically a borough, which also has a borough council and a borough Council President, with whom, Mayor Fetterman shares responsibility for Braddock.
In this once vibrant steel town, where Andrew Carnegie built his first steel mill, Fetterman purchased a rundown warehouse for $2,000. Located across the street from the pride of the city, the 1887 Braddock Carnegie Free Library, the warehouse became his home. The Braddock Library was the first of Andrew Carnegie’s 1,500 libraries around the country.
While the town structures exceed the dilapidated state, Mayor Fetterman says he does not see his town through rose-colored glasses. “This isn’t Mayberry. Braddock will never be what it once was.” But he says “We’re not distressed, we’re experimental.” Fetterman’s strategy is to get the town into the “urban mix,” saying that residents can create their own opportunities in Braddock.