Like her Bajan great-grandmother Louisa Parris-Edwards and grandmother Irene Quashie Edwards, Chirlane McCray wears her hair in cornrows, a common style among hard-working Bajan women of yesteryear.
She also shares something else with Bajan women: an interest in Barbados and in people across the board.
“I like Barbados and so does my husband,” she said some time ago.
“We have both been to Barbados.”
Actually, Chirlane and Bill de Blasio, New York City’s Public Advocate, were in Barbados four years ago, visiting places she grew up hearing her grandparents talk about.
“It was a very informative and entertaining visit,” she said.
Chirlane, a woman with deep-set eyes, a disarming smile and strong opinions on the issues that matter to millions of New Yorkers, stands a very good chance of becoming New York City’s next first lady, the wife of the mayor. With ten days to go before Democrats in the five boroughs go to the polls to choose their party’s standard-bearer in the November mayoral election, de Blasio is the front-runner among the six candidates.
According to the latest Quinnipac University poll, he leads the field, with 36 per cent of likely voters favouring him, leapfrogging Christine Quinn, speaker of the City Council, who led the field for months but now has a mere 21 per cent support. William “Bill” Thompson, the grandson of Kittitian immigrants, has 20 per cent.
“It feels very good,” said McCray, who is the most highly visible of the candidates’ wives on the campaign trail.
“I am very inspired every time we go out to events or meet with people because people are very passionate about the issues that Bill is talking about. They are passionate about health care and housing which, as you know, is of special concern to the Caribbean community, to everyone.”
Almost everywhere de Blasio and Chirlane go, either together or individually, to explain his positions on the issues, voters seem intrigued by the image of this tall, well-dressed and articulate white man and his black wife hitting the streets, going to churches together, stopping at subway stations to shake hands with would-be voters; and attending political rallies, breakfasts, lunches and dinners organized by backers. And when he began running his campaign ads on television, there was his mixed race son with a large Afro telling people why they should vote for his father.
McCray, who is as media savvy as she is committed the issues, said her husband’s good showing wasn’t surprising.
“It didn’t come as a surprise to me that he (Bill) was doing well. It surprised me that the numbers were so high,” Chirlane told the Sunday Sun.
“I didn’t expect that he would be so far ahead of the other candidates. But if you had look at Bill’s trajectory during this campaign, you would see that he has been steadily increasing in support. Every few months he would get a bump because of whatever else he was doing.”
For instance, he recently led the campaign to save Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn after New York state officials had decided to close it. He took the matter to court and a State Supreme Court judge ordered the State University of New York to keep it open. He then turned his attention to Inter-Faith Medical Centre, another major hospital in Brooklyn, and has vowed to prevent it from closing.
McCray, a writer, poet and activist, met her husband when both worked in the administration of then mayor David Dinkins, she as a speech-writer and he as an aide to a deputy mayor. Later she became a speech writer for New York State comptroller Carl McCall and for Bill Thompson when he became city comptroller.
De Blasio and McCray fell in love and got married in 1994. They have two children, Chiara and Dante, and live in Brooklyn’s upscale Park Slope community.
“I have been doing a little bit of everything” on the campaign, she explained. “I have travelled to all of the five boroughs. I have been going to the meet and greets, meeting with voters. I talk with them and tell them about what Bill stands for. I have attended fundraisers. Bill and I have separate schedules.”
Interestingly, Chirlane has spoken openly about her life as a lesbian before she met her husband. The candour has helped his campaign among Blacks, lesbians, gay men and progressive voters.
She freely describes their life as one of a “conventional unconventional couple”.
