Now that City Commissioner Jeremy Matlow has announced a run for mayor, the race to fill his seat is underway. One of the candidates who has filed is Talethia Edwards.
Edwards previously founded the Greater Bond Neighborhood Association and is executive director of the nonprofit Good News Outreach. During an interview after she filed to run, she said her experience has prepared her for the job.
“I've done the work. I'm doing the work, and this is just the next level in doing the work I want to serve this community,” she said. “Most of my work has been focused on the South side of Tallahassee, but I understand this community holistically. There's over 200,000 residents in Tallahassee, and I'm poised and ready to serve all of them in a real way.”
She wants to prioritize bringing business investment and affordable housing to Tallahassee.
“I want to see more industry, right? I want to retain talent in this community. How do we attract big companies to this community so that we retain our talent? I believe in housing affordability. And how do we utilize city funding, that billion dollar budget to be creative, to bring about housing affordability, creation of more jobs,” she said.
For the past several years, Tallahassee’s city commission chamber has been a contentious place. Votes split along a 3-2 line with spats from the dais have captured headlines at almost every outlet in town. The minority bloc has pushed for reshaping leadership at city hall and ousting city manager Reese Goad. Edwards said fighting from current commissioners isn’t her focus.
“We get distracted a lot with things about, oh, they want to fire the city manager. Oh, the 2-3 split. We get distracted. And those things take us off the focus of what is important, that's the people and making sure that this city stays moving in the direction that it needs to be moved in for generations to come,” she said.
Edwards is friendly with the current majority at city hall. Commissioner Dianne Williams-Cox posted a picture to Facebook in 2023 of herself, Edwards, Mayor John Dailey and Commissioner Curtis Richardson at a Florida A&M University football game. Edwards also previously donated money to Williams-Cox and Dailey’s campaigns in 2022.
Other candidates filed so far for the seat are PJ Perez, a teacher at SAIL high school with 15 years of experience, and Norm Roche, a former Pinellas County Commissioner.