And the very diverse crowd went wild at the announcement by Frisco Mayor Jeff Cheney during the election night watch party at The Patios at the Rail on Saturday, June 5, 2021 that Angelia Pelham had won the race for Frisco City Council Place 3.
Unofficial polling results show that Pelham defeated Frisco veterinarian Jennifer White by garnering 53.01 percent of the 8,914 votes cast in both Denton and Collin counties.
During the celebratory evening, persons of varying hues made their way to Pelham to get a hug, shed tears and take photos. Many were repeated scenes as if they’d forgotten they’d connected for their opportunity before. As the first African American female to be elected to a seat on the Frisco City council, perhaps processing the historic and rare moment in the city’s history was a challenge.
Pelham often spoke about unification along her campaign trail, and confirmed the reality of the present view in front of her and in what lies ahead.
“What makes this win so beautiful is, it wasn’t a small slice of Frisco that came out for the race,” she said. “What makes this so beautiful is the diversity that we saw. Y’all, if you look around this room, this is Frisco. We have every race, every ethnicity, every religious background; this is Frisco.”
“You came together and you said, ‘Not in our city,’” Pelham said. “You said ‘We will not be divided. We will come together in unity because we want what’s in the best interest of all of Frisco.’”
Pelham later added, “We came together and now we are Frisco strong.”
Clarification/Correction: A previous Texas Metro News story written by Eva D. Coleman about Angelia Pelham shared that Pelham would be the first African American elected to Frisco City Council. Pelham is the first African American female to be elected. While Frisco voters adopted their initial Home Rule charter which set the present form of government structure in 1987, it has been written and shared via personal accounts that Otis Spears, an African American minister, was elected to a two-year term in 1983.
