Join as we welcome Kenneth T. Welch, the 54th Mayor of St. Petersburg and the first African-American mayor in the city’s history. A proud third-generation St. Pete resident, Mayor Welch has been serving the community for a quarter of a century – first as a county commissioner and now as mayor – leading St. Pete with a focus on opportunity, equity, and inclusive progress.

In November 2021, Ken was elected to become the first African American mayor of St. Petersburg, FL – a unifying leader who believes in partnership and working toward a common goal of authentic progress for every neighborhood. Mayor-elect Ken Welch is a third-generation St. Petersburg native. He grew up on 16th Street, where his grandfather ran a wood yard and was a deacon at Prayer Tower Church – both in the Gas Plant area. A few blocks away, his grandparents built a home by hand on 7th Avenue near 22 nd Street, known as the Deuces.

Growing up, Ken and his cousins worked in the wood yard, and his grandparents’ home served as the after-school daycare hub for Ken and his cousins. Eventually, the wood yard and church were displaced by Interstate 275 and the public purchase of the Gas Plant area for redevelopment. The redevelopment never occurred, and the Gas Plant property eventually was used to build Tropicana Field to attract a Major League Baseball franchise. His grandparents’ home was purchased to expand 16th Street Middle School (now named John Hopkins). All in the name of progress.

Ken graduated from Lakewood High School, where he focused on business courses, played saxophone in the band and anchored the offensive line on the Pinellas County championship team in 1980. He went on to earn Bachelor’s and MBA degrees from the University of South Florida St. Petersburg and Florida A&M University, respectively. Ken and his wife, Donna, have been married for 30 years and have two daughters, Keonna and Kenya.

While at Florida A&M completing his MBA studies, Ken was hired by Florida Power Corp., headquartered less than 2 miles from his home in St. Petersburg, as an accountant. Ken worked for Florida Power for 14 years and at additional jobs Raymond James and St. Petersburg College, working in accounting, IT, and business administration. His focus was accounting, business technology and business process improvement.

Ken was elected to the Pinellas Board of County Commissioners, District 7, in 2000, representing St. Petersburg, Lealman, Gulfport and South Pasadena. He was subsequently re-elected to four consecutive terms. Commissioner Welch served as commission chair in 2006, 2013 and 2018. He focused on community progress on issues including justice reform, poverty reduction, housing, transportation, environmental protection, community development and homeless services.

As a commissioner, Ken led the effort to create the first Pinellas Community Redevelopment Area (CRA) focused on poverty reduction. The South St. Petersburg CRA is the first of its kind in Pinellas and will generate more than $100 million in county and city funding to reduce poverty over the 30 years. He also led the adoption of the countywide Adult Pre-Arrest Diversion program, the increase in the minimum wage for county employees to $12.50 an hour, the county’s adoption of workplace and housing protections for the LGBTQ community, and the county’s local investment of more than $100 million for affordable and workforce housing. As chair of the Pinellas Tourism Development Council, he represented the county at international tourism conferences in London and Berlin. As commission chair, he joined regional leaders to represent the county in Mexico City in 2018 as a part of the Global Tampa Bay initiative.

Commissioner Welch was elected as the Florida Association of Counties 1 st Vice President, served on the Board of Directors, and has served as Urban Caucus Co-Chair and Finance/Admin/Transportation Chair at the state level. He is a multiple recipient of the FAC Presidential Leadership Award and a Certified County Commissioner. In 2010, Commissioner Welch debated a group of pro-drilling advocates at WFSU in Tallahassee, including industry lobbyists and the incoming Senate president and speaker of the House. The BP Gulf Spill occurred shortly thereafter.

In 2020, Ken Welch led a strong, science-based response to COVID-19 in Pinellas County – including beach closures, a Safer-At-Home ordinance and a countywide mask ordinance. As a strong voice for public health, he was invited to join Chris Cuomo on CNN to discuss the Pinellas County response to COVID on a day when Mr. Cuomo noted that multiple Florida officials refused the invitation to appear on television to speak on the deadly pandemic. As chair of the Pinellas County Complete County Committee for the 2020 Census, Welch led the committee’s two years of collaboration, resulting in the highest census response rate in the Tampa Bay area, and second-highest of any large urban county in Florida. Ken has received numerous recognitions for his leadership, including the Florida Association of Counties Presidential Advocate designation, Sierra Club Black Bear Award, Catholic Charities Angel Award, PACE Governmental Leadership Award, Urban League Government Award, and Daystar’s “With These Hands”; recognition, among others.

Before his election to the county commission, Commissioner Welch was appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to the St. Petersburg Junior College Board of Trustees, where he was part of a strong board consensus to create four-year access at SPJC, leading to the evolution of the college to St. Petersburg College, offering Bachelor’s Degree options to Pinellas residents.