By Deba Uwadiae

With over half a century of political activism and representing diverse communities, Ohio’s 15^th Senate District Senator Hearcel Craig (D) hopes to continue to serve and represent the people of his district and the state. After many battles, including in the military, Ohio Senate Assistant Minority Leader Hearcel Craig told the New Americans magazine that “Nevertheless, we find ourselves with the assault on voter rights, human rights and civil rights. While we’ve made progress, we still have a long way to go.”

I am not originally from Ohio. My mother and family came from the coal mine state of West Virginia. My mother came here to find employment. I finished grade school, high school and college here. I served in the military from 1970 to 1972. I am a graduate of Columbus East High School. I continued my education at Ohio State University. I came out of the military and finished at Franklin University. I earned my master’s degree at Central Michigan University and later went to the Seminary for Ohio State Theological Seminary for the graduate program. I served on Columbus City Council. I then served in the Ohio House of Representatives. I have been very fortunate to be elected to the Ohio Senate. I have four children, 11 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

Ohio Senate District 15

Ohio Senate District 15 is a pretty massive district, mostly in central Ohio covering the city of Columbus, the northeast side, the downtown area, north Linden, the eastland area, Bexley, Whitehall, the south side, the University district, parts of Independent Village, parts of Grandview and parts of Blacklick. It is a large district, very diverse in terms of socio economics, education, workforce and all of those issues. I am so honored to be elected to serve the district.

New Americans

New Americans are very entrepreneurial. I have the great privilege of having worked in my house districts with the Somali community and other members of the new American population. In the 1990s I was president of a nonprofit on the westside of Columbus and worked with Eritreans and Ethiopians. Now certainly I am having the privilege of working with new Americans.   One of my best friends is Nigerian and he is an architect. I live next door to a Nigerian, two of his children are attorneys and another has a doctorate. I have both experiences and the opportunities to work for many years for new Americans and appreciate the enormous contributions that continue to be made by new Americans.

Immigrants

We are all immigrants. Though nobody is perfect, it’s been my experience that for many years that certainly, the new Americans want to come to the United States of America and to contribute, to raise their families, to pay taxes and to contribute to the economy. Yet, they are keeping their culture, which is important, and they bring their culture to America, and we can all live and experience the richness of these great cultures. We will always be the beacon on the hill, a place where folks can come, people can come, families can come, and children can come to build their lives for their families and children.

Ohio Senate

Ohio Senate is modeled very much after the federal government. There are 99 members of the House and 33 members of the Senate. Our legislation is local. The work that we do in our legislature in state government really affects the lives of the family in many ways – issues around education, access to affordable housing and safe housing. The state government really affects the lives of people in so many critical ways.  

Ohio State House

The residents and citizens of this state must understand that this is their House. We strongly encourage that in every way for them to be advocates. They can write their legislators, they can phone their legislators, email and use all systems and reach out to them. There are lots of ways that the public can reach out and to hold all of us accountable for the work that we are doing. In addition to that, we go out to the community, we have newsletters where we disseminate news to the community. We have community phones where the public can weigh in when we are outside. We have a communications director that does a wonderful job, very efficient and very effective, that puts out information weekly and daily to the residents about what is going on in the Senate.

Councilmember

I was 40 years old before I got elected to the Columbus City Council. I started in the 1968 campaign with Robert Kennedy. I was 18 or 19 years old. Even before then, in high school I was on the student government council. Overtime, I had many opportunities to work on other campaigns both federally and locally. I ran for the Columbus School Board in 1990 long before I got appointed to the Columbus City Council. I wanted to serve families and children in our schools. The journey was a long one.

Opportunities

A lot is going on. I had a loving mother, one that challenged us to be better, to learn and to be respectful. We have a community of folks, as we say that it takes a village to raise a child, that is true. I had a lot of folks that we called mentors. I was in the boys’ scout. I had a lot of early experiences. I watched African Americans who were attorneys and physicians. They lived right in the community, in part because it was de facto segregation, but they were brilliant in every way. Certainly, there has been progress. The longest serving Mayor of this city, Columbus, was African American. There’s been progress. Nevertheless, we find ourselves with the assault on voter rights, human rights and civil rights. Why we’ve made progress we still have a long way to go. We have work to do in that area.

Democrat

Voting or non-voting has consequences. I have been around for a long time. Voting matters. What I continue to encourage is that one exercise that is the most precious privilege is voting. We talked about it. People have literally died to have the right to vote. It matters that elections are fair, equitable and there are safe guides. We don’t do anything that impairs or restricts folks from having opportunities to vote. We need to continue to focus on that, focus on justice and fairness in the process and ensure that we are fighting for the marginalized and the vulnerable.

Hope

I will continue to be hopeful. There will be challenges but I will continue to be hopeful and encourage folks to keep their core values and principles around the things that are important to all of us – all families and all children, no matter what your zip code is to make sure that this is a state that all families will have opportunities, justice and fairness.

Next

I don’t want to get too fast ahead of the game. We have two more years left to get the work done. I would like to continue to serve in some capacity in the elected office. We got a lot of work to go here for the people that sent me here to serve.

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