Gwendolyn Reese backs Charlie Crist for Mayor to restore ‘confidence and faith’ in leaders

Gwendolyn Reese, a beloved member of St. Petersburg’s Black community and the community at large, is endorsing former Gov. Charlie Crist for St. Pete Mayor.

The move notches another big win in Crist’s bid to unseat incumbent Mayor Ken Welch.

Welch is the city’s first Black Mayor and has made honoring past promises to the Historic Gas Plant District among his top priorities. Reese, a community leader pushing for racial equality for decades in the city, was a resident of the Gas Plant District before it was dismantled to make room for what is now Tropicana Field.

That’s at least one reason why her endorsement for Crist, not Welch, carries perhaps more weight than other endorsements.

Reese described her support for Crist in an interview with the former U.S. Representative posted on Crist’s social media this week.

She said little things matter in the race, “like engaging with people, like listening to people, making people feel comfortable, helping them feel confident in you as a person and you as a leader, and I think you are such a people person.”

“You are so engaging with people, and you’re comfortable doing that, and we sense that, and that’s an important quality in a leader,” she added, reaching out to grasp Crist’s hand.

“You have served us in Congress, and those are skills that are so much needed in these times. These are challenging times. They’re frightening times. They’re precarious times, and that’s why we need to have confidence and faith in our leaders.”

Reese grew up in a segregated St. Petersburg, when access to some city businesses was still not permitted to Black residents and when cruelty was the norm, not the exception. She has fought for decades to improve the lives of, and create opportunities for, the city’s Black community.

Reese serves as President of the African American Heritage Association. Up until recently, she was a key figure in one of the Welch administration’s biggest projects: keeping the Tampa Bay Rays in St. Petersburg.

Reese was a consultant for the Tampa Bay Rays on the Historic Gas Plant redevelopment plan, which fell through after Hurricane Milton blew the roof from the Trop in late 2024, causing project delays that ultimately prompted the Rays’ previous ownership group to walk away from the stadium deal. The team is now negotiating with the city of Tampa and Hillsborough County.

Reese had essentially been the face of the Welch administration’s stadium deal, but broke with the Mayor after the deal crumbled. She was disenchanted with Welch’s unwillingness “to even come back to the table to see if there were options,” according to a St. Pete Catalyst interview with her last year.

At the time, Reese praised the Rays for meeting with former Gas Plant residents and descendants even before a deal was reached with the city. She said the team’s careful attention to the displacement that occurred in the late ’70s and into the ’80s gave people hope, but the “light at the end of the tunnel” was put out after the deal faltered.

Now, Reese is lending her considerable influence over the city’s Black community, and those allied with it, to Crist’s campaign, subtly referencing the lost faith in the incumbent, Welch.

“We’re hungry for strong leadership. We’re hungry for a leadership that we can trust and have faith in, have confidence in. We are hungry for a leader who is one of the people and comfortable being with the people, and so I think Charlie, for me, you have all of that and more, and I am so happy. I am so happy you’re in this race,” she said.

Crist, in announcing Reese’s support, praised her work “preserving St. Pete’s history” over the past several decades, noting her service on the Commission to Study Structural Racism in St. Petersburg and her recognition by the city of St. Pete with a Key to the City and the MLK Leadership Award.

Reese’s endorsement comes as Crist continues to gain momentum in the race, leading Welch in both fundraising and polling.

A St. Pete Polls survey taken last week found Crist leading Welch in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup 44% to 28%, a 16-percentage-point advantage that has doubled since previous polling at the end of June.

Meanwhile, Crist continues to dominate fundraising, giving him an advantage in sharing his message. Crist has a cash-on-hand advantage over Welch of more than $882,000. In the most recent fundraising period covering July 4-12, Crist raised $61,000 to his political committee while Welch raised just $15,000 to his, St. Petersburg Progress.

Crist is also leading fundraising to his official campaign account, with $11,000 raised in the most recent period covering June 26 through July 10. Welch raised just $8,000 to his campaign during that same time.

St. Pete Shines, the political committee supporting Crist for Mayor, recently launched its latest ad, “Mess,” describing the catastrophic damage resulting from back-to-back hurricanes in 2024 and a mayoral administration “missing in action.” It features images of hurricane damage throughout the city, including flooded streets, damaged structures, debris piles and a devastated Tropicana Field with its roof in tatters.

“After Milton and Helene hit, St. Pete was a mess. Water mains busted, homes destroyed, and City Hall was missing in action,” Crist narrates in the ad. “Recovery funds got delayed. Piles of debris never collected. Construction permits unapproved, and neighborhoods left to fend for themselves.”

The ad ends with a positive message from Crist.

“We can do better, a lot better. I know that when a hurricane hits, you don’t sit at home, you act. As Mayor, I’ll never abandon our city during a storm. That’s not a promise — that’s the job,” Crist added.

The ad builds on criticism leveled against incumbent Mayor Ken Welch over his administration’s response to various hurricanes throughout his tenure. Following Hurricane Helene in 2024, residents in neighborhoods that flooded had debris piles that sat untouched for weeks, leading some to nickname them “Welch Piles.”

Before that, during Hurricane Ian in 2022, Welch faced criticism for leaving the city’s Emergency Operations Center to return home to his family, even as other top city staff slept at the facility, as is protocol. Welch has defended his decision, arguing he did not leave until after the path of the storm shifted and the city was no longer in harm’s way.

But the issue has come up frequently, with a previous St. Pete Shines ad targeting Welch over a Tampa Bay Times report finding he had swiped into City Hall on just 34% of work days.

The latest endorsement, paired with funding and polling advantages, comes as voting is already underway for the Aug. 18 Primary. Vote by mail ballots went out last week and early voting begins Aug. 8, running through Aug. 16. If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, the top two vote-getters will advance to the November General Election.

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Ed. note: Michelle Todd Schorsch is the Chair of St. Pete Shines, a political committee backing Crist for St. Petersburg Mayor. Todd Schorsch is married to Peter Schorsch, the publisher of Florida Politics.