The City of Fort Wayne saw a major change earlier this year after the passing of longtime mayor Tom Henry, who was battling late-stage stomach cancer.
Henry had served as Fort Wayne’s mayor since 2008, winning his historic fifth term in the 2023 municipal elections over Republican challenger Tom Didier.
Replacing Henry was no easy assignment. On April 20, then-Sixth District Councilwoman Sharon Tucker was chosen as Fort Wayne’s next mayor.
The Allen County Democrats caucused her into the position after two rounds of voting. Other candidates for the position included Michelle Chambers, Austin Knox, Phil GiaQuinta and Stephanie Crandall, all of whom earned enough votes to stay in the race after the first round of voting. Palermo Galindo and Jorge Fernandez were quickly eliminated.
Chambers and Knox withdrew between rounds.
Tucker is the first African American and first woman ever elected as mayor of Fort Wayne. On that day, she said she was most looking forward to addressing mental health in the city.
“I’m looking forward to making sure we create a mayoral council on mental health. Having been the executive director of Vincent Village, I know how important mental health can be and the impacts it has on homelessness.”
Both Tom Henry’s daughter and nephew hugged Tucker after her caucus victory. His nephew, Adam Henry, who has spoken on behalf of the Henry family since the mayor’s death, said “we support Mayor Tucker.”
Tucker was required to vacate her Council seat as a result. Then-FWCS school board vice president Rohli Booker was selected to fill that role a month later.
Tucker was sworn in several days later at the Clyde Theater.
In her speech, Tucker thanked her friends and family for their support before wrapping up by paying homage to Henry.
“I will not pretend that I could ever fit his shoes. But I will absolutely take the path that he has laid out and leave my own little footprints in the sand.”
She said her experience succeeding Glynn Hines as the sixth district city council representative qualified her to finish out Henry’s agenda.
“Being able to take the mayor’s blueprints and move forward with that will be very easy. Probably easier than I thought, but very easy to go through and just add my flavor on it.”
After her first 30 days in office, Tucker reevaluated how easy she expected that transition to be.
“You know, when you're running for office, you really don't think much about the work afterwards, you know, what we see publicly, you see the smiles and you see the shaking of the hands and Mayor Tom Henry made it seem so effortless," she told WBOI at the time. "But there are a lot of decisions that have to be made. After the ribbon has cut or the swearing in is done, you go right to work at making really hard and tough decisions.”
There were also small things that began to come up that she said she hadn’t considered when she thought about the transition. But she wanted to keep away from any big, drastic changes in an administration that was already moving successfully.
In some ways, it has not been an easy start to her administration. A spate of police-action shootings by Fort Wayne Police officers drew scrutiny. And the interlocal agreement between the City of Fort Wayne and Allen County which governed emergency medical services within the city fell apart as the county pursued expansions of fire districts outside of city limits.
However, there have been the apparent seamless continuation of Mayor Henry's development projects, including the continued expansion of the Riverfront and the opening of the deep rock sewer tunnel that will help improve the water quality in the city's rivers.
Earlier this month, WBOI again sat down with Mayor Tucker to have a more personal conversation about her past eight months as mayor and what she’s learned in that time, as well as where she sees the city moving forward.
