Shayla Adams-Stafford announces her bid for the Prince George’s County Council District 5 seat before supporters Saturday at the LIUNA Training Center in Lanham. Photo by William J. Ford.
At least two more candidates announced plans over the weekend to run in a March 4 Prince George’s County special primary election, and other hopefuls have until Friday’s filing deadline to add their names to the ballot.
Democrats Tonya Sweat and Shayla Adams-Stafford, business owners and education advocates, said Saturday they will seek county executive and the District 5 County Council positions, respectively.
Sweat joins a field of five Democrats running for the executive job, including a former executive, a state senator, the state’s attorney and the two at-large members on the county council.
Adams-Stafford becomes the second Democratic candidate for District 5 after Ryan Middleton, who announced his bid in August, shortly after the special election that elevated the previous 5th District council member, Jolene Ivey, to the at-large seat, from which she is now mounting a bid for executive.
Alonzo Washington announces his intention to run for Prince George’s County executive
Middleton is a former staffer for U.S. Sen. Ben Cardin (D). District 5 includes Cheverly, Fairmount Heights and Glenarden.
Before Adams-Stafford can run for council, she must resign from the county’s Board of Education, a position she’s held since 2020 and was re-elected to last month.
Adams-Stafford’s announcement Saturday at the LIUNA Training Center in Lanham brought out State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy (D) — another of the county executive candidates — and county council members Wala Blegay, Tom Dernoga and Krystal Oriadha and Council Vice Chair Edward Burroughs III.
“Shayla brings the interest of the people at the table,” Blegay said.
Adams-Stafford’s time on the school board includes the county’s first Saturday Academy to help students with literacy and math. She also initiated a partnership between the school system and Blacks in Government, a national nonprofit that helps students establish careers in the federal government.
She has worked as a teacher and instructional coach in D.C. Public Schools, and is currently the CEO of AdaptiveX, a professional development and software company that works nationwide with educators on culturally responsive teaching and learning. Part of the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, the state’s sweeping school reform plan, requires teacher preparation programs that include “cultural competency.”
Part of Adams-Stafford’s platform will focus on what she calls “participatory development,” where residents not only know details of a particular housing or commercial project, but also participate in the development process with developers.
“We are so disconnected in our ability to advocate. We can’t properly push developers to bring the type of development we want to see,” she said in a brief interview. “We can’t show up to these meetings in mass because you can barely get an understanding of when they are and I just think that that’s unfortunate.”
In the county executive race, Sweat goes up against at least five, high-profile Democrats: In addition to Ivey and Braveboy, the race has drawn former County Executive Rushern L. Baker III, At-Large County Councilmember Calvin Hawkins and state Sen. Alonzo Washington .
The seat became open after the Dec. 2 resignation of former Executive Angela Alsobrooks, who will be sworn in to a U.S. Senate seat on Jan. 3 after winning the election in November. The county’s chief administrative officer, Tara H. Jackson, is serving as acting county executive in the interim, but has said she doesn’t plan to seek the position permanently.
Sweat, who ran for county executive two years ago, said residents have contacted her in wanting new leadership.
“Nothing’s changed,” said Sweat, an attorney who manages her own consulting firm and is former vice president of advocacy on the Maryland PTA. “I heard the calls, the cries, the screams of people of Prince George’s saying, ‘We’re tired of the same faces. We’re tired of the same politicians. We need someone new who cares about the people.’”
Sweat’s platform focuses on public safety and tackling the county’s budget deficit and improving education. She said that what should not happen are education budget cuts, locally or statewide, after Gov. Wes Moore (D) told leaders at Thursday’s Maryland Association of Counties (MACo) conference there could be reforms to the Blueprint plan.
“That’s the first thing we want to roll back when we get in trouble,” Sweat said about education funding. “When we don’t educate our children, they cannot join the workforce to be successful. The children are always the ones to get sacrificed first, and that needs to stop as well.”
The winners of the March 4 special primary elections for county executive and District 5 will compete in the special general election set for May 27. The winners of that election will complete the remaining two years left on those terms.