East Ward Winston-Salem City Councilman Derwin Montgomery.
Derwin Montgomery ‘10 was interning in Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines’ office this past summer when the idea hit him: He should run for a seat on city council this fall, as a college senior.
No one else was stepping up to oppose Jocelyn Johnson, the sixteen-year Democrat incumbent in the city’s East Ward (which includes the university). So Montgomery, 21, who says he’d been planning a run for council in 2013, switched into high gear. In months he had organized a successful primary campaign; no time like the present.
“I knew this was a prime opportunity, because I graduate in May. After that I wouldn’t have the same political capital that I do now, being on campus,” he says.
That capital came up big for Montgomery, with students voting early and in big numbers. He campaigned online and in person, often educating his peers in the process. And he beat Johnson handily, taking 57 percent of the vote in the East Ward primary in September.
Without a Republican opponent, Montgomery won the council seat on Tuesday, the first Winston-Salem State University student to serve on city council.
Montgomery came to WSSU from Hopkins, South Carolina, where he was politically active in high school, including three years as class president. At Winston-Salem State, he has been active in the chapter of NAACP since his freshman year; he serves as chapter president this year.
But he knows about defeat, too. He ran for student government president in his sophomore and junior years and lost both times. This year Montgomery serves as president pro tem of the student senate.
In high school, Montgomery thought he would try biology in college. But attending a campus program on the sciences the summer before his freshman year convinced him otherwise. “That helped me define that political science is what I was really interested in.”
Montgomery in a moment of thought prior to the election.
The youngest city council member says in order to tackle any of his priorities for the East Ward, the first step will be organizing people. He plans to bring together neighborhood groups in each precinct to talk about pressing issues such as public safety and economic development, “so people begin to talk to each other and neighborhoods know they’re not alone.”
Already, he says, running for elected office has made a difference. “My campaign definitely made students on campus more aware of local issues. The university is the largest employer in the ward, and we (the students) make up the largest number of residents.”
Montgomery plans to enter Wake Forest University School of Divinity next fall for a master’s degree.
He thanks two fellow students who have served as his campaign managers: Shanda Neal and Candace Knight.
