City councilman Malik Evans announces bid for mayor

Rochester, N.Y. — More than a week after Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren announced her bid for a third term, she is now facing a serious challenger from her own party: Democrat Malik Evans.

Warren is facing felony charges that she and two campaign workers committed campaign finance fraud. She also has faced criticism over the handling of Daniel Prude’s death.

Now is the time for new leadership, Evans said.

“We’ve seen so many challenges in the last year with the pandemic, with social unrest,” he said. “I think we are at a period in our city where we really need someone that has a track record of bringing people together – of building bridges – and that’s the way that I’ve lived my life.

Evans is currently in his fourth City Council term after serving 13 year on Rochester Board of Education.

MORE: Rochester mayor: ‘The easy thing to do is run away’

But Evans says his life of service started long before then.

“My commitment to the city started when I was in high school. When I was in high school, I started something called the City-County Youth Council, which brought county youth and city youth together to work on solving problems in our community,” he said. “My leadership did not start as an elected official. My leadership started as a citizen.”

His main focus will be on job growth, creating a plan to rebound from the pandemic, and improving communities.

“Without strong economic development, without families knowing where their next paycheck is from, nothing else really matters to them,” he said.

Evans said he wants better transparency between government and citizens, too.

“We have so many people who have lost faith in government, lost faith in government in moving things forward, because the only we can tackle those big issues is that people need to have faith in government.”

In a statement, Friends of Lovely Warren said:

We’ve prepared for this moment. All over the country unfortunately it’s been our brothers that have been first in line to take on sisters. The powers that be playbook hasn’t changed since the days of slavery. We know our ancestors are looking down upon us and asking…when will our people learn.

The Warren Campaign is committed to breaking these generational curses. We will run on our record of service and our record of results

We’re confident that He who delivered us two victories before will deliver us another victory.

Abdul Bounds and Mohamed Mohamed are also running as Democrats. They will all meet in a primary.

The last day to file a petition to run for office is April 1.