Nichole Rogers will be the next Albuquerque city councilor for District 6, which includes Nob Hill and the International District. She beat Jeff Hoehn in Tuesday’s runoff election with 52% of the vote, according to unofficial results.
While she had to go through two rounds of voting to secure the seat, Rogers’ family said they’re not surprised that becoming a city councilor — and the first Black woman to hold a seat in the council’s nearly 50-year history, at that — is the next part of her journey.
The campaign
Rogers ran in part on her lived experience as a Black and Hispanic woman and single mom who has had to navigate social support systems. She said having that history prepared her to serve her constituents in the International District, who are the District 6 residents most in need of resources and advocacy.
“You are a better representative when you have the same lived experience of the people you are trying to represent,” she told KUNM ahead of the election.
Hoehn argued his professional experience running nonprofits, along with his master’s degree in public administration, was the more valuable background for a city council candidate to have.
“I think, unfortunately, in this campaign ‘lived experience' has somehow supplanted the idea of actual, real experience,” he said ahead of Election Day.
Professionally, Rogers has held positions in the Office of Equity and Inclusion at the City of Albuquerque, staff development at University of New Mexico Hospital, and in the School of Health, Wellness and Public Safety at Central New Mexico Community College.
She also runs a nonprofit to promote health equity for people of color in New Mexico that Hoehn raised concerns over during the campaign. The Welstand Foundation neglected to file registration forms with the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office, according to records. It also failed to file the necessary financial disclosure forms with the IRS, resulting in the agency revoking its tax-exempt status.
Rogers said the issues were brought to her attention during the campaign and she is working to resolve them. she has said she'll make the financial forms available to the public as soon as they’re completed.
The issues
Rogers' platform centered on addressing poverty as a root cause of crime in the city. While Hoehn ran on increasing police presence throughout the district, Rogers said many of her neighbors in the International District feel over-policed.
“We want to minimize harm. And it’s not always by putting more police in an area,” she said.
She said she’d like to see the understaffed Albuquerque Police Department grow to be able to handle violent crime in the city, but that public safety is about more than police. She said she wants to boost the budgets of the Albuquerque Community Safety Department and Albuquerque Fire Rescue in that effort.
As part of her approach to lift residents out of poverty, she proposed implementing a Guaranteed Income pilot program using cannabis taxes.
She has also called for increased funding for mental health and addiction support and housing services.
Victory of the people
Rogers said she discovered during the campaign that her first name, Nichole, means “victory of the people" — as though she were destined for public service. It wasn’t the only uncanny thing that led her to Flock of Moons Brewing Company for her election watch party Tuesday night.
She said she told a campaign staffer about a dream she had ahead of selecting a venue. “All I remember from the dream was moons and 111,” she told her supporters as they awaited election results. The brewery, with “moons” in its name, is located at 111 Harvard Drive SE.
As polls closed at 7 p.m., early and absentee votes posted first. Rogers looked over the shoulder of a volunteer with a laptop open with a surprised look on her face. She was behind. Hoehn had secured about 52% of runoff votes that came in before Tuesday.
But as the Bernalillo County Clerk’s Office began releasing Election Day totals, the results flipped on their head. With Rogers leading with about 52% of the vote, the mood among the 60 or so supporters in attendance turned around.
As the last of the unofficial results posted around 8:45 p.m., and Rogers maintained that lead, the crowd erupted. After hugging her parents through tears, Rogers took to the front of the room to declare victory in the hard-fought second round of voting.
'I’m walking in my purpose'
In her speech, Rogers thanked her supporters and God. She said she'd had doubts about getting in the race and had asked her grandmother about barriers to running for the council seat.
“She said ‘tell God. Tell the universe, tell the mayor, tell everybody what your barriers are,'” Rogers recalled. “And I did. And they all got removed. In two weeks, they got all removed,” she said.
In response, she said her grandmother told her, “You’ve got your answer now. You can’t say no.”
Rogers said she showed her grandmother, her namesake, their name on the ballot.
“This is bigger than me,” Rogers told her supporters. “I’m walking in my purpose.”
Her election is historic in the city of Albuquerque. While Solomon Brown, a Black man, was appointed to the governing body for three months in 1977, no African-American has ever been elected to the council and no Black woman has held a seat.
“We shouldn’t be talking about firsts in 2023,” Rogers told KUNM. “So this means that hopefully somebody out there who looks like me is believing that they can do this. We can do this.”
Rogers’ mom Vanessa said her daughter was born with a “helpful spirit” and that she believes Rogers is here to do big things. She said sitting on city council may be just the first step. Rogers’ dad, Bernard, said it is a proud moment for their family.
“And I think for Albuquerque, it’s going to be an important chapter in politics here,” he said. “Because, for all this time to never have [a Black woman] on the city council, it bewilders me that that’s the case. But I think that it’ll be great for the city.”
Rogers, who included her experience as a single mom in her campaign, also had her two kids on hand for the watch party. While 6-year-old Elijah was more interested in talking to his mom about how tall he is for his age and getting some french fries, 15-year-old Aaliyah was more aware of the moment. She checked in on the results coming in and congratulated her mom as things looked up.
Hoehn concedes
Rogers’ competitor, Jeff Hoehn, called the councilor-elect to concede the race and congratulate her on her victory during Tuesday’s watch party. She put him on speakerphone for her supporters to listen in on their exchange.
“Well, it was close. And you have my support as our city councilor.” Hoehn said. “So just let me know what you need moving forward.”
"I love that," Rogers responded. “It’s going to take us all to tackle these problems and I look forward to working with you to do that,” she told Hoehn.
Rogers said her next steps are to listen, learn and “get a good warm handoff” from departing District 6 Councilor Pat Davis.
