‘Shoulders I stand on.’ From birth to death, Ella Scarborough broke barriers.
A trailblazing Black woman who built a widely revered career in Charlotte politics, county commissioner and former City Council member Ella Scarborough died this week. She was 75.
Scarborough is remembered by colleagues as a champion of Charlotte’s Black residents, a dedicated and jovial public servant— always well dressed, often with a hat to match.
She was born in Sumter, S.C. and became active in civil rights politics as a young woman. In 1963, she was arrested in Sumter along with hundreds of other Black students who tried to enter a segregated movie theater.
Segregation impacted her life from the very start.
Commissioner Pat Cotham said Tuesday night Scarborough often told a story of how she was born prematurely.
At that time in South Carolina, the hospital was segregated and she was denied care. Scarborough’s father “made a big ruckus with the hospital and said he wasn’t going to let his daughter die,” Cotham recalled Scarborough saying.
Eventually, the hospital broke its rules and gave Scarborough the care reserved for white children. Scarborough said she “ended up integrating as a newborn,” Cotham recalled.
“It set a tone for who she was,” Cotham said, “and it showed that her father fought for what was right.”
Elected to City Council
Scarborough was elected as a District 3 representative to Charlotte City Council in 1987, becoming its first Black female member.
She won the district with 78% of the vote, beating Republican Roosevelt Gardner Jr.
Scarborough carried each of the district’s 10 precincts, carrying over 70% of the vote in predominately white districts and more than 90% in predominately Black districts, The Charlotte Observer reported at the time.
On the historic significance of her victory, Scarborough said in November 1987, “You’re looking at quality here. It’s not whether it’s Black, white, female, whatever. I just hope people would say that I am one of the qualified people who made council. I look at it from that standpoint, and that’s it.”
Then 41, Scarborough was a supervisor at Duke Energy and lived in the Montclaire neighborhood. She had made two unsuccessful bids for school board before she won the District 3 City Council seat.
She was active in the community, the Observer reported, including by volunteering with a group that repaired houses in Crestdale.
Bob Davis, then-chairman of the Black Political Caucus, called her victory “a milestone in local politics.”
Other people saw it that way, too.
Commissioner Mark Jerrell, who worked with Scarborough at Sprint PCS before he was elected to the Board of County Commissioners, said sitting next to Scarborough at the dais was surreal.
“It was never lost on me sitting in the dais … (that) she was one of the reasons I got to sit there,” Jerrell said of Scarborough’s barrier-breaking career. “I’m sitting next to somebody whose shoulders I stand on.”
Scarborough served on City Council for 10 years and later ran for Charlotte mayor and for a North Carolina U.S. Senate seat. She was unsuccessful in both of those bids, but was the first Black woman to run for those positions.
In a news release, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Black Political Caucus said Scarborough was also the past president of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., Tau Theta Zeta Chapter; former president of Black Women’s Caucus of Charlotte Mecklenburg “Blackberry Bunch”; and long-time active member of the caucus who received the highest award, Legacy of Service.
“While this represents many activities; it only represents a microcosm of her endeavors,” the caucus wrote. “Commissioner Scarborough will undoubtedly leave a void in the BPC, community and in her family.”
Service on Board of County Commissioners
Scarborough won an at-large seat to the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners in 2014. She was the second-leading vote-getter, behind commissioner Pat Cotham.
She won a seat in every ensuring election. In her last, 2020, she was the top vote-getter.
Commission Chairman George Dunlap said it’s not hard to see why.
On Tuesday, Dunlap recalled getting a call from a citizen shortly after Scarborough fell ill — she stopped attending commission meetings during her final term because of her illness, and later went on formal medical leave.
The man had been dropped from a social services program and asked Dunlap for help. “’The last time I needed help, Ella Scarborough helped me,’” Dunlap recalled the man saying. “She made a lasting impression on people.”
‘A beautiful soul’
Commissioner Vilma Leake said Scarborough was revered for her public service, but that she was also funny, loved to dance and sing, and had impeccable style.
At dinners and events, Leake said Scarborough would find the dance floor, even if no one else was dancing. Between conversations about politics, they joked about which hats they were planning on wearing to church.
As a child, Scarborough would go from one church to another with her father, who was a minister. She was a devout Christian, Leake said, and attended Friendship Missionary Baptist Church in Charlotte.
Leake said she and Scarborough talked often about the civil rights movement and growing up in the segregated South. Her experiences in her youth fueled her spirit and propelled throughout her distinguished career, Leake said.
“Ella was a beautiful soul,” Leake said. “A beautiful Black woman who valued her people.”
This story was originally published May 26, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
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