Cambridge Mayor E. Denise Simmons Seeks 13th City Council Term

E. Denise Simmons — the longest-serving current member of the Cambridge City Council, who is serving as mayor after thrice being elected to the position — is seeking re-election for her 13th term.

Simmons, who has been a fixture of Cambridge politics for nearly 4 decades, has had a historic stint on the Council. She became the first openly lesbian, Black mayor in the country in 2008 during her first mayoral term, and she has overseen everything from landmark zoning legislation to police reform proposals and multiple Cambridge Public Schools superintendent searches during her time in city government.

Born and raised in Cambridge, Simmons started working for Cambridge’s Civic Unity Committee in the 1980s. She served as executive director of the committee, which was created to address racial discrimination against veterans.

Simmons did not respond to multiple requests for an interview for this piece.

In a 2024 interview with The Crimson, Simmons recalled deciding to run for Cambridge’s School Committee because the body at the time was considering making the school system’s “affirmative action officer” a part time role.

Opposed to the action, Simmons pulled papers for her first School Committee run, winning her first seat in elected office in 1991 after unsuccessful runs for both the School Committee and the Council. Simmons made racial equity in Cambridge Public Schools a top priority of her eight-year tenure in the role. She advocated for a study of racial achievement gaps in the school system and pushed for greater diversity among staff in the district.

Simmons is often seen as a progressive “townie.” She has firm roots in the city, a focus on constituent services, and a retail politics approach to campaigning but she also has held a decidedly progressive voting record on the Council.

The mayor has been a leader on affordable housing — Cambridge residents’ top issue — throughout her stint on the Council, recently voting to end single-family zoning city-wide and leading efforts to invest millions of dollars into the Affordable Housing Trust, a fund created by the Council for low-income housing development.

Simmons is endorsed by A Better Cambridge, a pro-development housing advocacy group, and Representative Ayanna S. Pressley (D-Mass.), who cited advancing affordable housing as one of her main reasons for endorsement of her slate.

While Simmons is one of the most progressive voices on the Council for affordable housing, when it comes to the city’s bike lanes — another central issue for voters — the mayor has consistently voted against policy orders to expand the network.

Simmons was not endorsed by the city’s main bike safety advocacy group, Cambridge Bicycle Safety, after refusing to take a pledge to complete the Cycling Safety Ordinance, a plan to install 25 miles of separated bike lanes in the city by Nov. 1, 2026, on time.

Still, the mayor has also been a leader on strengthening the city’s sanctuary city policies and expanding available resources for residents and city officials as the presence of federal immigration enforcement increases in the city.

In September, Simmons made a late appearance at a candidate forum hosted by ABC when she was delayed by receiving an emergency call from residents seeking help with an encounter with ICE agents, after many of the city’s nonprofit aid groups had already closed. After the incident, Simmons sponsored a policy order calling on City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05 to develop more emergency resources in case of an ICE encounter.

—Staff writer Shawn A. Boehmer can be reached at shawn.boehmer@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @ShawnBoehmer.

—Staff writer Jack B. Reardon can be reached at jack.reardon@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @JackBReardon.