Cynthia Willard-Lewis

Who is Cynthia Willard-Lewis?

Cynthia W. Willard-Lewis is a Democratic Party former member of the Louisiana State Senate, being elected from District 2 in an October 2, 2010 special election to replace Ann Duplesis, who resigned to take a position in Mayor Mitch Landrieu's administration. She was displaced by redistricting. The daughter of Dr Elliot Willard and Mary Jane Willard, Cynthia Willard-Lewis represented District 100 in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1993 to 2000 when she was elected to the City Council. She is a graduate of Xavier University of Louisiana, where she was a member of Zeta Phi Beta sorority. Willard-Lewis is a former first runner-up in the Black Miss America Pageant.

In 2007, when Oliver Thomas was eliminated from an at-large seat on the Council because of conviction for bribery, Willard-Lewis attempted to win the at-large seat but was defeated by then-former Councilwoman Jacquelyn Brechtel Clarkson in a special election reported nationwide as it changed the Council's racial majority. In 2006 Willard-Lewis, together with Mayor Ray Nagin supported a landfill project's opponents led by then-future U.S. Representative Republican Joseph Cao. In 2009 Willard-Lewis was back in the news for telling fellow Councilwoman Stacy Head to "sit down with your prop" when Head was displaying a poster critical of the Orleans Parish garbage-collection fees—a discussion which preceded the New Orleans e-mail controversy.