Cedric Dean
Cedric Dean (Democratic Party) ran for election to the Charlotte City Council to represent District 4 in North Carolina. He lost in the Democratic primary on May 17, 2022.
Dean completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Cedric Dean was born in Charlotte, North Carolina. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2021. Dean's career experience includes working as a nonprofit president, peer support specialist, reentry specialist, and community health worker.[1]
Elections
2022
See also: City elections in Charlotte, North Carolina (2022)
General election
General election for Charlotte City Council District 4
Incumbent Renee Perkins Johnson won election in the general election for Charlotte City Council District 4 on July 26, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Renee Perkins Johnson (D) | 94.8 | 5,986 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 5.2 | 328 | ||
| Total votes: 6,314 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Charlotte City Council District 4
Incumbent Renee Perkins Johnson defeated Darlene Heater and Cedric Dean in the Democratic primary for Charlotte City Council District 4 on May 17, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Renee Perkins Johnson | 56.6 | 4,684 |
| Darlene Heater | 23.8 | 1,968 | ||
 | Cedric Dean | 19.6 | 1,618 | |
| Total votes: 8,270 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign themes
2022
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Cedric Dean completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Dean's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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I was expelled from CMS, incarcerated at 16 years old, sentenced to serve life in prison at the age of 22, published 20 books from prison, received a Civil Service and Call to Service award for being a PEACEKEEPER, founded a national nonprofit, worked for CMPD and MCSO, as a community engagement coordinator, started a reentry home for returning citizens and attended the State of the Union in 2019. As a nonprofit president, I am out in the community every single day. I take time to listen, learn, and lead - to ensure personal accountability to the people I serve. People know me, people trust me and people depend on me. Specifically, I am accessible to all people – 7 days a week / 24 hours a day via my cell phone 704-492-1533. If you google CEDRIC DEAN my cell number comes up with my name.
- I am running to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous Charlotte. I chose to run for the City Council at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren.
- Economic Mobility for ALL. I am running to increase the number and diversity of community, government, private, philanthropic, and academic actors working together to dramatically increase economic mobility and opportunity and reduce poverty and violent crime in Charlotte.
- I plan to engage young voters with the issues that are nearest and dearest to their hearts. College debt and a lack of jobs dealt some of the most crippling blows to the financial futures of many young voters during the pandemic. Because unemployment rates are so high, millennials need to be shown how to find their footing in a new economy. Policy change and reform in areas affecting college students, such as debt forgiveness and healthcare, very critical now more than ever. I intend to show youth voters who want to inspire change how I best represent their needs. No other District 4 candidate is going to vote in the interest of young people like me.
Safe neighborhoods and support our police officers
Less regulation & give tax credits for small businesses
Provide additional funding for preservation of trees, green spaces and cultural arts
Create new opportunities for affordable housing and protect property values
My public safety philosophy has been informed by my time as a CMPD lead community contractor with the Community Empowerment Initiative, where I helped deliver some of the safest solutions to teen violence in recent history, and I plan to continue that trend when I become District 4 Councilman.
My public safety plan is designed to bring Charlotte fully into 21st Century policing by prioritizing diversity, modern comprehensive training, and providing our officers the resources to prioritize community policing.
The modern police force needs to be able to provide a nuanced response to the community and that requires hiring and training a police force that is prepared to do more than simply arrest and incarcerate our community. While arrests for violent criminals are of course necessary, we simply cannot arrest our way out of a crime wave. We need a comprehensive approach. Diversion and police alternatives are an integral part of managing Charlotte’s criminal justice system. More importantly, those tactics, responsibly deployed, have granted countless Charlotteans a second chance at becoming productive members of our society.
We will ensure that this is a crime spike and not the new normal by reassigning non-sworn personnel to non-emergencies, redeploying the police force for a robust presence at shopping centers, gas stations, clubs and bars, and hiring more officers to fill the gaps we currently have in the department.
I am one of the countless millions who drew inspiration from Nelson Mandela’s life. My first political action, the first thing I ever did that involved an issue or a policy or politics was a protest against the 100-to-1 racial disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine. I would study his words and his writings. The day he was released from prison gave me a sense of what human beings can do when they’re guided by their hopes and not by their fears. And like so many behind bars, I cannot fully imagine my own life without the example that Nelson Mandela set.
Learn structure, procedures and processes. All three responsibilities are interrelated.
Because no offense.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2022 Elections
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on May 15, 2022
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