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Portia Wilson Rochelle
Portia Wilson Rochelle ran for election to the Raleigh City Council to represent District C in North Carolina. She lost in the general election on November 5, 2024.
Rochelle completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Portia Wilson Rochelle was born in Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina. She earned an associate degree in legal secretarial science from Wake Technical Institute in 1972, a bachelor's degree in liberal studies from Shaw University in in 1999, a master's of divinity from Shaw University Divinity School in 2002, and a doctorate of ministry from Drew University in 2012. Rochelle's career experience includes working as a youth minister with Macedonia New Life Church and as an adjunct professor. She founded A Word for Transformation Ministry in 2002. Rochelle was appointed to serve on the executive board of the Raleigh-Apex branch of the NAACP as the chair of religious affairs from 2004 to 2008.[1]
As of 2024, Rochelle was affiliated with the NAACP, the Wake County Education Coalition, the Raleigh Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, and the Shaw University Alumni Association.[2]
Elections
2024
See also: City elections in Raleigh, North Carolina (2024)
General election
General election for Raleigh City Council District C
The following candidates ran in the general election for Raleigh City Council District C on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Corey Branch (Nonpartisan) | 40.1 | 15,676 |
| Tolulope Omokaiye (Nonpartisan) | 20.1 | 7,847 | ||
 | DaQuanta Copeland (Nonpartisan) | 10.4 | 4,060 | |
 | Portia Wilson Rochelle (Nonpartisan)  | 8.6 | 3,351 | |
| Tomara DeCosta (Nonpartisan) | 8.1 | 3,155 | ||
 | Jared Ollison (Nonpartisan) | 7.5 | 2,918 | |
| Daniel Grant-King (Nonpartisan) | 5.0 | 1,956 | ||
| Other/Write-in votes | 0.4 | 149 | ||
| Total votes: 39,112 | |||
| = 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. | ||||
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Endorsements
Rochelle received the following endorsements.
2022
See also: City elections in Raleigh, North Carolina (2022)
General election
General election for Raleigh City Council At-large (2 seats)
The following candidates ran in the general election for Raleigh City Council At-large on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Stormie Forte (Nonpartisan) | 23.2 | 61,026 |
| ✔ |  | Jonathan Melton (Nonpartisan) | 19.2 | 50,539 |
 | Anne Franklin (Nonpartisan) | 14.8 | 38,975 | |
 | John Odom (Nonpartisan) | 14.0 | 36,700 | |
 | James Bledsoe (Nonpartisan) | 11.9 | 31,257 | |
| Portia Wilson Rochelle (Nonpartisan) | 9.6 | 25,256 | |
 | Joshua Bradley (Nonpartisan) | 6.9 | 18,143 | |
| Other/Write-in votes | 0.4 | 1,069 | ||
| Total votes: 262,965 | |||
| = 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. | ||||
2019
See also: City elections in Raleigh, North Carolina (2019)
General election
General election for Raleigh City Council At-large (2 seats)
The following candidates ran in the general election for Raleigh City Council At-large on October 8, 2019.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Nicole Stewart (Nonpartisan) | 33.7 | 30,960 |
| ✔ | | Jonathan Melton (Nonpartisan) | 23.1 | 21,183 |
 | Russ Stephenson (Nonpartisan) | 19.4 | 17,805 | |
| Portia Wilson Rochelle (Nonpartisan) | 12.5 | 11,449 | |
 | Carlie Allison Spencer (Nonpartisan) | 6.0 | 5,502 | |
| James Bledsoe (Nonpartisan) | 4.9 | 4,484 | |
| Other/Write-in votes | 0.4 | 382 | ||
| Total votes: 91,765 | |||
| = 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
2024
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Portia Wilson Rochelle completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Rochelle'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 am a community servant for Raleigh and surrounding cities. As President of Raleigh-Apex NAACP I was on the frontline advocating on employment issues, landlord issues, police brutality, etc for citizens of Apex, Cary, Fuquay-Varina, Garner, Holly Springs, Morrisville, and Raleigh. Now, I would like to serve on the Council as a policymaker to help avoid some of these issues that our citizens have to deal with.
I am an experienced community leader; problem solver; issue-driven leader. I lead with courage, dedication and compassion.- 1) Housing: We need to reexamine how growth development affects each citizen. Raleigh faces a critical challenge with over 6,000 individuals seeking homelessness support services, as reported by Raleigh Rescue Mission. The 2023 Wake County Point in Time Count revealed that more than 900 individuals experience homelessness in the county on any given night (a 200 percent increase since 2020). Homelessness and unaffordable housing: crisis is nationwide. The National Low Income Housing Coalition has released the 2024 Out of Reach (OOR): The High Cost of Housing report. This annual report highlights the gap between wages and cost of housing across the United States.
- 2) Equity in pay: All citizens should make a minimum living wage of at least $15 an hour. Raising the minimum wage helps workers find affordable housing, sustains local business, and reduces crime. b) Fair wages--This year, the housing wage for our state is $25.21, which is an increase from last year’s housing wage of- $21.54. North Carolina is now ranked 28th (1 being the highest wage, 50 being the lowest) for its 2 Bedroom Housing Wage when compared to other states. A housing wage of $25.21 means that someone earning minimum wage in North Carolina ($7.25/hr) would have to work at least 139 hours per week to afford a 2-Bedroom Rental Home at Fair Market Rent (FMR), or 3.5 full time jobs. The housing wage in Raleigh is $31.65.
- 3) Community engagement – the Council has not involved citizen comments and opinions on many issues that affect them. Recently they changed terms of office and bypassed public comment. This needs to cease. We have yet to recover from their decision to dismantle the CAC’s.
2) UE Local 150
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.
2022
Portia Wilson Rochelle did not complete Ballotpedia's 2022 Candidate Connection survey.
2019
Portia Wilson Rochelle did not complete Ballotpedia's 2019 Candidate Connection survey.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
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Candidate Raleigh City Council District C |
Personal |
Footnotes
- ↑ RWAC Hall of Fame Honorees, "Portia Wilson Rochelle," accessed August 25, 2019
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on October 8, 2024
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