Jennifer Dougherty
Encyclopedia
Jennifer P. Dougherty was elected Frederick
Frederick, Maryland
Frederick is a city in north-central Maryland. It is the county seat of Frederick County, the largest county by area in the state of Maryland. Frederick is an outlying community of the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is part of a greater...

, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

’s first female mayor
Mayor
In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....

 in 2001. Dougherty defeated 2-term incumbent Republican Mayor James S. Grimes.

Dougherty campaigned for re-election in 2005 but did not win the Democratic primary, losing to opponent Ron Young. Dougherty and Young both ran bitter, negative campaigns in which each attacked the other.

Dougherty was the Democratic candidate for Maryland's 6th congressional district
Maryland's 6th congressional district
Maryland's 6th congressional district elects a representative to the United States House of Representatives from the northwest part of the state. Today the district comprises all of Garrett, Allegany, Washington, Frederick and Carroll Counties, as well as portions of Montgomery, Baltimore, and...

 in 2008.

Early life

Dougherty graduated from Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School
Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School
Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School was founded in Washington, DC in 1799 as the Georgetown Academy for Young Ladies. It was also formally referred to as the Convent and Academy of the Visitation. Since 1799, the school has continued for over 200 years as a college preparatory school for women...

 in Washington, DC. She later graduated from Mount Saint Mary's University
Mount Saint Mary's University
Mount St. Mary's University, also known as The Mount, is a private, liberal arts, Catholic university in the Catoctin Mountains near Emmitsburg, Maryland. It was founded by French émigré Father John DuBois in 1808 and is the oldest independent Catholic college in the United States...

 in 1983 with a BA in History, magna cum laude. While a student at The Mount, Dougherty was a 4-year varsity field hockey player. She is the only woman, or person of any gender for that matter, in The Mount’s Athletic Hall of Fame honored for field hockey. Dougherty also wrote for The Mountain Echo for 4 years, serving as Editor-in-Chief in her senior year.

Professional career

Her professional career included operating Jennifer’s Restaurant on West Patrick Street (opened 1987; closed 2008) and Dougherty’s Irish Shop (1999-2006). She also served on the Board of Directors of Heartly House, the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce President (1999), and Rotary Club of Carroll Creek. More recently in December 2009, Dougherty and partner Bruce Rhoderick opened Magoo's Pub and Eatery at 1-A W. Second St in Frederick. Reviews are lukewarm (Frederick New Post, dated 3/12/10) "The food was satisfactory the Sunday night we went stopped by for dinner. My husband said the meatloaf was the real McCoy. "Meatloaf is the backbone of Ireland's tradition. You wish your mother would make as good a meatloaf." It could have been jazzed up a little more with spices, but the potatoes were fantastic, he said. "I don't know how they did it." My other guest said his shrimp and scallops were tasty. His only complaint would be there were not enough of them."

Political career

Dougherty’s tenure in Frederick’s City Hall was marked by accomplishments and challenges. The focus on improving the relationship with the Frederick Police Department by hiring a superior Chief of Police, Kim C. Dine, strengthened the community support for the police. Her tenure was marked with inciting divisiveness among her fellow politicians. A strong proponent of unions, she fought hard behind the scenes to get city workers to unionize. The workers finally voted against this initiative, and the labor support of Dougherty waned.

The creation of the Neighborhood Advisory Councils to better serve each neighborhood established a more effective communication link for the residents. Many saw her Neighborhood Advisory Committees (NACs) as a way to pander to select, influential neighborhood members who then fostered votes on her behalf. The City resisted speed bumps for years, at the request of fire and rescue professionals. Speed bumps became commonplace in neighborhoods where there were NACs supportive to Dougherty.

During her tenure, the City faced serious water shortages to due decades of growth and poor management of water and sewer infrastructure. Innovative legislation created a process to track and allocate water to new development in the City. A million-dollar temporary, mobile water treatment plant was installed that never was able to produce viable water. The water produced created plumbing problems for surrounding neighborhoods.

The long-stalled Carroll Creek Linear Park was finally completed with the investment of public effort and investment. With the completion of the public improvements, the City sought private investment of more than $100 million in the first phase bringing needed tax revenue to the City.

The Dougherty Administration also addressed aging infrastructure by creating an incentive for mall owners to improve their properties. The Golden Mile Tax Credit District resulted in more than $50 million in private investment and 1000 new jobs. Dougherty was diversified in her hiring, placing more women in high positions. After a failed re-election bid Dougherty went to work for the mother of one of her previous subordinates in real estate.

On November 19, 2007, Dougherty filed to run for Maryland's 6th congressional district
Maryland's 6th congressional district
Maryland's 6th congressional district elects a representative to the United States House of Representatives from the northwest part of the state. Today the district comprises all of Garrett, Allegany, Washington, Frederick and Carroll Counties, as well as portions of Montgomery, Baltimore, and...

. She won the primary and was the Democratic candidate for congress in 2008 against 8-term Republican Roscoe Bartlett
Roscoe Bartlett
Roscoe Gardner Bartlett, Ph.D. is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1993. He is a member of the Republican Party, and a member of the Tea Party Caucus...

. Despite the 6th district being heavily Republican (Bartlett won re-election in 2006 with 59% of the vote), Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot
Peter Franchot
Peter V. R. Franchot assumed office as the Comptroller of Maryland in January 2007. He was formerly a member of the Maryland House of Delegates, representing the 20th legislative district in Montgomery County, Maryland from 1987 to 2007.-Education and family:Franchot was born in New Haven,...

 predicted that Dougherty would unseat the incumbent, primarily due to Bartlett's embroilment in the scandal surrounding his failure to report over $1,000,000 in property sales to the government.

In mid-October 2008, a poll commissioned by Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley
Martin O'Malley
Martin Joseph O'Malley is an American Democratic politician who is currently serving as the 61st Governor of Maryland. Previously, he served as the mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007. He is currently the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association.-Early life, education and career:O'Malley...

 showed the 6th District race within 6 percentage points with 16% undecided. The poll did not include voters aged 18–24, or new registrations within the previous two months, groups which were expected to vote heavily Democratic in the election. Dougherty lost the general election.

Dougherty announced in 2009 that she would again seek the office of Mayor of the City of Frederick, but lost in the primary to newcomer Jason Judd. Dougherty has remained visible in Frederick politics since and there has been speculation that she may run again.

External links


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|bgcolor=#FFE8E8 |Roscoe Bartlett
Roscoe Bartlett
Roscoe Gardner Bartlett, Ph.D. is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1993. He is a member of the Republican Party, and a member of the Tea Party Caucus...


|bgcolor=#FFE8E8 |Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...


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|bgcolor=#DDEEFF |Jennifer Dougherty
|bgcolor=#DDEEFF |Democratic
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...


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|bgcolor=#9DFF9D |Gary Hoover
|bgcolor=#9DFF9D |Libertarian
Libertarian Party (United States)
The Libertarian Party is the third largest and fastest growing political party in the United States. The political platform of the Libertarian Party reflects its brand of libertarianism, favoring minimally regulated, laissez-faire markets, strong civil liberties, minimally regulated migration...


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