Sharetta Smith is the 59th Mayor of Lima and the first woman and first African American to be elected as the city’s chief executive. With an agenda focused on safe and livable neighborhoods; job creation and economic development; youth, recreation and parks; quality, affordable housing; and improving city operations, she started her first term with a focus on making government more accessible and responsive to citizens.

A daughter of our city, Mayor Smith was raised with her younger sister in the Greenfield Heights neighborhood in south Lima and is a proud graduate of Perry High School. After working in the private sector managing purchasing and logistics contracts for a construction services firm, Mayor Smith started her public service career working as a public defender representing hundreds of clients who could not afford a private attorney. She later served six terms as a Magistrate Judge, before returning home to Lima to serve as former Lima Mayor David Berger’s Chief of Staff.

As Chief of Staff, Mayor Smith helped develop and implement smart solutions for entrenched problems in local government, including having three of Lima’s most blighted census tracts designated by the federal government as Opportunity Zones to attract investors and spur economic development; leading a solutions-driven, community-wide conversation about the future of housing with the creation of the Lima Housing Task Force; collaborating with youth serving agencies throughout the city and county to create an afterschool program for middle-school youth; and working with Lima City Council and the Lima Civil Service Board to establish the position of Chief Technology officer to move city operations into the 21st century by leveraging technology to improve service delivery.

As Mayor, she has shown that she is not afraid to tackle the big issues facing the City of Lima. Through on-going collaboration with community stakeholders she is working to improve citizen engagement in local government; create more opportunities for Lima’s small business owners and entrepreneurs; increase home ownership; and implement a multi-faceted approach to address crime through prevention, intervention, and enforcement.

Mayor Smith holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Toledo, a Juris Doctorate from the Ohio Northern University Pettit College of Law, and a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Phoenix.  In 2021, she was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Law from Ohio Northern. She is also a graduate of Allen Lima Leadership, Leadership Ohio, the Bloomberg Harvard City Leader Initiative, and the Ohio State University John Glenn School of Public Affairs Public Leadership Academy.