![]() Parker likely honed those skills in Austin. "She truly listens to people and keeps an open mind," McCall said. Parker helped broker those relationships. To make the partnership work, institutions needed to agree not only to take students receiving financial support from T3, but also provide services to the students to ensure they succeeded, he said. The partnership includes TCU, UT Arlington, Tarleton State, Texas Wesleyan, Tarrant County College and UNT Dallas. The role involved getting a lot of often competing institutions to agree, McCall said. Parker had demonstrated an ability to understand both what the younger workforce wants and how to recruit talented people to projects, he said. McCall had met Parker around 2012 when he worked at Miles Foundation, and said the advisory council establishing T3 slowly began to float the idea of bringing her onboard as the founding CEO. The nonprofit hopes to improve student outcomes in job placement by connecting low income Fort Worth school district students to scholarships and help them navigate higher education.Īt the time Parker was chief of staff for the mayor and City Council. ![]() Jay McCall, program manager for the Rainwater Foundation, recalled Parker being instrumental in helping the foundation navigate the city as it worked to establish what would become the Tarrant To and Through Partnership. "She's going to lead us through those times." "She's going to have to be very innovative in a time when the city is growing so fast," Betsy Price, the city's mayor for a decade, said after Parker won the June runoff. She'll face tough challenges with a city that has grown by 25% in the past decade, several new council colleagues with limited government experience and the looming need to reconcile wide differences in the diverse city. They see a smart woman who represents the kind of young professionals Fort Worth needs to attract as well as a fair arbiter capable of getting diverging parties to agree. Parker supporters have a lot of confidence she's the right person for the job. "There's a new younger generation taking the torch and willing to lead. "We'll be faced every night with 'Am I doing the right job for those kids, for my children?' " Parker said. This is a time when the city can improve the quality of life for families in every neighborhood, she said. The chaos of family life will be an asset to Fort Worth, Parker said in an interview recently, noting that her new council colleagues represent more than 20 children between their families and extended families. This is not an uncommon scene at Parker's home, which she described in a text as "maybe mass chaos!" As Fort Worth's next mayor Parker, 37, must lead a city of more than 900,000 that, like her son Laney, doesn't always know which direction it wants to go. ![]() It seemed an appropriate middle ground had been found in this brief impasse. The brown boots on his feet weren't to his liking though, so he kicked them off in favor of some Nikes, and commenced climbing a large decorative rock. 18-A debate on whether Mattie Parker's 5-year-old son would don appropriate clothes in time for her swearing in ceremony was answered when he swiftly appeared in the foyer fully dressed, but definitely shy. How family, Texas politics and a tiny town shaped Fort Worth's mayor ![]()
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