Houston is my home, and Houstonians are my family. I have spent 12 years at City Hall working with together with people in every community in our great city. You know me—I worked with Cora Johnson on Carverdale Park, Ruby Mosley on the hot sheet motel ordinance, I stopped the use of harmful pesticides in our parks, I created the Rainy Day Fund to help us recover from Hurricane Ike.

For the past 12 years, I have spent every day asking myself how I can make Houstonians’ lives better, because that’s what city government is all about. When I was a little girl growing up in Houston, my family didn’t have much money. My parents both worked and so did both my grandmothers — I come from a long line of working women.

One of my father’s jobs was a paper route and I used to help him on the weekends. I can still hear those newspapers hitting the driveways in the dark…one by one.

I treasured those times with my father and I learned some valuable lessons: You work hard, you do it right and you get the job done.

Those are the lessons I teach my children, those are the lessons I will bring to the job of Mayor of the City of Houston. Why do I want to be your Mayor? Because I can make a difference. Come with me to City Hall. Help me bring the brighter future to Houston that I know is ahead. Together, we can make Houston the city it could be, should be, can be and will be. Together, we can make a difference.