With nearly 80% of the vote, on November 6, 2007, with tremendous community support, MARIA D. QUINONES-SANCHEZ made history by becoming the first Puerto Rican/Latino elected to a district City Council seat and the first Latina to serve on the Philadelphia City Council. She was sworn in on January 7, 2008 for a four year term.
In City Council, Councilwoman Sanchez serves as Chair of the Committee of Licenses and Inspections, Vice Chair of the Streets and Services and also serves on Appropriations; Labor and Civil Service; Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs; Commerce and Economic Development; Public Health and Human Services; Education; Housing, Neighborhood Development and the Homeless and the Disabled and the Handicapped. Maria is a veteran activist with over 22 years of service to the City of Philadelphia, its constituents and neighborhoods, the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and beyond. She has advocated tirelessly for economic development, women’s and workers’ rights, family wages, voter registration, health care availability and other issues of importance to Philadelphia and Commonwealth residents and communities.
Prior to serving on City Council, María D. Quiñones-Sánchez served as the Regional Director for the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration (PRFAA), serving Pennsylvania and Delaware. At PRFAA, Maria mounted a historic, seven-city voter registration and Get-Out-the-Vote (GOTV) campaign registering over 32,000 new voters and produced an estimated increase of 35% of the Latino turnout in the campaign’s targeted areas.
Maria is a founding member of the Pennsylvania Statewide Latino Coalition and served as its first Co-Chair of the Board of Directors. From June 1996 to June 2000 she served as the first female and youngest Executive Director of ASPIRA, the largest Latino educational institution in Pennsylvania. Her accomplishments include the creation of the first bilingual charter school in Pennsylvania (Eugenio Maria de Hostos Community Charter School), and the development of a multi-million dollar school and administrative office building in her neighborhood of Hunting Park.
From 1988-1996, she served in several city government positions including Deputy Commissioner of Elections and Legislative Assistant in City Council. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Pennsylvania Women’s Campaign Fund, a statewide political action committee working to elect progressive women to the State Legislature.
She is married to Tomas Sanchez and they have two sons, Edgar and Tomasito. Having grown up in the Hunting Park section of the city, she now resides in the eastern North Philadelphia neighborhood of Norris Square.
