Shontel Lewis
2023 - Present
2027
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Shontel Lewis is a member of the Denver City Council in Colorado, representing District 8. She assumed office on July 17, 2023. Her current term ends on July 19, 2027.
Lewis ran for election to the Denver City Council to represent District 8 in Colorado. She won in the general runoff election on June 6, 2023.
Lewis completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2023. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Shontel Lewis was born in Denver, Colorado. Lewis earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Colorado Denver in 2011. Her career experience includes working as a consultant. Lewis served as a mayoral appointee to the Denver Women’s Commission and on the Walk Denver Policy Committee, Denveright Community Think Tank, and the Board of Radian|Place Matters. She also co-chaired the YMCA Advisory Board.[1]
Elections
2023
See also: City elections in Denver, Colorado (2023)
General runoff election
General runoff election for Denver City Council District 8
Shontel Lewis defeated Brad Revare in the general runoff election for Denver City Council District 8 on June 6, 2023.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Shontel Lewis (Nonpartisan)  | 51.2 | 7,476 |
 | Brad Revare (Nonpartisan) | 48.8 | 7,119 | |
| Total votes: 14,595 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
General election
General election for Denver City Council District 8
The following candidates ran in the general election for Denver City Council District 8 on April 4, 2023.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Shontel Lewis (Nonpartisan) | 35.7 | 5,083 |
| ✔ | | Brad Revare (Nonpartisan) | 33.5 | 4,764 |
| Leslie Twarogowski (Nonpartisan) | 13.5 | 1,916 | |
 | Tyler Drum (Nonpartisan) | 9.1 | 1,294 | |
 | Christian Steward (Nonpartisan) | 7.5 | 1,063 | |
| Rita Lewis (Nonpartisan) (Write-in) | 0.8 | 113 | |
| Total votes: 14,233 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Michelle Mondragon (Nonpartisan)
Endorsements
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Lewis received the following endorsements. To view a full list of Lewis's endorsements as published by their campaign, click here.
2018
General election
General election for Regional Transportation District Board of Directors District B
Shontel Lewis defeated Chris Martinez and JoyAnn Keener Ruscha in the general election for Regional Transportation District Board of Directors District B on November 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Shontel Lewis (Nonpartisan) | 47.8 | 28,514 |
| Chris Martinez (Nonpartisan) | 32.1 | 19,115 | |
 | JoyAnn Keener Ruscha (Nonpartisan) | 20.1 | 11,969 | |
| Total votes: 59,598 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign themes
2023
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Shontel Lewis completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2023. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Lewis' responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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Shontel M. Lewis was born and raised in historic Five Points, and has lived in several neighborhoods throughout District 8. She is a proud graduate of Manual High School where she became the proud Mother to an amazing son, Diego. In 2016, she transitioned from an affordable housing rental into home ownership in the East Colfax neighborhood following displacement from Five Points due to rising housing costs. This experience helped to expand her focus and advocacy for affordable rentals units as well as a path to home ownership as a wealth-building tool.
Shontel was elected to serve on the Board of the Regional Transportation District (RTD) in 2018, District B representing Denver, Aurora, and Adams county. During her time she served as the inaugural Chair of the Performance Committee helping to facilitate the development of the agency’s strategic priorities and direction in collaboration with the CEO.
Most recently she worked as the Vice President for the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless where she developed and oversaw programmatic, policy, and operational strategies for justice, equity, inclusion, and diversity. Prior to that Shontel served as the Director of Engagement and Strategy at the Denver Public Schools where she lead a team to plan, design and implement community engagement throughout the district and improve broad stakeholder engagement.
She currently lives in NE Park Hill where she enjoys access to local parks and the farmers markets.
- The Health of our city is the Wealth of Our City. Too frequently, we measure the progress of our city in dollars when we should be prioritizing our social determinants of health — affordable housing, healthy and affordable food, quality health care, education and job training, community based resources, frequent and effective transit, and a flourishing culture. As your next City Councillor, I am committing myself towards making District 8 the healthiest District to live in in the City and County of Denver, while improving both individual and community health outcomes across the entire city.
- Housing is a top issue for nearly everyone in Denver —an out-of-control housing market is making our city less and less affordable, forcing workers to either give up more and more of their disposable income or leave the community entirely. District 8 deserves a Councilmember who will step up, champion major policy changes, and create a welcoming community where working class people can afford to live.
- As an RTD Director for District B, I know the vital role that public transit serves for our Denver community, and the many challenges of meeting the transportation needs of our diverse community. On the next City Council, there will be no fiercer advocate for our transit community or when it comes to justice and equity in Denver’s transportation policies. Denver deserves a city with exceptional transportation services and infrastructure — let’s build a city where people have all the safe and effective mobility options they need.
I am a firm believer in representative government, that elected officials should be accessible and accountable to each and every one of their constituents. Too often, residents of Denver feel they are heard, but not listened to.
Expand Participatory Budgeting
Increase accessibility of City Council meetings, including time for public comment
Digital engagement opportunities in Council Business beyond public testimony
Community-led issue advisory committees for the District 8 Office
I believe in an evidence-based, trauma-informed approach to public safety and policing, where restorative policy is the first resort and poverty or mental illness are not treated as crimes. Denver’s public safety policy should aim to address the underlying causes of community division and dysfunction, moving us beyond punitive reflex and toward deeper understandings of harm, healing, and reconciliation.
When we talk about climate justice, we’re talking about a critical lens to examine and improve all of our social and economic practices towards a sustainable and just future. This includes everything from how we think about public health, to protecting air and water, to building and maintaining infrastructure, to how we move people and goods around, and to what economic practices are rewarded or restricted by public policy.
It means understanding how poverty is a barrier to climate action, as well as a risk magnifier for climate-related harms. It means cultivating practices of stewardship toward our natural systems. It means committing, in our part of the world here in the City of Denver, to the proposition that nobody should be left behind in the transition to a sustainable future.
When communities of color voice their issues with how their communities are policed, too often the communities' concerns are not listened to. Selective enforcement of law undermines the public trust, and makes our communities less safe. As your District 8 Councillor tasked with oversight of these public agents, I will hold Denver Police accountable to their community and to the community’s safety needs.
The nationally-recognized mental health responder unit for Denver is hoping to expand in the coming years, reducing the need for law enforcement officers in dealing with persons experiencing a mental health crisis. With overdose deaths at an extremely high level and deaths of despair on the rise, it is critical that the next council must protect this program and its life-saving mission.
During my time on the RTD board, I did work to implement policies to keep our city safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. My advocacy for RTD frontline staff, included: ensuring access to PPE, the implementation of rear-door boarding, and advocacy of social distancing for transit providers throughout the state of Colorado.
One area is the health of our city's residents including nutrition, clean air and water, physical fitness and mental health. Housing is another area where Shontel is looking at creating a social housing authority, housing first policies and implementing land use reform and tenant protections. Shontel plans to address transportation issues and supports recommitting Denver to the Vision Zero policy, and move with swift urgency to install life-saving traffic calming infrastructure, as well as, create a fully integrated, accessible, and protected city-wide bike network.
SEIU Local 105, Colorado Working Families Party, Sierra Club of Colorado, Denver Area Labor Federation, Jane Fonda Climate Pac, Run on Climate, AFSCME Council 18, Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Communication Workers of America (CWA), Vote Pro Choice, LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, Faith in Colorado, LPAC, IATSE #7, Denver DSA, UFCW Local 7, YIMBY Denver, Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance.
Please view the website for the many community member endorsements.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
Note: Community Questions were submitted by the public and chosen for inclusion by a volunteer advisory board. The chosen questions were modified by staff to adhere to Ballotpedia’s neutrality standards. To learn more about Ballotpedia’s Candidate Connection Expansion Project, click here.
See also
2023 Elections
External links
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Candidate Denver City Council District 8 |
Officeholder Denver City Council District 8 |
Personal |
Footnotes
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on May 24, 2023
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Christopher Herndon |
Denver City Council District 8 2023-Present |
Succeeded by - |
| Preceded by - |
Regional Transportation District Board of Directors District B 2019-2022 |
Succeeded by - |
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