ABOUT ODETTE RAMOS
Odette Ramos is the first Hispanic person to be elected to any office in Baltimore City
As a City Councilwoman, Odette Ramos has been advocating for affordable housing and eliminating vacant and abandoned properties. She has passed several pieces of legislation to help advance this agenda.
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Councilwoman Ramos currently lives in Charles Village with her husband, John Spurrier, and daughter, Teresa.
Odette is Puerto Rican and grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico before coming to Baltimore in 1991 to attend Goucher College. She served as Student Government President at Goucher College for three years and graduated with honors in a self-created major called Social Justice. She continued her education to earn her Master's of Science in Public Policy from the Eagleton Institute at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
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After graduating from graduate school, Odette returned to Maryland to work for Delegate Jim Campbell in the Maryland House of Delegates. She then worked for long-standing United States Senator Barbara Mikulski.
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Odette has always been very involved in her community. As the Neighborhood Programs Director for Greater Homewood Community Corporation, she led the Neighborhood Congress in 1998. Then, she was the founding Director for the Baltimore Neighborhood Indicators Alliance, or BNIA.
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In 2005 she founded her own consulting firm, Strategic Management Consulting, where she worked with nonprofits and small business to help them become more efficient and effective. After several years of consulting, she was hired as Executive Director of the Community Development Network of Maryland in 2013, but left to be sworn in as District 14's Councilwoman.​
COMMUNITY
Councilwoman Odette Ramos greatly enjoys meeting and engaging with her constituents. She is often seen walking the District, visiting with constituents, logging 311 requests for service, and checking in with district businesses.
EXPERIENCE
Councilwoman Ramos has decades of experience in policy development and review. Though she specializes in housing policy, in particular affordable housing and tackling the vacant and abandoned property crisis, she is well versed in all factions of Baltimore City agencies and government.
Other Notable Accomplishments
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Elected to the Democratic State Central Committee for District 43 from 2014-2020
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Founding Chair of the Fair Housing Action Center of Maryland
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Co-founder of the Village Learning Place
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Co-founder and former co-chair of Baltimore Women United
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Served as President of the Abell Improvement Association
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Served as Chair of the Baltimore Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
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Served as Board Chair of the Baltimore Community Mediation Center
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Served on the Board of the Urban Children Foundation
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Served on the Board of Civic Works
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Served on the Board of Waverly Main Street
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Honorable Mention, Best Politician/Government Official, Baltimore Sun's 2022, 2023, and 2024 Best of Baltimore
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Baltimore Sun's Women to Watch 2020
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Influential Marylander by the Daily Record 2019 Emerge Maryland graduate