Why THAW CEO Saunteel Jenkins wants to be Detroit’s next mayor

Nonprofit CEO Saunteel Jenkins said the senseless death of her young brother shaped a lifelong commitment to improving social conditions in Detroit, culminating in her decision to run for mayor in 2025. 

Her brother Jovan was fatally shot at the age of 14 while walking home with friends from playing basketball at St. Suzanne Cody Rouge Community Resource Center. Jenkins launched her campaign on Tuesday from the same gym, 34 years later. Jovan’s murderer, who pulled a gun after demanding the boy’s Duke University basketball jacket, has never been brought to justice. 

BridgeDetroit joined Jenkins in December for tea to discuss her vision for the city’s future. Jenkins opened the conversation by reflecting on how her brother’s killing continues to drive her community-building efforts. 

Jenkins is the third candidate to formally enter the race, behind Council President Mary Sheffield and businessman Joel Hasshiim. Jenkins is also a council president but left the position in 2014 to lead The Heat and Warmth Fund. She’s spent the last decade there as CEO, helping low-income families pay utility bills and improving energy efficiency in older homes.

Editor’s note: This interview has been slightly edited for length and clarity.

BridgeDetroit: You’ve been focused on youth violence prevention going back to your time on the City Council. How did your brother’s death influence the work you’ve done? 

Jenkins: I’ll tell you about the day my brother died. I started working at Focus: HOPE when I was 17. I lived probably a mile-and-a-half from my parents, but I would go over there a lot of days after work because they always had food. 

I was cooking so that when my brother and sister got home they would have dinner. It was probably 5:30 p.m. and the phone rang. I answered because my father was asleep, and there was a frantic voice on the other end.

“They shot Jovan.” He was with his two best friends and their mother was on the phone. I threw on my boots and coat. 

A car pulled up on the boys and they said “Hey, give me that jacket.” My brother’s friends said they saw a gun come out of the car and they said “Run.” My brother went to turn and they shot him. One bullet, nine millimeter. Right through his heart, out his back. 

I get to the corner and I see a crowd of people standing over my brother. He’s on the ground, blood coming out of his mouth. His eyes are open. I knew he was dead. 

I can literally see him now. It’s never left me. His friends were in therapy longer than we were because they saw it. They were just babies.

I was studying social work at Wayne State, going part-time and working full-time. When I got to my anger phase of grief, I wanted to quit. My brother was a good kid. He didn’t bother anybody. He would, without shame, hug and kiss his big sister and mother. If they could kill him over a jacket, I was like “I can’t help anybody.”

When I told my mother I was quitting school, she told me that my brother had lived a good life. Even though he didn’t have everything he wanted, he always had love. The kids who thought his jacket was worth more than his life needed some love. They needed some nurturing. I needed to finish and get my degree in social work to help kids like that, and then kids like my brother would be safe.

My brother’s body was not even cold, but my mother could find that kind of compassion for the kids that took his life. That’s what sticks with me: My mother’s strength and compassion and ability to have that kind of empathy, even when she’s in pain.

There are no throwaway kids. When you take care of the least of us, everybody is better off. 

BridgeDetroit: Detroit’s community violence intervention program aims to stop interactions like that from escalating into fatal violence. Do you feel safety has improved, has Detroit made strides toward preventing other families from going through what you experienced? 

Jenkins: I’d say yes and no. Whether you’re celebrating a lower crime rate in the city depends on what neighborhood you live in, right? If you’re in a neighborhood where you know people who are getting killed, you don’t feel safer. These statistics or the story in the paper means nothing to you. If anything it means you feel forgotten. 

When my brother was killed in 1991 we stopped watching the news probably for two or three weeks. It was so unheard of for a 14-year-old to be shot over a jacket. Now it happens so much, and we’re so used to it as a society. 

There are more guns on the streets. It’s happening so often we’re almost desensitized to it. I would not say crime is better, I would say it’s worse. 

There are fewer recreational options today than there were when my brother was a kid. Horrific as what happened to him was, he had just left a safe space. We had many safe spaces across the city that kids could walk to. That is not true today in the same way. 

If everybody’s saying ‘Great job, we fixed it,’ and you’re looking around you and you know that it’s not fixed, then it feeds into the narrative that maybe we’re not worthy of all these great things that are happening. That should not be the message ever. 

BridgeDetroit: There’s been a big difference in the city’s financial position since when you were making decisions about budget cuts and emergency managers on the City Council. What is the opportunity you see in being mayor now, and what challenges do you see with the expiration of pandemic funds and pension payments coming back? 

Jenkins: You’re stealing my lines. One of the things I talk often about is being at the council table during that time when we were making so many tough decisions. It required a lot of soul-searching because I had to make sure my decisions were based on data and what was best for citizens in the city. 

Fast forwarding to where we are now is great, but this wouldn’t have happened without the bankruptcy. We’re still not where we need to be. It’s very fragile and our next mayor will determine the trajectory of the city for generations. 

If we go backwards we won’t get another chance in any of our lifetimes.

I think we have some really good elected officials that came before us, but I think too often the decisions might have been made for today, not for the future. It’s going to be important for the next mayor to understand it and to be financially astute, to have good people around them, and to be somebody who does their research.

BridgeDetroit: How has your experience running The Heat And Warmth Fund prepared you to be mayor? 

Jenkins: As CEO, I had to have the vision and strategy to deliver on our mission. The buck stops with me. It’s a different level of responsibility and accountability. You have to be able to identify, nurture, and retain good talent. None of this is done by one person. Any good organization is good because there are lots of good people making that happen.

Being at THAW has been an amazing opportunity for me to help people. I know when my dad missed a paycheck when he got hurt on the job, we had our lights cut off. We had our gas and water cut. As a kid, that’s tough. I can imagine as a parent it was even tougher. The embarrassment of not being able to take care of your family has got to be tough.

The pride in being able to help families is indescribable. It’s also a daily reminder of how much still is in this city, as we hear all the stories about the renaissance and the resurgence. A lot of people still feel unsafe and a lot of people are still struggling.

When we launched our water program in 2015, we got 14,000 calls in one day. It almost shut down our call center.

BridgeDetroit: Housing affordability and home repair needs seem tied to those problems. How do we address those problems more directly? 

Jenkins: There are a lot of homes in disrepair where the people may not qualify for THAW’s help. They’re right near what used to be called the working poor. They’re just barely paying their mortgage so they definitely can’t fix a $10,000 roof. 

Even for people who qualify for our energy efficiency program, if there’s a hole in the roof it automatically disqualifies them. The thinking behind the policy is if I replace your furnace it’s not going to reduce your energy costs because the heat is going out the roof. 

I spent a lot of time in Lansing talking to people about water, about the need for home repairs, about the need for the plumbing repairs, and we now have state funding that is helping us do both.

There are no quick fixes and easy solutions. Things require strategic, intentional, sustained effort. 

BridgeDetroit: Do you have policy ideas that you would roll out immediately? 

Jenkins: The focus is on economic development, job opportunities for Detroiters, public safety, public transit, and access to public services for everybody. It’s about creating opportunities from cradle to career. 

I would love to see more of the Marygrove campus model. You create this fantastic educational environment, you bring in nonprofits, you bring in community services, and now everybody wants their kid to go there. Kids within one mile get first dibs, kids within two miles get second dibs. So there are families moving into the Live6 neighborhood because they want that opportunity. 

If we’re creating those cradle-to-career opportunities we’re also rebuilding neighborhoods. We still need other options as well, because every kid is not going to be able to go there. The mayor and the schools should be tied at the hip.

Whether the mayor runs it or not can be debated, but for us to really have a comeback, to attract and keep families, we’re going to need options for families to educate their kids. 

BridgeDetroit: There was a conversation when you were on the City Council about whether the mayor should run the school board. You opposed it then, but now are more open to the idea. Why? 

Jenkins: It is something we should be talking about because a true revitalization will require good schools. It will require options and tackling negative perceptions. We have some good schools. Kids are learning in Detroit public schools, but the perception is they’re not. 

I had a community activist say to me ‘Our kids are like refugees.’ That’s harsh, when they said it I clutched my pearls. But when you think about it, Detroit schools are everywhere. We don’t know where they are because there is no comprehensive way to keep track. 

The problems have gotten worse. For the city to continue and grow and sustain that growth, we have to have a school system that people believe in. 

BridgeDetroit: Quality education is also tied to the population decline issue. How else would you convince people to move to and stay in Detroit? 

Jenkins: We need to invest in the culture of education. We should make it something that’s cool to attain, that’s applauded, and that everybody is proud of so that our kids know this is something to be achieved. 

One of the other really controversial things when I was at City Council was the capital bond for (the former) Detroit Public Schools. There were a lot of people against it. My thing was, how are we telling kids that education is important and then sending them into a building that’s crumbling? 

On attracting teachers, one of the things I’d like to do in partnership with the schools: The city could say, ‘If you’re going to teach here in Detroit we have a house we will give you and a housing repair grant.’ There could be a stipulation for how long you have to live and teach here. It’s helping the schools, rebuilding neighborhoods, and bringing taxpayers here. 

BridgeDetroit: We’re asking all the candidates about the relationship between downtown development and the neighborhoods. Is there anything you would do differently around tax subsidies or community benefits? What’s your relationship with the business community like? 

Jenkins: I have a good relationship with the business community, and I think what you would hear from the business community is, even in times where I didn’t agree, they knew where I stood and why. 

If you’re creating these massive developments and getting tax incentives, the business that’s creating it should not be insular. Detroit-based businesses should have an opportunity to participate. If you’re not asking for money you can build it however you want. 

We need to complete our Master Plan. If the District 1 Master Plan calls for grocery stores and movie theaters, we say to developers that we have incentives for them for those things versus waiting for developers. It would reduce red tape in this city. Part of the red tape is because our Master Plan hasn’t been updated in such a while that everything is a special use. You have to go through the mayor’s office and City Council. 

BridgeDetroit: At Mary Sheffield’s campaign launch, supporters talked about how Detroit is ready for a woman mayor – but it has to be the right woman. How will you navigate comparisons to her?

Jenkins: The city should be ready for a woman and I agree that it has to be the right leader. I will tell you what I bring to the table that I believe makes me more qualified than any other candidate, not just a woman candidate.

It’s my executive experience over a decade of being a CEO, and that’s what the mayor is, the CEO of the city. Of the names we’ve heard so far, only one of us has been a CEO. I have legislative experience as a City Council staff person, chief of staff, and as a council president. I’ve worked in education, I’ve worked in the nonprofit and for-profit sector. 

My experience has uniquely prepared me for this position, and my life has uniquely prepared me for this position. Gun violence, hardship, economic hardship, a survivor of breast cancer, a survivor of domestic violence, I know personally so many of the things that Detroiters are dealing with. All of those things together make me uniquely qualified for this moment in the city of Detroit.