Otis Rolley

Otis France Rolley (born Otis Rolley, III on August 5, 1974) was the seventh Director of Planning for the City of Baltimore, Maryland, serving from July 2003 until 2007. He was a Democratic candidate for mayor of Baltimore in 2011.

Rolley was raised by his mother and stepfather, Andrea Catherine Rolley and Otis Rolley, Jr. He has seven siblings. Rolley grew up in Jersey City, New Jersey. He attended Sacred Heart Catholic grammar school and Lincoln High School. At Lincoln, he participated in the Model Program, which offered challenging top tier classes to its students. In his junior year, Rolley was accepted into the Governor’s School of Public Issues, one of five Governor’s Schools of New Jersey.

After graduating from Lincoln, Rolley attended Rutgers College and was admitted into the school’s Honors Program. At Rutgers, he was a James Dickson Carr Scholar and a recipient of the Buttonwood Scholarship. In his junior year at Rutgers College, Rolley was accepted into the Eagleton Institute of Politics as an Undergraduate Associate. Through special seminars and discussions with government officials and political practitioners, he explored applications of political science to the practice and processes of American politics.

During that same academic year, 1994–1995, the president of Rutgers University, Dr. Francis Lawrence, made a racist statement about African Americans. Rolley, among others, was outraged by Dr. Lawrence’s comments to a group of professors regarding the “disadvantaged genetic background of African Americans” and worked with a coalition to remove Dr. Lawrence from his post. Rolley served in the leadership of the United Students Coalition, leading media outreach and organizing protests and acts of civil disobedience. He appeared on the Today Show with Bryant Gumbel and Teen Summit on BET. During that time, he was also profiled and quoted in The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Star-Ledger of New Jersey. He was arrested in April 1995 for obstructing a highway during a protest near the president’s mansion. He went to trial charged with three misdemeanor offenses. He was acquitted of two of the charges, but found guilty of disturbing the peace.

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