OH- Obama friend plans to be ally outside administration

1-6-2009 Ohio:

If you had to pick one person in Cincinnati who might have a ticket for a top job in the administration of Barack Obama, David Singleton would not be a bad choice.


The same could be said for his wife, Verna Williams.

He is the executive director of the Ohio Justice and Policy Center in Cincinnati, a nonprofit law office in Cincinnati that works for reform of the state's criminal justice system, representing the rights of those in prison and those who have served their time while helping them re-enter society.

She is a professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Law and a former vice president of the National Women's Law Center, a legal advocacy group for women.

Both have close ties to the soon-to-be president and his wife, Michelle Obama. Singleton was Obama's classmate in Harvard Law School's class of 1991; Williams struck up a friendship with Michelle Obama at the same law school several years earlier.

Singleton had a hand in introducing his former law school colleague to Cincinnati, when, in the summer of 2004, he hosted a fundraiser for Obama's U.S. Senate campaign that gave Cincinnati Democrats their first look at a man who would soon be their presidential candidate.

Later, he helped state Sen. Eric Kearney and his wife, lawyer Jan-Michelle Lemon Kearney, also personal friends of the Obamas, organize some fundraising events in Cincinnati for Obama's presidential campaign.

'Both ordinary and extraordinary'
Bringing Obama to Cincinnati back in 2004 - about two weeks before Obama made a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Boston that cemented his status as a rising political star - "opened a lot of people's eyes around here," Singleton said.

"They were impressed by his obvious intelligence, but also by his ability to connect with people, one on one," the 42-year-old lawyer said. "A man who is both ordinary and extraordinary at the same time." Singleton had seen those qualities years before at Harvard Law School.

"Barack was always seen by the rest of us as a little older and a little wiser than the rest of us," Singleton said. "And he was about five years older than most of us. He was approachable, friendly. And clearly a star."

Jan-Michelle Kearney - who, like Singleton, was a Harvard Law School classmate of Obama - called Singleton and Williams "two brilliant, wonderful people."

"To meet them for the first time, you would never know how accomplished they are," said Jan-Michelle Kearney, publisher of the Cincinnati Herald. "They are fun to be around."

Williams, Jan-Michelle Kearney said, is still very close to Michelle Obama; the two of them were mock trial partners at Harvard Law School.

"Whenever Michelle was in town, she'd ask for some private time with Verna," Jan-Michelle Kearney said.

Williams declined a request to be interviewed and the Obamas could not be reached for comment on their relationship with the Cincinnati couple, but Singleton spoke recently about his law school friend. He made it clear that while he supports Obama and believes he will make a good president, he himself is satisfied to watch from afar.

It is easy to picture Singleton, who lives in Kennedy Heights with his wife and daughter, playing a role in an Obama Justice Department or elsewhere in the administration. But Singleton said that is not going to happen. He and his wife have tickets to the inauguration and are looking forward to watching their friend be sworn in as the 44th president, but, when it is over, they will come home to Cincinnati.

"This is where I am meant to be," said Singleton, sitting in his cluttered office at the center's East Ninth Street headquarters.

"I think the world of Barack Obama," Singleton said. "Nothing has pleased me more than to watch him succeed. And I think he will succeed as president. But my place is here. This is where we are raising our family. This is where I can do the work I want to do."

'Couldn't stand' Cincinnati
Singleton did not always think so highly of Cincinnati.

The Asheville, N.C., native left Harvard Law School 17 years ago and took a career path similar to Obama's in many ways. He, like Obama, could have landed a high-paying job in a Wall Street law firm. Instead, he worked for three years at the Legal Action Center for the Homeless in New York City and then spent seven years as a public defender in Harlem and Washington, D.C.

Singleton came to Cincinnati in 2001 when his wife was hired to teach at the University of Cincinnati College of Law. He worked at a private law firm before being named executive director of the Ohio Justice and Policy Center, a nonprofit funded by foundation grants and individual contributions.

Back then, he could not have imagined a day when he would say that he would want to make Cincinnati his home forever.

"I couldn't stand this community when I first came," Singleton said. "It was a harsh transition. I just saw it as a place of narrow-mindedness, a hidebound legal system. Not the kind of place where people who do my kind of work would be welcome."

But he said that he quickly found that there are other lawyers in town who shared his passion for justice, and learned that a lawyer who speaks for prisoners' rights could have a fair hearing.

"I've seen us make tremendous progress," Singleton said. "There is much more to do. And I want to stay here and do it."

The center had a major legal victory earlier this year when the Ohio Supreme Court decided that an Ohio law banning convicted sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school or day care center could not be applied retroactively to those who were convicted before the law was passed in 2003. Singleton's firm had represented two such convicted sex offenders in the case.

"That was satisfying, to see justice done," Singleton said. "The single biggest problem we have at the center is the perception that we are a prisoners' rights law firm. That is not what it is all about. It is about seeing that prisoners have a chance to rehabilitate and become a part of society again."

Singleton said he believes Obama would understand his desire to stay here and continue his work.

"I think it is possible that, if I wanted to, I could go to Washington and work in the new administration," Singleton said. "Barack Obama doesn't need people who support him just in Washington. He needs them in places like Cincinnati, too." ..News Source.. by Howard Wilkinson • hwilkinson@enquirer.com