Philadelphia voters elected their first Black woman mayor in November. But will Mayor-elect Cherelle Parker actually improve the lives of Philly’s Black residents?

While a political candidate’s race isn’t the most important factor for Black voters, it is a factor. Black representation in political spaces comes with an expectation that the circumstances and concerns of Black people are spoken for at the policymaking table. That Parker is a Black woman leading a city where Black people are a majority simply cannot be ignored.

She’ll be expected to address various challenges, including education, economic development and public safety — namely gun violence — which is likely her highest priority. Local exit polling data from the crowded Democratic primary shows that Parker was propelled to City Hall by voters who were Black, low-income, lived in areas with the most gun violence, or some combination of the three.

While the city’s gun violence is down compared to last year, “2023 follows three of the most violent years in recent memory.” Yet, Mayor-elect Parker’s response to gun violence is more policing: hiring more officers and reintroducing stop-and-frisk, the practice of temporarily stopping, questioning and searching anyone an officer suspects of a crime. To do that, an officer is supposed to have reasonable suspicion; that is, a reasonable belief that a crime is occurring or has already happened.

Research has well-established the fact that stop-and-frisk disproportionately target Black people. Black men specifically are more likely to be stopped and searched. Parker herself seems to acknowledge this in saying, “There is no place for unconstitutional stop and frisk…. Terry stops are what I wholeheartedly embrace as a tool that law enforcement needs, to make the public safety of our city their number one priority. It is a legal tool.”

But a “Terry stop” is just another name for stop-and-frisk. The term Terry stop comes from the 1968 Supreme Court case Terry v. Ohio, in which three men were stopped and frisked by a plainclothes police officer who suspected a robbery was taking place. While the Fourth Amendment bars unreasonable searches and seizures, the court ruled that if and when a police officer observes unusual conduct by someone the officer reasonably believes to be dangerous and engaged in criminal activity, the officer is “entitled for the protection of himself and others in the area to conduct a limited search to........

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