Credit: (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)Sheila Oliver, New Jersey’s lieutenant governor and the first Black woman elected to a statewide office, has died, her family announced Tuesday. She was 71.
“She was not only a distinguished public servant but also our cherished daughter, sister, aunt, friend, and hero,” the family said in a statement released by the governor’s office.
“Sheila Y. Oliver leaves behind a legacy of dedication, service, and inspiration. We will remember her commitment to the people of New Jersey and her tireless efforts to uplift the community.”
Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat who chose Oliver to be his running mate, was out of the country at the time of her death; he said that he is returning to New Jersey.
On Monday, the governor’s office announced that Oliver was hospitalized and Senate President Nicholas Scutari would be acting governor.
Murphy’s statement
“When I selected her to be my running mate in 2017, Lieutenant Governor Oliver was already a trailblazer in every sense of the word. She had already made history as the first Black woman to serve as Speaker of the General Assembly, and just the second Black woman in the nation’s history to lead a house of a state legislature. I knew then that her decades of public service made her the ideal partner for me to lead the State of New Jersey. It was the best decision I ever made,” Murphy said in a statement released by his office shortly after Oliver’s death was announced.
Tammy and I, and our children, are incredibly saddened to learn of the passing of our dear friend, colleague, and partner in government, @LtGovOliver.
We ask that you all keep the Oliver family and all those who loved her in your thoughts and prayers during this difficult time. pic.twitter.com/ty6drz7DgY— Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) August 1, 2023
The state constitutional amendment in 2006 that created the position of lieutenant governor says only that if the position becomes vacant due to death, disability or some other reason, the governor shall appoint a new lieutenant governor within 45 days. There are no requirements for who that has to be.
Sheila Y. Oliver was born July 14, 1952 in Newark and grew up there, graduating from Weequahic High School. She graduated cum laude from Lincoln University, a public historically Black university in Pennsylvania, with a bachelor’s degree in sociology. She later got a master’s degree in community organization, planning and administration from Columbia University.
She settled in East Orange, living there for more than four decades. Her biography on the website of the state Department of Community Affairs, which she headed, states that she enjoyed spending time with her 95-year-old mother.
Many firsts for Oliver
Oliver also had ties to Hudson County. In a 2017 column for The Jersey Journal, former state Assemblywoman Joan Quigley wrote that Oliver’s fondest memories were of holidays spent in Jersey City with her extended family at her grandmother’s house: Her grandmother would wait until Thanksgiving morning to buy a live turkey, bring it home and kill and cook it. Quigley also wrote that Oliver’s aunt was the first Black woman to own a business in Jersey City, a hair salon.
Oliver had a number of firsts to her name, among them New Jersey’s first Black woman Assembly speaker, first Democratic woman Assembly speaker and first Black lieutenant governor.
‘I knew then that her decades of public service made her the ideal partner for me to lead the State of New Jersey. It was the best decision I ever made.” — Gov. Phil Murphy
She cut her teeth in politics on the East Orange Board of Education, where she served from 1996 to 2000, including one term as president. While on the board, she served a term as an Essex County commissioner (then known as freeholders) from 1996 to 1999, losing the Democratic primary for a second term. She was also an unsuccessful mayoral candidate in 1997.
She was first elected to the state Assembly in 2003, one of the Democratic-backed candidates. She won reelection seven times, including in 2017 when she was simultaneously elected to her first term as lieutenant governor to serve with Phil Murphy as governor.
Becoming lieutenant governor
In a 2017 interview with NJ Spotlight News shortly after being elected, she said she had met Murphy, then U.S. ambassador to Germany three years earlier at Berkeley College in Newark after he called seeking a meeting with her as he was meeting with other leaders throughout the state.
“We spent about close to two hours talking to each other,” she recalled. “Being in the Legislature, and knowing the next big thing that was going to happen in New Jersey was a gubernatorial election, quite frankly, I decided that day that that was the person I was going to support to be the next governor. But, I never engaged in discussion with the ambassador around me being a running mate with him.”
Credit: (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)Murphy’s choice of Oliver to be his running mate in July 2017 was praised by high-ranking Democrats.
“I’m thrilled,” said Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo. “It’s not only great for Essex, it’s great for the state of New Jersey. I think the experience she has is on every level of government. I think she’s going to make a great partner with Phil.”
Former Gov. Thomas H. Kean, a Republican, also praised her, calling her “a very dignified, proud person … one who’s able, and who has a lot of experience and who is going to have some of her own agenda.”
Vindication
It was a vindication of sorts after Democratic Party machinations led to Oliver’s ouster from the speakership in 2014. An Essex County administrator at the time, she had won the post after the 2009 general election with the backing of her boss, County Executive Joe DiVincenzo, and served two terms. While in power, she drew union ire for backing Republican Gov. Chris Christie’s public worker pension and benefit reforms and lost some support within her caucus. She was reelected to a second term as part of a deal made by Hudson, Essex and South Jersey Democratic Party leaders. But in 2013, South Jersey boss George Norcross made a deal directly with Hudson County Sen. Nicholas Sacco to instead elevate Vincent Prieto of Secaucus to the speakership, making Oliver speaker emeritus.
During that time, Oliver also ran in the primary for the U.S. Senate seat that became open when Frank Lautenberg died. She finished last in a field of four, starting late and having little money. Current Sen. Cory Booker, who was the mayor of Newark at the time, won that seat in 2013 and has held it ever since. Booker had supported her for a second speaker’s term two years earlier.
Under Oliver, the Department of Community Affairs has increased funding and support for affordable housing projects, homelessness prevention and a number of community revitalization programs. On the announcement she would head the department — her predecessor Kim Guadagno had been secretary of state — Oliver said she felt “privileged” because DCA’s work “is reflective of the things that I’ve been passionate about most of my professional career.”
What she said guided her
As acting governor when Murphy was out of the state, Oliver signed a number of bills into law. These include mandated financial literacy education for middle schoolers, stronger equal pay for equal work protections and a pilot program designed to help prevent young people from reoffending.
Earlier in her career, Oliver also headed a north Jersey nonprofit and taught college classes. And she co-founded the Newark Coalition for Low Income Housing, a group whose efforts to stop the demolition of publicly subsidized low-income housing in Newark led to a federal consent decree requiring the city housing authority to replace every unit it demolishes.
In her 2017 interview with NJ Spotlight News, she reflected on what guided her life, saying, “At an early age I was encouraged to be a critical thinker. And, I’ve been like that my entire life. My parents particularly encouraged me to be a critical thinker and I believe that we need more people who undertake critical thinking who work in government. So, it’s always worked well for me.”
