A conversation with Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker, moderated by professor of practice and Texas Tribune co-founder Evan Smith. Registration required.
Reelected in 2023 with 70% of the vote, Mattie Parker has served as the 45th Mayor of Fort Worth, Texas since 2021. With a pioneering spirit and determination to leave things better than she found them, Mayor Parker has been successful in implementing key efforts and community partnerships to bolster Fort Worth’s development, improve public safety, expand access to education and workforce opportunities, and advance the overall quality of life for all residents.
Understanding that strong public safety is the foundation of any successful city, Mayor Parker has worked to champion historic increases in the number of police officers and firefighters; in 2024, that was an increase 106 new Police Department positions and 76 new Fire Department positions. Mayor Parker has worked with Police and Fire Departments to tackle some of the City’s toughest and longest-standing issues, such as building out plans and partnerships to enhance safety in the West 7th entertainment district and creating the Ad Hoc Committee on Emergency Medical Response to study the best options for a future EMS system that prioritizes high-quality patient care.
She works with Councilmembers and City Management to focus the city budget on basic services that have the greatest impact on residents’ daily lives, while providing property tax relief for homeowners by voting to lower the city’s property tax rate every year and increasing exemptions for those over 65 and with disabilities.
She has helped lead key efforts at the state level on behalf of the City, focused on bolstering workforce and education initiatives, maternal health, and economic development, including increased incentives for the film industry in Fort Worth that has created $655 million in economic impact since 2015. Her leadership efforts extend statewide as she serves as Chair of the Texas Big City Mayors, a coalition of bipartisan mayors representing over 8.5 million Texans.
Development is booming under Mayor Parker’s leadership in the fastest-growing large city in America. In Downtown alone, more than $2 billion in new projects are underway, including Texas A&M University’s expansion. That tremendous growth can be seen across the city, from the Crescent development in the Cultural District, to Mule Alley in the Historic Stockyards, to Hillwood’s AllianceTexas. With limitless opportunities, and its connectivity through DFW Airport and its newest $1.63 billion terminal in partnership with Fort Worth-based American Airlines, the City is solidifying itself as a global force with Mayor Parker at the helm.
Building onto Fort Worth’s ongoing boomtown effect, Mayor Parker has worked to set the city up to continue growing for years to come. She worked with the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce in creating the Fort Worth Economic Development Partnership to lead business recruitment and attraction for the city. She is focused on attracting innovative expansion and high-paying jobs to Fort Worth while fostering conditions that help companies and small businesses alike thrive. During her tenure, Parker has seen Fort Worth named both the most pro-growth city in America (Pacific Research Institute) and best large city in Texas for starting a business (WalletHub).
Mayor Parker, who serves as co-chair of the national Mayors for Parks Coalition, is determined on ensuring that all residents have easy access to the city’s expanding parks system, preserving the heritage of Fort Worth’s landscape, and growing the overall health and beauty of the city. In 2023, she created Good Natured, a Fort Worth greenspace initiative and bold investment in natural community spaces. The partnership has set an aggressive goal to add 10,000 acres of open greenspace to Fort Worth in the next five years. Mayor Parker’s tenure also saw the first bond program in City history that included dedicated funds for open space conversation, a $15M investment that voters overwhelmingly supported.
With an eye always on improving Fort Worth for the next generation, Mayor Parker is leading efforts to expand access to education so all students are given the opportunity to succeed. Her Mayor’s Council on Education & Workforce convenes school and business leaders to match students with careers and higher education pathways, ensuring students in Fort Worth are prepared to succeed when they enter the workforce and, importantly, that Fort Worth is prepared to meet the future workforce demand.
She believes the long-term success of our economy is dependent on family-friendly policies. She serves as Vice-Chair of the nation Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger effort, helped pioneer The Best Place for Working Parents® initiative, which originated in Fort Worth in 2020, and formed a Blue Ribbon Action Committee on Childcare to address longstanding childcare issues worsened by the pandemic. At City Hall, she championed an expansion of paid maternity leave for city employees to 12 weeks. She has worked to improve access to quality care and resources for mothers and children locally by convening a coalition of nonprofits and local hospital CEOs working to better streamline services for maternal and infant health care in Tarrant County.
Mayor Parker embraces modern mobility solutions and champions the needed infrastructure projects that spur economic development and to improve the connectivity for residents throughout Fort Worth and into the North Texas Region. In 2024, she established the Mayor’s Urban Rail Committee Supporting Economic Development & Tourism to explore urban rail as an innovative transportation solution and in her time in office has seen infrastructure investments increase including more than $369 million in bond funds for streets and pedestrian mobility improvements.
She recognizes the complex issues around housing and homelessness and is committed to ensuring the City invests in long-lasting solutions. Under her guidance, the City has invested more than $41M in projects to support permanent supportive housing, deeply affordable housing, and permanently affordable housing since 2022, largely funding with one-time American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) dollars and leveraging partnership funds with Tarrant County. This includes a new project in which, for the first time in Fort Worth’s history, the City is partnering with a community land trust.
Mayor Parker is a licensed attorney, with more than twenty years of experience in national, state and local public affairs, including her service as the chief of staff for Mayor and the Fort Worth City Council where she helped shape major policy decisions on a variety of complex issues. She was the founding CEO of Fort Worth Cradle to Career and the Tarrant To & Through (T3) Partnership.
She and her husband David are the proud parents of one daughter and two sons. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a Bachelor of Arts in Government and has a law degree from Texas A&M University School of Law, where she was awarded the prestigious MacLean & Boulware Endowed Law Scholarship.