LEXINGTON, Ky. — Primary elections are around the corner, and Adrian Wallace is one of the four candidates running for Lexington mayor.

Adrian Wallace has called Kentucky home his whole life.

“My great grandmother helped raise me at 529 West Third Street,” Wallace said.

And now with a family of his own, including five children, Wallace said it’s because of them he is running for mayor. 

“I want to make sure that those same neighborhoods and those streets are just as safe as they were when I was a kid,” Wallace said.

His past played a part in his career in politics and in his reasons for running.

“I think God has uniquely set me on this path that has prepared me to lead my city, the city that I was born in,” Wallace said.

His passion for policy came from his time in the military. 

“I sat across from a kid who wanted to join the Army National Guard who could not because they couldn’t pass the test, because they couldn’t read and write, and do arithmetic. And that’s a travesty,” Wallace said.

Unfortunately, the young man was a product of a failed education system, which Wallace said he hopes to address as mayor.

“It broke my heart because I had to tell him no, you have to do this on your own. But I shouldn’t have had to say that,” he said.

Wallace attended Kentucky State University, majoring in pre-law and later studying at Asbury University, receiving a bachelor’s in leadership and ministry. 

“Then in ministry, I started to see more and more of the problems that were plaguing our families and I decided that we needed a different type of leadership downtown,” Wallace said.

He added that his leadership focuses on three main points: building community, promoting economic growth and stability, and expanding educational opportunity.

“Lexington is no different from most cities in this nation. I mean, the nation was built on the backs of slavery, in fact on land that was stolen from the natives, indigenous people,” Wallace said. “We need to have those very real conversations.”

Very involved in his community, Wallace takes part on many boards, both nonprofit and for profit. One of those positions is working alongside the Lexington Police Department, where he’s seen firsthand the public safety issues Lexington faces. 

“It’s also about creating policy and leadership in a way that our young people have hope,” he said. “Right now, the young people in this community feel like there is no hope, and that’s the reason that they resort to crime.”

If elected, Wallace said he plans to focus on solutions, creating a safe environment for the youth to walk on the same streets he once grew up on.

“So that they can walk down to Mr Hutchinson’s drugstore that used to be down in Victoria Square, you know it’s walking three and four blocks and not have to worry about stray bullets or substance abuse and needles on the street,” he said. “I mean, it’s just it’s a travesty that we haven’t had the investment in our communities that needs to be here.”

Safety issues, Wallace believes, start with poverty and educational failures in Kentucky. 

“There are seven schools that score and have basically scored at the bottom of the list in Kentucky for education. And the six of them are in contiguous communities and neighborhoods. And all of them, the things they have in common, are concentrated poverty,” Wallace said.

Wallace would institute universal pre-k and create relationships between public and private institutions. 

“There are too many people who seek to pull funds from public institutions and put them into private institutions that would then be segregated and they would actually do a disservice to those that are failing to educate,” Wallace said.

And while working with the Lexington police department, he found himself in a position to be a bridge builder.

“That’s one of the strengths that I bring to the table. And then once I am mayor, I’ll be able to bring together both the Black Lives Matter groups and those who feel that they can’t trust the police, and the police should be defunded,” Wallace said. “I want to bring everybody to the table that would be opposed to policing, and I want to bring together the FOP and the police department.”

Another priority for Wallace is to create racial justice in Lexington.

“I am the person that can build that consensus. And that I think that it’s an emergency situation, the record homicides that we’re facing. We can’t have that disunity in our community. And it’s one of the things that I’ll do on day one,” Wallace said.

Besides public safety and race justice, Wallace plans to invest in small businesses, help the economy, provide jobs and creating affordable housing. 

“Lexington is becoming more and more a city of the haves and have nots. The rich and the poor, the middle class is disappearing all across America and Lexington. And so we have to have leadership that protects everyday working Lexintonians. That’s bringing new jobs and focusing truly on wealth creation,” Wallace said.

Increasing wealth, Wallace said, will help those who want to live in Lexington do so.

“We need leadership downtown that says we can do everything we can to protect those interests to protect affordable housing and create and provide adequate quality of life for those people, those residents who were born and raised in this city who desire to stay in Lexington, the horse capital of the world,” Wallace said.

Wallace’s mission is to improve the city, alongside his faith and family. If elected, he said he envisions creating a Lexington that will thrive in 2050, building bridges on many issues, and making Lexington the best place to live.

Lexington will hold their general election for mayor on Nov. 8 and the primary is scheduled for May 17.