Gwendolyn Reese

Gwendolyn D. Reese is the President and CEO of Peaten Reese Peaten Consulting, Inc., providing professional development and consultation services to individuals and organizations in Florida and beyond.

Ms. Reese is President of the African American Heritage Association of St. Petersburg, FL, Inc. The Heritage Association created and curates the African American Heritage Trails along 22nd Street and 9th Avenue in South St. Petersburg. Reese serves on the Voice Heard Voices Matter Bloomberg Harvard Equity Group with the focus of ensuring equity and engaging and sustaining community involvement in the redevelopment of Tropicana Field. Additionally, and she is a member of the Commission to Study Structural Racism in the City of St. Petersburg, the Sankofa Project Advisory Council, and the Community Benefits Agreement Policy Council.

She formerly served as a co-chair of Pinellas Remembers, a Community Remembrance Project of the Equal Justice Initiative, a Commissioner on the City of St. Petersburg’s Community Planning and Preservation Commission and as chair of the City Hall Mural Committee. She is a graduate of Leadership St. Pete Class of 1991 and a charter member of the St. Petersburg Midtown Rotary.

Ms. Reese was the first Social Justice Coordinator for the Alabama Institute of Social Justice (AISJ). She was a primary organizer and facilitator for Agenda 2010, a historically significant political action and education project to increase black voter participation and candidate accountability during the 2009 City elections. She was co-founder with Gypsy Gallardo of the PACT, Agenda 2010 & Beyond and the Southside 2020 Project.

In 2015, Ms. Reese was the recipient of the 2015 MLK Leadership Award presented by the National Council of Negro Women and was recognized by Congresswoman Kathy Castor for her more than 40 years of community activism and leadership. The Congressional Recognition included a U.S. flag which was flown over the United States Capitol on January 13, 2015, and a Statement for Congressional Record which was filed in the Library of Congress. In February 2015 she was named one of the Pinellas County Urban League’s 2016 “Champions of Justice”. In February 2018 she received the Peggy Peterman Award from the Legacy Group for her column which is dedicated to preserving and educating the community about the history of African Americans in St. Petersburg. The column appears in the Weekly Challenger newspaper. In May 2018 she received the Founders Tribute award from the 2020 Plan. On August 19, 2021, she was presented with the Key to the City of St. Petersburg by Mayor Rick Kriseman.