Syracuse, N.Y. — As hundreds of onlookers waited for the next mayor to speak, Sharon Owens huddled in a small, private room with her family. She wanted to pray.

When Owens, the deputy mayor and a pastor in her hometown of Geneva, took the stage to declare victory, she opened with words of thanks.

“To God be the glory for the great thing he has done,” Owens said. “I thank God, I thank God, I thank God!”

Owens spent the night Tuesday surrounded by hundreds of friends and supporters at the Treasury in downtown Syracuse. She made history when voters elected her Syracuse’s first Black mayor with a jaw-dropping 73% of the vote.

Photographer Dennis Nett spent the evening shadowing Owens as she talked with friends, prayed with family, and celebrated a historic win with hundreds of supporte

See Full Page