Sheena Wright

Sheena Wright (born January 6, 1970) is an American nonprofit executive and civil servant. She is the First Deputy Mayor of New York City and formerly the president of the United Way of New York City. In August 2021, she was chosen as the chair of New York City mayor-elect Eric Adams's transition team. Wright was named deputy mayor for Strategic Initiatives by Adams on December 6, 2022 and began in January 2023.

Early life and education
Wright is a native of The Bronx, daughter of, Debra Fraser-Howze, an AIDS activist who founded the National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS. She also founded the Choose Healthy Life, a network of churches providing coronavirus testing and administering vaccines. Her sister, Tanya Wright, is an actress.

She was educated at the George School in Pennsylvania. She then enrolled at Columbia University and was a member of the school's varsity track and field team. She graduated from Columbia College in 1990 and Columbia Law School in 1994.

Career
After graduation from law school, Wright worked as a lawyer for Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, in private equity firms and served as general counsel for Crave Technologies, a minority-owned software startup.

Wright served as president and executive director of the Abyssinian Development Corporation, the economic arm of the influential Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. On April 1, 2013, Wright was subpoenaed to speak with federal prosecutors about her tenure at Abyssinian because of the sale of a townhouse intended for buyers making less than $130,000 to Todd Hunter, son of NBA union executive Billy Hunter, through an Abyssinian subsidiary while Wright was leading the organization. Wright's tenure as CEO and President at Abyssinian has been described in an unflattering light by former employees who note over $500,000 spent on team-building, leadership events and conferences that these employees describe as "junkets or vacations for favored senior staff" to Martha's Vineyard, the Bahamas, and Jamaica.

In 2012, she became the first female head of the United Way of New York City in the organization's 79-year history. As president and CEO of United Way, she has been involved in Hurricane Sandy and COVID-19 relief work. She also led the ReadNYC initiative to support child literacy.

She is formerly a trustee of her alma mater, Columbia University, a position she was elected to in March 2021.

In August 2021, she was named by Eric Adams to lead the mayoral candidate's transition team.

Personal life
On January 5, 2013, Gregg Walker, Wright's former husband and then an executive at Sony, called Harlem's 30th Precinct to report that Wright had assaulted him. Both Wright and Walker were arrested, though Wright's charges were dropped the same night while Walker's were not dropped for several weeks. It was reported that Wright's family members contacted influential New Yorkers while she was detained, including Calvin O. Butts, who subsequently contacted Wright's future partner, David C. Banks and this brother, then-NYPD Chief Philip Banks III. The next day, Walker’s mother alleged that Wright slapped her in the face, scratched her arm, and pushed her.

Wright's current partner, David C. Banks, serves as New York City Schools Chancellor in the Adams administration.