JERSEY CITY – Former Jersey City Councilwoman at Large Willie Flood passed away Tuesday after a long illness. She was 72.
She served as a City Council member from 2005 until last February, when the former educator cited ill health as her reason for leaving the governing body.
According to NJ.com, the end was brought about by complications from Alzheimer’s disease.
Flood was the second of 13 children, and grew up in Mobile, Alabama, daughter of a Baptist minister who knew Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. She later participated in the Montgomery bus boycott of the 1950s, the report said.
As a teacher at School 22 she met her husband Phillip, now the chairman of the Jersey City Incinerator Authority, and together they had three children.
Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy released the following statement: “Willie Flood was a great family person – a mother and wife, but she was also a tireless public servant. Whether it was teaching in or leading one of our schools, serving on the governing body of the City, or volunteering on too many boards or causes to name here, she was always unfailingly gracious to all who she encountered and was very much giving of her time. Her family, friends, the entire city, and all who knew her have sustained a great loss and will long remember her. She will be in our prayers.”