Calvin Ball III

Calvin B. Ball III (born September 2, 1975) is an American politician who serves as the county executive of Howard County, Maryland.

A member of the Democratic Party, he is the first African-American to hold this office.

He graduated from Woodlawn High School in 1993, and later attended Towson University, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy and religion in 1997, the University of Baltimore, where he earned a Master of Arts degree in legal and ethical studies in 1999, and Morgan State University, where he earned an Doctor of Education degree in 2008.

Ball is a member of the Kappa Delta Pi and Alpha Phi Alpha fraternities.

After graduating, Ball worked as a supervisor in the Consumer Protection Division of the Maryland Attorney General's office and as a part-time professor at the University of Phoenix.

In October 2001, he announced his candidacy for the Howard County Council in the second district, seeking to succeed term-limited councilmember C. Vernon Grey.

He lost the Democratic primary, placing second behind David A. Rakes by a margin of 355 votes out of 4,451 votes cast.

Following his defeat, state delegate-elect Neil F. Quinter hired Ball as a legislative aide.

He also worked as assistant education and urban studies professor at Morgan State University, as a revitalization coordinator and community organizer for the Oakland Mills Village Board, and as a firefighter and emergency medical technician for the county.

He previously served as a member of the Howard County Council from the 2nd district from 2006 to 2018.

Ball was born and raised in Catonsville, Maryland to father Calvin Ball Jr., a Vietnam War Air Force veteran, and Carolyn Ball, a computer assistant.

In January 2006, Ball announced that he would again run for the Howard County Council in District 2, challenging Rakes.

In March 2006, after Rakes announced he would resign from the Howard County Council, Ball applied to serve out the remainder of his term.

The Howard County Democratic Central Committee voted unanimously to nominate Ball to fill the vacancy on the Howard County Council.

He was confirmed by the Howard County Council and sworn in on April 20, 2006.

During his tenure, he gained a reputation as a social progressive.

Ball was thrice elected as chair of the Howard County Council in 2006, 2010, and 2013, becoming the youngest person to ever hold this position.

In 2010, Ball was named as the chair of the Maryland Sustainable Growth Commission's education subcommittee.

In 2012, he started a statewide minority caucus within the Maryland Association of Counties.

In 2013, Ball was appointed as the chair of the Commission on Environmental Justice and Sustainable Communities.

On November 9, 2017, Ball announced his candidacy for Howard County Executive, challenging incumbent county executive Allan H. Kittleman.

During his campaign, he spoke on national and statewide political trends and ran on platform that included increasing school funding, protecting the environment, and diversifying the county tax base.

During the election campaign, Ball was outraised by Kittleman, with total spending on the race reaching $1 million by the end of October 2018, but was aided by the national environment favoring Democrats.

He received endorsements from the Howard County Education Association, Progressive Maryland, and former Governor Martin O'Malley.

Pre-election polling showed a tight race between Ball and Kittleman, despite Kittleman's popularity and uncontroversial tenure.

Ball narrowly defeated Kittleman in the general election on November 7, 2018, receiving 52.8 percent of the vote.

On June 1, 2021, Ball announced that he would seek a second term as county executive in 2022.

During the election campaign, he outraised Republican challenger and former county executive Allan H. Kittleman, with total spending on the race reaching $1.3 million by the end of October 2022.

In June 2021, state delegate Robert Flanagan filed a public records request for emails exchanged by Ball, other county employees, and a lobbyist.

The county identified 748 emails, but declined to release 497 of them, saying that doing so would reveal internal deliberations or information protected by attorney-client privilege.

Flanagan filed a lawsuit in August 2021 against Ball, seeking the full release of the emails, arguing that they were withheld without being reviewed by the county's Office of Law.

By the end of 2021, the county released nearly every email to Flanagan, who continued the lawsuit until it was dismissed in July 2022 after the county acknowledged that it had violated the state's Public Information Act and Open Meetings Act, and agreed to pay the maximum penalties.

Kittleman subsequently ran ads highlighting the lawsuit, which Ball called a "Donald Trump, Dan Cox-style political stunt".

Ball defeated former county executive Kittleman in the general election in November 2022, receiving 59 percent of the vote.

Ball was sworn in as the new County Executive on December 3, 2018, becoming the county's first African-American county executive.

During his first term in office, Ball focused on the issues of crime, climate change, and education.

In January 2019, Ball was named as treasurer for the Maryland Association of Counties.

In January 2023, he was elected as the organization's president.

In September 2019, the Howard County Ethics Commission initiated an investigation into allegations that Ball illegally used the county seal in a video where he explains his commitment to the Democratic Party.

The alleged infractions did not lead to a criminal prosecution because they were reported outside of the county's statute of limitations.