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Chris Coleman campaigning with Sen. John Kerry and Rep. Betty McCollum, October 2005

Chris Coleman (born 1961, St. Paul) is a Minnesota politician and the mayor of the state's capital city of St. Paul. In the 2005 mayoral race, he ran against and beat incumbent St. Paul mayor Randy Kelly. Chris Coleman took office in January 2006.

Coleman spent eight years working in Hennepin County as a public defender and prosecutor. Proposals to build a metal shredder along the Mississippi River in Saint Paul inspired his first run for the Saint Paul City Council. Mayor Coleman represented Saint Paul's Ward 2 from 1997 to 2003. Currently, he is also an investment management consultant working with non-profit organizations and is also president of United Family Practice Clinic (serving people without insurance and/or with low income). Ann Mulholland serves as Chief of Staff, having replaced Dennis Flaherty when Coleman was elected.

Coleman ran as a Democratic-Farmer-Labor candidate against fellow DFLer Kelly, and won by a 69% to 31% margin. This was even larger than margins in pre-election polling, such as in October 2005, when Coleman was ahead of Kelly among likely St. Paul voters by a margin of 35%. Kelly's resounding loss was considered remarkable for being an incumbent DFLer in an overwhelmingly Democratic city and despite the respondents to the same poll also reporting that they feel generally that the city was doing well and was heading in the right direction. The large margin in Coleman's favor was widely recognized to reflect the deep unpopularity among Democratic voters in St. Paul of Kelly's decision to endorse George W. Bush for president in 2004.

Shortly after taking office, Coleman signed a city ordnance banning tobacco smoking in all bars and restaurants within city limits. The ban had long been opposed by former mayor Kelly.

John Kerry visited St. Paul to campaign for Coleman in October 2005 (see[1]), although it meant campaigning against an incumbent of his own party. Wesley Clark and Bill Richardson have also personally campaigned for him in St. Paul, while Hillary Clinton and John Edwards have both actively supported him.

Mayor Coleman is a member of the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Coalition^[1], an organization formed in 2006 and co-chaired by New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston mayor Thomas Menino.

Chris Coleman is son of Nicholas Coleman, Sr., a Minnesota state senator from 1963 to 1981, who also served as state senate majority leader, and the brother of Nick Coleman, a columnist for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Chris is also the brother of Emmett Coleman, who works in Governmental Relations with Comcast.

He is no relation to Norm Coleman, Randy Kelly's predecessor as mayor of St. Paul and a current U.S. Senator ([2]).

1. ^ Mayors Against Illegal Guns: Coalition Members. Retrieved on June 19, 2007

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• Chris Coleman for Mayor official website
• "A Bush Democrat May Lose His Way", Washington Post, November 6, 2005
• Mayors Against Illegal Guns homepage