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He left the Prosecutor’s
office in 1991 to become executive director of Toledo’s
Board of Community Relations (BCR), after which he joined
the Toledo law firm of Cooper, Walinski & Cramer as an
associate attorney.
During 1991, he served as
chairman of the City of Toledo’s Apportionment Board that
was charged with drawing the six City Council districts
resulting from revisions to the City Charter – he ran
unsuccessfully for Council two years later.
In 1996, Mitchell left
Cooper to start his own private practice.
Over the years, Mitchell
has been involved with such causes as preserving the
historic Lathrop House – a stop on the Underground Railroad;
Democratic Party activities such as campaigning for
statewide candidates such as Sen. Howard Metzenbaum in the
1980’s to serving as finance chairman for a recent Judge
Myron Duhart campaign; serving as an officer and on the
board of the Thurgood Marshall Law Association; helping to
host community and cultural events; providing guidance for
young business and political aspirants; assisting in
neighborhood social events – to name a few.
“It’s time for us older
folks to pass the baton onto younger people,” Mitchell said
in recent years of his commitment to working with younger
generations.
Robert Smith, CEO of the
African American Legacy Project, hosts an annual event with
the AALP to honor local Legends. Keith Mitchell was to be
honored this past year, but as with so many events scheduled
during the pandemic, that ceremony was postponed. Smith,
however, organized a ceremony via Zoom on March 8 to present
Mitchell with his Kente cloth as a number of local community
luminaries paid tribute to the friend and colleague they had
come to admire over the decades.
Tributes were presented by
Judge C. Allen McConnell, Rev. Willie Perryman, pastor of
Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church and president of the
Toledo Chapter NAACP; his sister Carolyn Mitchell and Brian
Latta of the Northwest Ohio Young Black Democrats. All of
the speakers addressed Keith’s commitment to the community
and his unstinting desire to help and uplift others.
Keith’s family included an
older brother and sister – Arthur Mitchell (three children:
Sono, Arthur IV, Kuno)) and Carolyn Mitchell, along with a
younger brother John Mitchell (one son, Gabriel) and a
younger half-sister, Kelly Gallagher. Keith has one
daughter, Messiri, and two grandchildren, Aisha and
Jonathan.
Robert Smith interviewed a
number of people during his radio broadcast on March 6 to
announce the Zoom ceremony. One of the people interviewed
was Rebecca West-Estell, a local attorney who entered
practice in the late 1990s. West-Estell expressed her
gratitude for the mentorship Mitchell provided her as he
guided her through the process of starting to practice law
in Toledo.
West-Estell also summed up
what so many people in the Toledo area have felt about Keith
over the years and have said about him in recent days.
“He had the highest
integrity and was very intelligent,” said West-Estell. “He
was a wonderful person to be around.”
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