Feb 18, 2023 By Mike Jones 6 min read

Blayre Holmes Davis has been the second lady of Pennsylvania for a little more than a month, but she’s been putting the community first for nearly her entire life.

Holmes Davis felt that calling to public service from her upbringing in Donora and Monessen, and she credited her parents for inspiring her to help others.

“Service has always been a part of my day-to-day life and giving back,” she said.

Her husband, Austin Davis, was elected in November as Pennsylvania’s first Black lieutenant governor while running on a ticket with Gov. Josh Shapiro, and the Democratic pair took office Jan. 17. While her husband’s political life has brought him one step away from the governor’s office in Harrisburg, Holmes Davis has carved out her own career centered around serving others that’s led to a prominent role with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

And she credits how she was raised growing up in the Mon Valley as helping to shape the person she is today.

“Just because these towns are small, people are tough because they have to be,” Holmes Davis said, noting that her great-grandmother survived the Donora Smog disaster in 1948. “People have survived the things that tried to rip us apart and kill us. I’m a living legacy.”

Holmes Davis spent her early childhood in Monessen before the family moved across the Monongahela River to Donora around the time she was in elementary school. Her parents, Robert and Darla Holmes, were both pastors, with her father serving as minister for Christian Life Ministries in Monessen and her mother working for more than 30 years as a head administrator in the foreign language department at California University of Pennsylvania.

Women in her life served as role models, but she didn’t see much diversity in leadership positions.

“That’s something I knew early on growing up that there weren’t a lot of people who looked like me,” Holmes Davis said. “My family filled that threshold (and) exposed me to those types of things.”

She graduated from Ringgold in 2008 and then received her bachelor’s degree in communications from Cal. U four years later. While in college, she became an organizer for AmeriCorps, which specializes in community service.

After graduating from college, she worked for the Women and Girls Foundation, helping to train high school girls to become “the next generation of female leaders.”

“As they start to think about what they want to be … think about public service,” Holmes Davis said. “How to use their voice.”

She later went to work for Adagio Health, a regional health care organization that focuses on reproductive health care, mammograms and educating people about food assistance programs. Holmes Davis helped to set up medical pop-up clinics, teaching people the importance of healthy eating and getting exercise, but it also allowed her to meet with public officials to let them know about the challenges people face and how government can help.

“Let elected leaders know what barriers people have to getting health care,” she said of her work.

It was around that time that her husband began expressing an interest in politics. The couple married in September 2017 after meeting several years earlier while both were at an event at the August Wilson African American Cultural Center in Pittsburgh. Holmes Davis recalls the couple buying their first house in McKeesport in January 2018 and it immediately being transformed into campaign headquarters for a special election for the 35th state House seat that Davis won in a landslide at just 28 years old.

“I’m so super proud of him and excited. Especially for someone who had a close view of what he’s done, especially at such a young age,” Holmes Davis said. “He wants to make real change. Austin is about action, not about talk. That’s who he really is.”

As her husband’s political career was ascending, Holmes Davis was also making a name for herself with her career when she was hired by the Steelers in 2019 to work as the director of community relations. In her current position, she works closely with players to help them find nonprofits or community service projects that allow them to give back in ways that personally resonate with them.

“Throughout their careers, they’ve been blessed so much, so this is an opportunity to give back to the community,” she said. “How do they want to be remembered off the field?”

And now with her husband’s elevation to lieutenant governor, Holmes Davis sees it as an opportunity to put a spotlight on the initiatives that matter the most to her. She thinks her current job in a “male-dominated sport” will give her creditability when reaching out to the community through her role as second lady.

“What I’m excited about with this new position (is) I’m not giving up my career with the Pittsburgh Steelers,” she said, adding that the couple still lives in McKeesport. There are so many different stories in Pennsylvania, I’m excited to share those. … I’m also excited for people to hear our stories and know that they’re seen.”

Gisele Fetterman, her predecessor as second lady, had a very public role that she termed with the acronym “SLOP,” but Holmes Davis wants to carve out her own niche with the position. Health care, pay disparities and maternal mortality are the biggest issues that she wants to shine a light on, and this new platform will help her to get that message out.

“Part of this piece will be using my voice. We’re going to have fun, but I’m also here to elevate these issues and causes,” Holmes Davis said. “I’m going to guide it in the way I see fit. I’m excited for it and I have a career I’m really proud of, and I’m just getting started.”

Her folks still live in Donora, and she travels home regularly to visit. But even as her life becomes increasingly public with more responsibility, Holmes Davis said she’ll “always be leading with my heart first and foremost,” no matter where her professional life and husband’s political aspirations take them.

“I want people to see me, Blayre, and who I am. I’m going to lead and guide as the person I have always been,” she said. “I’m really excited about what the future holds to make it my own.”