Senator Shelly Hettleman has been a member of the Maryland State Senate since February 2020, after having been elected in 2014 to the House of Delegates. In the Senate, Sen. Hettleman is a member of the Budget and Taxation Committee, where she chairs the Subcommittee on Public Safety, Transportation, and the Environment and is a member of the Pensions Subcommittee. She is the Senate Chair of the Joint Audit and Evaluation Committee, the Chair of the Baltimore County Senate Delegation, and co-Chair of the Maryland Jewish Legislative Caucus.

Shelly was the lead sponsor of a number of bills that have become law on a variety of important issues, including expanding privacy protections for reproductive health consumers and providers, ensuring access to counsel for renters facing eviction, creating a Correctional Ombudsman for the criminal justice system, reforming Maryland’s geriatric and medical parole system, assisting college students in seeking transparency and tax credit assistance in their student loan debt, expanding tax credit availability for student loan debt to graduate students, protecting older adults and children from abuse, broadening the access and availability of contraceptives, and passing an array of bills protecting survivors of sexual assault, including statewide standards for the preservation and testing of rape kits.

Prior to serving in the House of Delegates, Shelly was the campaign manager of the 2012 Ben Cardin for Senate campaign, which resulted in Sen. Cardin’s resounding re-election. In former positions, Shelly was the founding director of a domestic violence program, worked in financial resource development for a local non-profit organization, served as a legislative assistant in the office of then-Congressman Cardin and on the staff of Sen. Barbara Mikulski’s first campaign for U.S. Senate.

Shelly is married to Jeff and Mom to two adult children. She also has a wonderful daughter-in-law and son-in-law, a dog and a cat, and is thrilled to be a grandma.