Carolyn J. Krysiak, long-serving Maryland delegate who fought for rent reforms, dies

Hannah Gaskill, Jacques Kelly, Baltimore Sun
Updated ·4 min read

Carolyn J. Krysiak, a politician who represented neighborhoods in Southeast Baltimore in the Maryland General Assembly and fought for rent reforms, died of cancer May 8 at her daughter’s Middle River home. She was 84 and lived in Bayview.

Born Carolyn Josephine Fabiszak in Baltimore, she was the daughter of Henry Fabiszak and Bertha Mach. Raised in Fells Point on Castle Street, she attended the old Our Lady of the Holy Rosary School and was a 1957 Catholic High School of Baltimore graduate.

She married Charles J. Krysiak in 1962. They met at a Catholic Youth Organization dance.

She helped with his election as a representative to the Maryland House of Delegates in 1966. A Democrat, he served until 1979, when acting Gov. Blair Lee III appointed him chair of the Maryland Workers’ Compensation Commission.

Mrs. Krysiak gave birth to five children between 1963 and 1971, who were raised in a three-bedroom rowhouse in Bayview with the family’s three dogs.

A daughter, Anne Krysiak, said her mother attended a few college classes but did not complete a degree program.

“My mom was very much self-educated,” her daughter said. “She read like a crazy person.”

In 1990 Mrs. Krysiak was elected as a Democrat to the Maryland House of Delegates as the representative of neighborhoods including Highlandtown, Canton and Bayview in Maryland’s 46th District. The district was later enlarged to include South Baltimore and its neighborhoods of Federal Hill, Riverside and Locust Point.

“Carolyn broke ground as a woman in Baltimore politics,” said former State Delegate Margaret L. “Maggie” McIntosh. “She was well regarded in the House and she took on important issues. Carolyn helped reform the entrenched ground rent industry in the City of Baltimore because she knew how unfair it was to her constituents. She watched people lose a home over a ground rent issue.

“She was a champion of the people of East Baltimore and their issues. She was also a loyal supporter of Mike Busch and helped him become speaker of the House,” said Ms. McIntosh. “She went on to be chair of the Democratic Caucus.”

Former Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski said: “While Carolyn’s husband was from old East Baltimore politics, she was ahead of her time. She was a reformer. She saw a new day coming. She was also the eyes and ears of her neighborhood. She was equally at home in Annapolis as she was at a neighborhood bull roast.”

Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson said: “Carolyn held nothing back. She said what she thought and was always candid.”

Mrs. Krysiak held her seat until her retirement in 2011, serving on the Judiciary Committee, the Economic Matters Committee and as the chair of the House Democratic Caucus during the intervening years.

She also played a role in establishing Harbor East’s National Katyń Memorial, participated in a delegation that traveled to Taiwan in support of its representation at the United Nations, and participated in race and ethnicity initiative discussions during the Clinton administration.

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“Mom was never a housekeeper and we were not the kids at school with a nicely packed balanced lunch with crusts cut off the bread,” said her daughter, Anne. “We had handmade Barbie clothes [wedding gowns and fur coats] and hand-sewn ‘Star Wars’ curtains, homemade Halloween costumes, shelves full of LEGOs and construction sets and homemade Christmas ornaments.”

“The door was never locked. We forever had various troubled teens staying on the couch, and we knew Mom couldn’t say no to a stray animal,” said her daughter.

Mrs. Krysiak’s family helped get her elected.

“All us kids and our friends and neighbors, and all the little Polish ladies in East Baltimore, including our grandmother, went door-to-door campaigning and stuffed and stamped tens of thousands of mailers,” said her daughter, Anne.

Mrs. Krysiak served on the boards of Southeast Community Development Corporation and Johns Hopkins Bayview.

Survivors include her three sons, Charles G. Krysiak and Paul D. Krysiak, both of Baltimore, and Mark E. Krysiak, of Middle River; two daughters, Carolyn Krysiak Shiflett, of Middle River, and Anne Krysiak, of White Marsh; a brother, Henry “Sonny” Fabiszak, of Berlin on the Eastern Shore; and five grandchildren. Her husband died in 2004.

No funeral is planned.