She quickly won praise from across Cambridge for her tremendous work ethic, and for her efforts to find ways to build consensus with her colleagues.

Over the next several years, Simmons gained a reputation as a calm, thoughtful voice on the school committee, and as a person who always kept her door open to anyone who wished to speak with her.

Simmons – being Black, a woman, and a member of the GLBT community – worked hard to make sure that each of these constituencies was given a voice inside City Hall.

She opened the "mayor's parlor" to the people of Cambridge, where she convened meetings on everything from environmental policy, to the coordination of the city's various social services providers, to a senior citizens' advisory group.

Simmons was interviewed on ABC's Good Morning America,[10] CBS's The Early Show, CNN's State Of The Union with John King,[11] among several other national media outlets.

Simmons won praise from her constituents for giving measured, thoughtful responses in public, as well as for her diligent work to contain the situation behind the scenes.

Simmons noted that she had a lengthy record of leading public discussions on how race and class impact contemporary Cambridge, and this work would continue long after the Professor Gates arrest faded from the headlines.

In February 2010, Councillor Simmons announced that she was running for an open state Senate seat in the Middlesex, Suffolk and Essex district[12] that was vacated by Anthony Galluccio.