[1][2] Throughout his political career, Arrington faced racial harassment and multiple investigations by the FBI and IRS for the changes he made to the city.

[3][4] He replaced David Vann as mayor and, upon retiring after five terms in office, installed then-City Council president William A.

[1] Richard Arrington Jr.'s parents emphasized self-reliance, choosing to rent a home rather than stay in workers' housing.

Soon, he was Sunday School superintendent, a member of the choir, and eventually elected to the Board of Deacons which he continued to participate in throughout his political career.

While there, he first experienced an integrated social environment and gained the perspective necessary to effectively critique the established segregation of his hometown.

[1][5] He earned his doctorate at Oklahoma in 1966, completing a dissertation on the "Comparative Morphology of Some Dryopoid Beetles",[6] and, at the urging of President Lucius Pitts, returned to Miles as acting Dean and Director of the Summer School.

[1] As Arrington took a job at the Alabama Center for Higher Education (ACHE)[7] and Barbara began to deepen her faith, they faced political disagreements.

[1] Even though Arrington held the responsibility and role of City Council member and Mayor, his wife and family offered support and stability during those struggling times.

Arrington's second run for City Council was smoother due to the young politician winning a seat without a runoff.

[2] With opposition in the business community, the latter action failed, but the departmental hiring ordinance made it out of council to be vetoed by Siebels.

Revised proposals that established recruitment programs and prohibited contracting with openly discriminatory firms, were later passed.

[10] For his fourth run for office in 1991, Arrington faced a federal investigation into his personal and political life which earned him a strong albeit mixed presence in the local media.

He worked to bring banking and finance companies as well as expanding the city's solely steel industry to other fields.

[2] Under his leadership, the University of Alabama at Birmingham became the city's top employer while also providing medical research and healthcare to the community.

[2] Additionally, Arrington created the Birmingham Plan in 1989 which was a program where construction contractors set annual goals for various projects in the area.

When first elected to mayor, he wanted to select his own staff, but the decision was met with pushback from the Jefferson County Personnel Board.

[1] In the end, Arrington won the fight and was able to select department heads and administrative staff, many of whom were minorities, which brought more professionalism and diversity to the City Hall.

[1] In 1992, he appointed the city's first African American chief of police, Johnnie Johnson Jr.[12] Richard Arrington Jr. faced many challenges, but his greatest was the investigation led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Division (IRS), which lasted throughout his political career.

The FBI, led by their racial counterintelligence program (COINTELPRO), launched their investigation into Arrington on January 26, 1972, shortly after he became a member of the Birmingham City Council.

[3][13] The mayor denied taking any money from Brown, stating that he only met with him to encourage him to open an office in Birmingham.

There, he confessed that the FBI and U.S. Attorney Frank Donaldson had tried to get him to frame the mayor for bribery and corruption for the past three years.

[3] The goal was for him to buy property in areas where there were zoning issues and ask the African American politicians for help in rezoning.

Hood and James Vaules, would go undercover with Mousallem to gain the mayor's trust and eventually encourage him to take the bribe.

[4] In September 1989, Mousallem was convicted of bribery, conspiracy, and tax evasion and later shot to death, which was ruled an accident.

[4] On January 23 of that year, the mayor was sent to prison for two days at Maxwell Airforce Base in Montgomery, Alabama for his refusal to give up his records.