William K. Smith is one of two names that will appear on the Nov. 4 ballot for Advisory Neighborhood Commission seat 2A04, representing a sliver of Washington’s Foggy Bottom area that includes the Watergate complex and, yes, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Smith, a 53-year-old physician who lives in the Watergate West building and runs a medical software company, confirmed Wednesday what is his first run for public office but said he does not have a political career in mind.
“I think of it as service,” he said. “I’ve done a lot of different things internationally, and I’ve been involved in grass-roots activities in a lot of different capacities. . . . I just felt it was a good thing to do.”
Smith came to national attention more than two decades ago after being accused of raping a woman in Palm Beach, Fla., when he was 30.
He was acquitted in December 1991 of sexual battery and battery after an eight-month prosecution and two-week trial that garnered intense national attention.
After the trial concluded, Smith continued with his medical residency and later founded and ran a nonprofit organization devoted to helping individuals in foreign countries with disabilities.
