It was an unusual Town Meeting Day for Burlington, Vermont Mayor Miro Weinberger on Tuesday: for the first time in more than a decade, he was not on the ballot. The Democrat declined to run for a fifth three-year term. Progressives took advantage of the opportunity as State Representative Emma Mulvaney-Stanak won the mayoral race, defeating Democratic City Councilor Joan Shannon. Now, Weinberger is preparing to leave office on April 1 amid speculation about a potential run for governor later this year. Weinberger spoke with WAMC’s North Country Bureau Chief Pat Bradley.
First of all, it's an exciting day for Burlington. The city's just elected our first woman as mayor in the city's history. First openly queer mayor. I've talked to Emma Mulvaney-Stanak about a half hour ago and congratulated her on her historic wins. These are important milestones for the community and a remarkable accomplishment. I also think Joan ran a very solid race. It's a very impressive result as well. This is a this is not an easy town for Democrats to get elected mayor and Joan came close to doing it. And I applaud her for that.
I thought for the party overall, it was significant that a year ago, the Democrats essentially took, I know we've had some back and forth about it, but it's essentially the first Democratic majority on the council in decades, and the party held that tonight. And I think many of the issues that Democrats and that I have pushed for in recent years also had a good night: the public safety tax passed overwhelmingly, both campaigns were very focused on housing, housing supply and addressing homelessness challenges, as we have been, both campaigns made commitments around the net zero goals. So that's how I see it. Again, congratulations to Emma, she's accomplished something very significant.
What are you going to be watching for as the new mayor and the council moves forward? You know, considering the issue with public safety, and as you mentioned, housing and things like that? What sorts of things are you going to be watching for as a private citizen once they take office?
You got that last part exactly right, Pat. Like I said, I talked to Emma tonight already, our teams have been in touch over the last week with both campaigns to make it clear that whoever won, we intended to be as supportive as possible during the transition, we've actually set up for the first time, I think, the city has had, a small budget for the transition team to have over the next month, something that I created in the last few weeks. And we're gonna work very hard for this to be a smooth transition. And then I tend to offer Emma any support that she would like to have beyond that. It's very important to me that she succeed in this role at this important time for our community. But I will be becoming a private citizen, I think it's the job once they become elected mayor, to give space for the new person to come in and take the city where they feel is best. II will say I watched the race fairly closely. And from what I heard and saw both campaigns were focused on many of the issues that I've been focused on in recent years. They were focused on public safety, rebuilding the police department, and doing so not just with more police officers, but with also other professionals. Both campaigns were focused on addressing the homelessness challenge in creating our housing supply, adjusting our housing supply challenges, both campaigns were focused on the net zero goals we've had. And so I'm hopeful that in many ways, what I've worked hard for 12 years will continue to be a priority and continue to advance.
Have you decided what you are going to be doing once you leave office?
I’ve not. All I've decided is that for the next month, I'm going to continue to work really hard to support the new Mulvaney-Stanak administration. Beyond that, when it gets to April, I am looking forward to being able to spend some more time in the short term — I’m certainly not retiring — but in the short term, I'm excited about spending more time with Li Lin as she's getting ready to go off to college. You know, spending more time with Ada in this kind of exciting period when she's in fourth grade. I'm not sure what the future holds. Like I've said to you all in the past, I have been very grateful to have been in the public arena for the last 12 years, if there's a way…I do think the state continues to face many challenges. If there's a way for me to possibly contribute to them, I will, but I have not identified that what that opportunity is gonna be yet.
