nothin 18 Years, 278 Days Later, Mayor Makes History | New Haven Independent

18 Years, 278 Days Later, Mayor Makes History

John DeStefano broke a record Thursday simply by waking up — becoming New Haven’s longest-serving mayor ever.

He matched and surpassed Elizur Goodrich’s record. Goodrich served as New Haven mayor for 18 years and 277 days, until June 4, 1822. (Click here to read about that, and about how Goodrich’s sixth-generation descendant helped elect DeStefano to his record 10th term last fall.)

Thursday marked DeStefano’s the 278th day in his 19th year in office running a city that’s 374 years old.

Not that he was counting. Too closely.

His office made no mention of the milestone. No special events were planned, no congratulations cards or gifts. DeStefano didn’t have a celebratory dinner planned.

Instead he did some paperwork at home in the morning. (It was too wet to cut the grass, his usual Thursday morning chore.) He arrived at the office mid-day for a planned meeting about the fire department, an interview with 6‑year-old reporter Isadora DiMartino of Cold Spring School about what it’s like to be mayor, a confab about the Columbus Day parade, an evening appearance at a community forum on citizen participation in civic life.

It’s a trip,” he said in a relaxed, upbeat interview in his office about doing the same job every day for going on 20 years. It’s great! I don’t need a cake.” (Click on the play arrow at the top of the story to watch interview excerpts.)

DeStefano said he’d been under the impression that he was merely tying Goodrich’s record Thursday and breaking it on Friday. (Various calculations exist about the exact date; the Independent’s is based on the state library’s recorded start date for Goodrich’s term.)

I’m not exactly sure what day” marks the record, he said. But it doesn’t matter. Right now I’m involved in a school reform initiative that is one of the most ambitious, collaborative and comprehensive in America. We’re doing extraordinary things … getting national recognition for school reform. Got a wonderful boost last week. … We’re seeing our workforce transition to a knowledge base environment, an entrepreneurial environment. We’ve got a 24-hour downtown. Go to these neighborhoods now, particularly public housing: Massive amounts of housing stock [is being rebuilt]. We’re leading the state in jobs, taxes, and population growth … Homicides are down 50 percent. Shootings down by a third. Anyone who’s been to Compstat knows the police have a focused violence reduction strategy. We’re seeing them build community partnerships — the way they treat victims and engage them. Twelve homicides to date [this year]; 17 homicides cleared. Going back and clearing the cold cases .…

You know what? It’s not about looking backward. It really isn’t. It’s just so cool to be doing all these things now.”

Melissa Bailey Photo

Goodrich’s tombstone in Grove Street Cemetery.

In 2000, DeStefano broke late Mayor Dick Lee’s record as the longest-serving continuously popularly elected mayor. (Lee, who oversaw urban renewal in the 1950s and 1960s, served 16 years.) Goodrich served as mayor back when a town meeting chose a chief executive once, then that person stayed in the job until retirement. The son of a Yale Corporation member, Goodrich descended from the original settlers of Wethersfield. Goodrich, a lawyer and Yale professor, came from an era when New Haven had patrician” mayors, to use political scientist Robert Dahl’s phrase. DeStefano is the son of a cop and a hairdresser; he got his education at University of Connecticut and mastered the art of maintaining a citywide electoral organization.

Like Goodrich, DeStefano has shepherded the city through some economically troubled times, including two recessions.

They first began before he won his first term in 1993 and started serving in 1994. He compared the job’s changing flavor to that of a marriage.

I’ve been married 33 years now. Love my wife; enjoy the marriage,” he said. You find different things in it. When the kids have moved out of the house, thank God, got jobs, thank God, you enjoy different things in the marriage. That’s what it’s like being mayor. What you find exciting and enjoyable today is very different than 1994.

Nineteen ninety-four was about stopping the bleeding and resetting the city,” he continued. The day before you take office the Superior Court says you’ve got to spend tens of millions more in education .… We’ve got our challenges now. The things we’re doing in the city around school reform, around violence reduction, around changing the economy, there’s a curve and a focus to it now that didn’t exist in those days and have only been made possible by people working together …”

The job also his its cycles. Besides inheriting a bleeding city budget, DeStefano also inherited a nationally recognized community policing program in 1994. Community policing waned over the past decade; this year the mayor rehired one of the original plan’s architects, Dean Esserman, to revive it and update it as the new police chief.

The job also has its learning curve. Blizzards, contract negotiations, a wildcat school bus driver walkout potentially leaving 20,000 kids stranded in the afternoon — all become easier to handle after dealing with them or similar crises once or 10 times.

In Thursday’s interview, DeStefano kept bringing up new challenges, new projects, new reasons to enjoy coming to work. He’s already running hard for reelection, a contest that’s still a year away. Asked how many terms he’d like to serve, he replied, one at a time.” (A group connected to Yale’s unions, which elected a majority independent slate to the Board of Aldermen last year, recently did a poll to test the waters to run a potential challenger in 2013.)

At the same time, DeStefano has learned to pace himself. He still works around 75 hours a week, he estimated. The days begin at 6:30 a.m. and include a morning stop at mass. Starting with an all-consuming 2006 candidacy for governor, he decided to start spending Thursday mornings at home to take care of chores. He and his wife Kathy have also bought a vacation home in Florida where he makes a point of spending a few weeks a year. He’s trying to hit the links, too.

As he repeatedly downplayed his history-breaking moment Thursday, the mayor was asked what next milestones he’s looking toward.

A golf score I’m not embarrassed by,” he quipped. Then he mentioned his son Dan’s upcoming wedding, planned for 2013.

Paul Bass Photo

DeStefano checks the schedule for Year 19, Day 278.

Look,” DeStefano said of bumping Elizur Goodrich from the perch he’d occupied for 190 years. Some day it will be a nice thing to say. [But] I don’t want it to be John DeStefano, longest serving mayor.’ I want it to be John DeStefano, dropout rate was cut in half, achievement gap was cut in half, and kids started going to college and having an aspiration for it.’ I want it to be that this was a community where people felt they could organize diaper banks, All Our Kin, Solar Youth, Lyric Hall, and paste photos under highway bridges. I want it to be the place where immigrants come too because they feel they’re welcome, where dreamers can go to college, where every school was rebuilt as an expression of our values …”

Mayoral Executive Assistant Rosemarie Lemley, who has kept the mayor’s schedule since June of 1996, gently interrupted him from the doorway to his office. The time had come, she said, for his next appointment.

Tags:

Sign up for our morning newsletter

Don't want to miss a single Independent article? Sign up for our daily email newsletter! Click here for more info.


Post a Comment

Commenting has closed for this entry

Comments

Avatar for anonymous

Avatar for THREEFIFTHS

Avatar for DarnellG

Avatar for Burnsie

Avatar for Edward_H

Avatar for THREEFIFTHS

Avatar for Brutus2011

Avatar for PH

Avatar for adelehouston

Avatar for THREEFIFTHS

Avatar for upwards

Avatar for Brian L. Jenkins

Avatar for Edward_H

Avatar for CLaudia H