They’ve only just now gotten used to calling him “mayor-elect,” and now the City Council will have to learn to go all the way. In a Palmer Events Center room stuffed with sweet tea, smiles, and standing ovations, Will Wynn was sworn in as Austin’s 53rd mayor Monday night. Joining him in the oath were re-elected incumbents Raul Alvarez and Danny Thomas, and the council’s newest member, young Brewster McCracken.
In the subsequent speechifying, all four hewed to common themes — thanking the family, thanking the campaign staff and all the volunteers, and in Wynn’s case thanking his opponents. “I’ll be a better mayor after spending months running across Austin with people who challenged my ideas,” Wynn told the crowd, which included at least two of his former foes, Brad Meltzer and Jennifer Gale. But the new and returning leaders also sounded cautionary notes as they took the keys to a city in financial and economic straits.
“For the first time in a long time, we have to reinvent how we do things,” said Wynn. “We need to reinvent how we do business with people who do business, our small local businesses.” Alvarez spoke of needing “to focus on partnerships to leverage our resources.” And newbie McCracken — after ingratiating himself to the crowd of city insiders with quirky self-deprecating humor that you had to be there to appreciate (a fried rat?) — opined that “people are hurting and inaction is not an option. But it’s an urban legend” — as opposed to a fact — “that we can’t work together and solve our problems.”
Receiving lavish praise from his three former colleagues, outgoing Mayor Gus Garcia was dubbed “a friend who will never be forgotten” by Thomas and “an idol of the barrio” by Alvarez. This was a coda to last Thursday’s two-hour-long Garcia farewell tribute at the council meeting, where the mayor emeritus was showered — for the second time, having retired from City Hall once before, y’know — with praise and gifts from his colleagues. Among the tokens of their affection: a learn-to-swim kit from City Manager Toby Futrell, who discovered Garcia’s nonaquatic tendencies when planning the Barton Springs reopening. The kit included not only goggles and floaties but also appropriate swimwear — either Speedo or baggy shorts, as Garcia’s wife Marina will allow. “It’s important for a woman to have choices,” Futrell said.
This article appears in June 20 • 2003.