Roger Reinert beat incumbent by a wide margin. What's next for the Zenith city?

CATHY WURZER: Since Duluth, Minnesota, became a city, it's had 39 mayors. In January, Roger Reinert becomes the 40th leader of the Zenith city. The former Duluth city council member and DFL state lawmaker handily beat incumbent mayor Emily Larson last night by a wide margin, 60% to 40%. After a hard fought campaign, he told supporters it's time for the city to unite.

ROGER REINERT: We need to have a smooth transition. We want to move forward from a challenging election and bring our community back together. Whether you supported me or whether you didn't, I am still a mayor for this entire community.

CATHY WURZER: Duluth mayor elect Roger Reinert is on the line. Congratulations.

ROGER REINERT: Thank you.

CATHY WURZER: Mayor Larson, as you know had, the backing of a number of unions, former mayor Don Ness, major DFL leaders like Governor Walz-- didn't seem to matter to the majority of Duluth voters. Why do you think that is?

ROGER REINERT: Well, Cathy, I think a couple of things. One, we just haven't had a contested election for mayor for almost 20 years. You have to go back to 2007, the last time that we really had a robust campaign.

And I started the campaign saying that's one of the reasons I'm running. I think we are overdue for a meaningful conversation about where we're at and where we're headed. And the other thing is we really were just a Duluth race for a Duluth mayor. The team was completely local Duluth folks, many of whom had never done a political campaign before.

And we spent so much time just sitting and listening with folks from one end of the community to the other. I'm a runner from a running standpoint. We really spent the first part of the campaign building our base, and that served us well during the homestretch.

CATHY WURZER: I was talking to a Duluthian who said-- this person was wondering out loud. Is this the revenge of the moderates in Duluth with your win? What do you think of that?

[LAUGHS]

ROGER REINERT: Well, I mean, that's certainly my history. Folks that will recall my service in the legislature-- Senator Jeremy Miller and I co-chaired the caucus, the idea we wanted to be Minnesotans first and other labels second. And that is really the same attitude I brought to the race. You mentioned endorsements. We intentionally chose not to seek political party endorsements. We intentionally chose not to seek those personal or elected official endorsements. And each time we did that, folks sort of said, well, you're done. I mean, this race is over. And yet, folks responded to that. They really were interested in a nonpartisan race that really focused on the city and our core city service and local issues.

CATHY WURZER: Hey, let's talk about core city services. The Duluth streets, as you know-- I know that, too. They're not great. No secret.

ROGER REINERT: They're challenging.

CATHY WURZER: They are challenging. That's one way to put it. Yeah, people have been complaining about them in the potholes for years, even long before Emily Larson took office. And you're dealing with some different things in Duluth. You've got the steep hill side. You got a pretty harsh climate. So what can you, Roger Reinert, do that others haven't been able to do with repairing and maintaining streets in Duluth?

ROGER REINERT: You know, Cathy, I think there are a number of things, but a couple I'd highlight for our conversation today. The first is, obviously, we're going to focus on aligning our resources within City Hall to better support those front end workers and better support street maintenance and our utility workers.

You noted we have a challenging situation in terms of being a cold climate city, steep streets, clay, bedrock underneath those streets, and so we have to align our resources appropriately. But we also can learn from what others are doing and doing successfully. I know you spend time in our lovely city.

And one of the things that we all know is you have such a stark contrast when you see a city street meet a county road. And one of the things I learned during the campaign from our county's engineering staff is to use our half cent sales tax that we have dedicated to street maintenance to bond and build up a big pool of money so that we can get ahead of the curve.

If we focus on building, then we can focus on maintaining. And right now, we just don't do enough annually. We might do 15, 17, even 20 miles of new streets a year. But meanwhile, almost 400 are getting worse.

CATHY WURZER: You mentioned climate, and I'm curious. Boy, when it comes to climate change, that is something that is being dealt with not only on the state level, but also in the local level. Duluth's climate is changing, which affects infrastructure, and you know that. What will a Reinert administration do to adapt to climate change?

ROGER REINERT: Well, I think you just talked about it. First of all, this was brought up repeatedly throughout the campaign, and I had to make that distinction really clear. Just because it's not a campaign issue in this election doesn't mean it's not an issue that I care about or that we should care about as a community, and my legislative voting record attests to that.

But as we look at the impact of climate change in Duluth, it really has two big impacts. One is infrastructure. And as we plan to rebuild and replace infrastructure, we have to plan for that changing climate and the impact that that's going to have on our infrastructure. And of course, we look at our city operations and how we contribute or can lessen that contribution to the change that we see happening.

We can give our voice as elected leaders to our citizens to talk about our individual contributions. That can help lessen the impact of climate change. The other big thing that we look at as a community that addresses that issue is also to look at the impact of the climate refugees or folks that are moving to places where climate is more stable and less of an issue.

And that, of course, is one of the things that we have, I guess, as an advantage of a more northern city, a more cold weather city. And for us, that presents a challenge in terms of housing. We have an incredibly limited housing stock, so even a small influx of folks to our community that are seeking a place to live is drastically driving up our home sale prices.

CATHY WURZER: Housing is a huge issue in Duluth. So is the homeless population. I think for many Minnesotans-- they're not aware that Duluth has a big issue. It is a serious issue. It's top of mind for many Duluthians. Where are you going to start with that?

ROGER REINERT: Well, really, like many communities, our unhoused are primarily folks that are struggling with addiction, whether that be alcohol or, more commonly now, it's fentanyl and opioids. That is where the start of the issue really originates. And we see it. We see it with folks that are finding homes on the street. We see it with folks that are finding homes in tent encampments.

I approach the issue with the basic premise that that's not healthy for that individual, and it's not healthy for our community. So we look at a couple of different things. We look at better connecting with the existing services that we have, and we have amazing services both within the city and in our nonprofit coalition within the community.

We look at how we partner with the county and with the state. It's not a Duluth specific issue. It's also inherent in part because we're a regional center, and so we just have things as a regional center that other communities don't have. And so folks that are in need of need of help and assistance find their way to Duluth.

But Cathy, the two things that I am really focused on as we move forward on this issue is number one, we've got a project in Duluth called the San Marco. It was something that we established when I was on the city council, targeted, meant to help folks with chronic alcohol issues.

And it has made such a difference to provide those folks a clean place to be, a safe place to be, a stable housing, supportive housing, and an opportunity to reach for help if they're able to do that. We need something like that for folks that are struggling through the opioid addiction pandemic, really, that we're seeing throughout the country.

And secondly, we have to advocate again, at the state level for regional treatment options. Right now for long term mental health care, far too often, jail and the emergency room are the options. Neither one of those are effective, nor are they affordable.

CATHY WURZER: I need to go. I also know that you're busy, too, so I appreciate your time, mayor elect Reinert. Best of luck.

ROGER REINERT: Thank you. Thanks, Cathy.

CATHY WURZER: Talk to you soon. That was Duluth mayor elect Roger Reinert.