MUKILTEO — It’s deja vu for the citizens and for Joe Marine.
He was sworn in as Mukilteo mayor this week and moved back into the office he was voted out of eight years ago.
His big wooden desk with leather inlaid top got the boot then, too, and he hopes to get it back.
“They put in a newfangled phone. It’s very fancy, with HD-something,” Marine said.
His first day ended with a three-hour City Council meeting.
“I hope to have a congenial council that can move issues forward,” he said.
The meeting lasted until nearly 10 p.m.
Marine, 59, is the city’s first mayor to serve a third term. The job pays $70,800 a year, the same as when he left office. He is an insurance broker specializing in Medicare.
In November, he defeated Jennifer Gregerson, who unseated him in the 2013 election. He returned to politics in 2019 on the council, intent on a 2021 run for mayor.
“It worked out well being on the council,” Marine said. “We had some big things: HAP. COVID.”
Marine was against Gregerson’s Housing Action Plan, a $100,000 grant to study and address housing needs. He strategically turned it into a campaign issue.
He proposed an advisory measure on the November ballot about whether the city should encourage high-density housing, which wasn’t part of HAP but garnered allies for him.
More than 80% of the voters said no to the measure. He won the election for mayor with over 56% of the vote.
He said priorities include a park-and-ride, waterfront development and preserving aerospace manufacturing jobs.
Ten people have applied for his council seat, including Carolyn Carson, Alex Crocco, Kevin Stoltz and Peter Zieve, who all ran in 2021. Others contenders are Jason Moon, Ashvin Sanghvi, Donald Saul, Joleen Sims, Sharon Swann and Theodore “Ted” Wheeler.
The six-member council will start the process to select the new member next week.
Current council members are Elisabeth Crawford; Richard Emery; Louis Harris, newly elected after filling an appointed seat; newcomer Tom Jordal; Riaz Khan; and Steve Schmalz, back from a break after serving two prior terms.
Council members Sarah Kneller and Bob Champion did not seek reelection.
Crawford is the only woman on the council. That could change depending on who is appointed.
At Monday’s meeting, Schmalz was elected council president and Crawford the vice president.
“It’s a new year with new opportunities,” said Schmalz, who was council president in a prior term. “I was impressed with the professionalism and knowledge and the questions asked. The city has changed in the two years since I left the council. It’s a totally different landscape.”
Andrea Brown: abrown@heraldnet.com; 425-339-3443. Twitter @reporterbrown.
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