New Rochelle’s Mayor As DNC Blogger, “TV Stage Prop”

Janos Marton reports for City & State:

* Of the thousands of bloggers who convened on Charlotte for the Democratic convention, Noam Bramson stood out in at least one respect – he was likely the only active mayor of the lot. The New Rochelle Democrat was attending his first convention as a delegate, and he provided candid daily observations at his personal website: http://www.noambramson.org. Bramson, who cut his teeth working in Congresswoman Nita Lowey’s office, was elected to the New Rochelle City Council while in his 20s, serving five terms before being appointed mayor in 2006 to fill a vacancy. He won election to a full term in 2007, and was easily re-elected in 2011. As mayor, Bramson has focused on renewing a “decayed, contaminated, inaccessible waterfront,” as well as building up the area by New Rochelle’s transit center and developing a long-term sustainability plan, but Bramson conceded that he has also been grappling with more immediate budgetary challenges. New Rochelle has had to lay off municipal workers and, calling municipal budgets a “lagging economic indicator,” Bramson noted that New Rochelle was still feeling the effects of the recession. “It will be some time before we reach pre-recession revenue streams.” Nevertheless, Bramson beamed that the city had a “20-year blueprint,” and said he was more optimistic about the city’s long-term planning than he had been several years ago. As for the convention, one of Bramsom’s early posts joked about his role as “a television stage prop,” and while he admitted that delegates had no serious role in the decision-making, he explained “the production is important. It lays out the difference in vision between Romney and Obama,” a difference Bramsom calls “as stark and as significant as any in my lifetime.”