Outgoing Evanston Mayor Delivers Final State Of The City Address

EVANSTON, IL — Evanston Mayor Steve Hagerty delivered his final state of the city address remotely Friday to a fundraiser for the local chamber of commerce. The outgoing mayor's third and final annual address included a recorded message and a live question and answer session.

"Being a mayor of any city has to be one of the richest experiences that you will have in your lifetime and as I get ready to go out of office, I'm going to miss that. You really get to know your community in a truly unique way that many people will never have the experience to, and so it's incredibly rich," Hagerty said. "I find it so fascinating that someone people will just belittle and demean me and yet other people will say 'Oh my God, you're the mayor of Evanston."

Hagerty touted several accomplishments of the past four years, including the the construction of the Robert Crown Community Center, the renovation of the Fleetwood-Jourdain Community Center and improvements to the Levy Senior Center library. The city also added 58 new affordable housing units, and 115 more are either under construction or have been approved, Hagerty said.

The mayor also noted Evanston has added new municipal water buyers — the Morton Grove-Niles Water Commission and the village of Lincolnwood — increasing its number of individual customers to 400,000. The legal battle between Skokie and Evanston relating to the circumstances of a rate hike imposed by the Evanston City Council a few months after Hagerty took office will continue after he leaves.

Ongoing challenges include the city's 7.5 percent unemployment rate, addressing racial disparities in how the coronavirus pandemic has affected Evanston residents and helping local businesses keep their doors open amid COVID-19, the mayor told Evanston Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Roger Sosa during the question and answer session.

"If you walk around downtown Evanston, as I'm sure many people do, there's a lot of vacancies, and it's hard," Hagerty said. "I sometimes even get a little emotional when I walk around and see those vacancies"

Hagerty, the founder of an eponymous emergency management consulting firm, said he was especially proud of the response to the pandemic by city staff and community members.

"No question, helping lead our city's emergency operations effort was the most unexpected yet rewarding time during my term as mayor. Our community's response to COVID-19 is something we should all forever be proud of, while remembering all those that we lost," he said.

Evanston's COVID-19 metrics have compared favorably to other municipalities, both local and nationally, across several metrics — whether it be rates of infection, hospitalizations, deaths or vaccinations, according to Hagerty.

"We have done well, in part, because Evanston residents are complying, and they follow facts and science and data, and that's what I try to follow," he said. "So I think that's made a huge difference."

Mayor-Elect Daniel Biss is due to be sworn in May 10 with a new City Council. Unofficial results from the Cook County Clerk's Office indicate there will be four new aldermen on the nine-member council.

Hagerty said he plans to take the summer off for the first time in decades before finding the right role to reinsert himself at his consulting firm. He said he is interested in serving on boards of nonprofit or health care organizations in the future and would like to be an adjunct professor somewhere.

In his prepared remarks, the mayor said the night the current council took their oath four years ago was a memorable one. Hagerty was sworn in by former Mayor Lorraine Morton, who died the following fall.

"The four years since that evening have been unlike any other," he said. "Together, we faced a global pandemic, racial inequity and Injustice, a growing climate crisis and threats to our nation's democracy. As a community, we've stepped up to address these historic, generational challenges while continuing to do the day-to-day work of making Evanston a city that works for all of us."