Portsmouth Mayor John Rowe said he will not seek re-election this year so he can spend more time with his family.
Rowe, who was elected to the job in 2016, is in his first term. Residents will choose a new mayor this fall.
“I’m still having fun and enjoy doing what I do in public service but in another four years I’ll be 801/2,” he said in an interview Friday.
He said he and his family are in good health, but that being mayor is essentially a full-time job, one that keeps him in town when he’d like to be visiting his grandchildren.
“Our youngest grandchild is seven and another term would put us in a situation where she would almost be a teenager,” he said.
The news came by email to the council Thursday, Councilwoman Elizabeth Psimas said. It was reported earlier by WTKR-TV.
“The one thing that, you know, Portsmouth has been very lucky about — whether you like their style or not — is that with with John Rowe, with (former mayor) Kenny Wright and with (former mayor) Jim Holly, we had full-time mayors. These were people who didn’t have to go to a day job,” Psimas said, noting Wright had wound down his business by the end of his time in office. “It takes a full-time person to be in there. Somebody who thinks they’re going to work every day and be mayor is kidding themselves.”
Rowe, who graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1966, said he’s been in public service for 54 years.
He began working in local government in 1971, taking a job with then-Norfolk City Manager Bob House. He took a job as assistant city manager under House in Suffolk in 1975. He’s served as city manager in Poquoson, Suffolk, Clifton Forge, Emporia and Portsmouth.
Rowe was fired as Portsmouth city manager in April 2015 after more than two years on the job in a vote split along racial lines. At the time, council members did not state a reason. The following year he beat Wright, who voted to fire him, in the race for mayor.
“Let’s work together for a new beginning,” the former city manager told a crowd of about 300 supporters that night. “The message that we got, was that we want change.”
But the following three years have brought no more racial harmony to city politics than the previous decades.
Former police Chief Tanya Chapman resigned in March and soon said she was forced to quit her job for fighting systemic racism within the department’s ranks. Rowe proposed a committee to “explore issues of race, ethnicity, equity and culture” in Portsmouth in April. Thus far that hasn’t happened.
Lisa Lucas-Burke, the vice mayor, said she was shocked by Rowe’s announcement but wishes him well. She said Rowe’s institutional knowledge was an asset to the council.
“He’s put in almost a half century of time in the political arena,” she said. “It’s impressive. … People have tried to intimidate us. It’s hard to deal with sometimes.”
Thus far only Councilman Shannon Glover and perennial candidate Donna Sayegh, who frequently berates council members during meeting public comment sessions, have said they plan to run for mayor. Psimas, Lucas-Burke and Councilman Bill Moody all said Friday they have no plans to join the list of candidates.
“We need to rebuild the trust that seems to be lost in this community,” Glover said. “Let’s stop fighting each other, literally and figuratively — whether that be in the media, in the board rooms, in council chambers, in the community. Let’s figure out what’s going on.”
He said Rowe has done the best he could with the frayed relationships on council.
“I’m not judging what he has or hasn’t done. I just believe with my skill sets, I can bring things to the table as well,” Glover said.
Moody said it would be hard find someone with the perspective Rowe has, having been both a city manager and mayor.
“Those cases are rare. He has unique insight,” Moody said. “It’s a breadth of experience that will be hard to replace.”
Rowe said he’ll miss working on the various committees and working to bring all of the local municipalities together on projects.
“I’m the chairman of the Hampton Roads Transportation Planning Organization. So I chaired the meeting yesterday, and I helped guide the discussion that will seek a federal grant to complete the widening of Interstate 64,” he said. “I was working hard to get unanimous consent on that and we did. … Someone from another jurisdiction, who was new to the committee, came up to me says, ‘You run a good meeting.’ And I get positive feedback like that all the time.”
In his email Thursday to fellow council members announcing his decision, Rowe indicated that he’d still be a full-time mayor until his term is up in January 2021.
“We have work to do in 2020, and I know that we, working together, will make this a banner year for Portsmouth,” he wrote.
Gary A. Harki, 757-446-2370, gary.harki@pilotonline.com
