Why Should Delaware Care?
Gov. John Carney is finishing an eight-year term as the leader of Delaware, and will begin a new four-year term as leader of its largest city. An elected leader for more than two decades, Carney has become an influential party leader, who has overseen a business-friendly brand of Democratic representation that has been challenged recently.
Gov. John Carney is preparing for a history-making change in Delaware.
On Tuesday, he will resign as governor in order to be sworn in as the next mayor of Wilmington, becoming the first sitting governor to make such a switch to municipal office in modern history.
A former lieutenant governor and Congressman, Carney has served in elected office for nearly all of the past 25 years. His eight years as governor brought stability to state finances, navigated the COVID pandemic and witnessed the rise of Democratic Party power in the First State.
Yet the governor also carved his own path and wasn’t afraid to oppose policies supported by Democratic state legislators.
Spotlight Delaware met with the governor in the waning days of his time at the helm of the state to discuss all this and more. The entire conversation can be heard in an exclusive podcast. A selection of the conversation, edited for length and clarity, is offered here.
When you look back at your last eight years, what do you hope Delawareans remember from your governorship?
I think it boils down to one thing, which is, I did what I said it was going to do. And I think that’s important. I’ve learned over 20 plus years as an elected official, and many years before that as an appointed official, that people are cynical of elected officials and what they tell them. In order to be successful, you need to develop a basic trust among the people that you serve, and part of that trust is built by doing what you said you were going to do.
What stands out to you about the COVID pandemic period that you led through?
The one thing I think that I always knew and became very front and center during the pandemic was how much better or easier it is to operate as an elected official in our small state than in a bigger state. Because we can get everybody in a sector – the business sector, the academic sector, the small business sector, the cities and towns – on one conference call.
The other thing that was very apparent was how critical really small things are to the smooth operation of the state and an economy. We tried really hard to keep road construction open and working so that people could go to work. We knew they were outside, they could socially distance and we could get a lot of work done. But, I get a call one day from the guy that runs the Delaware Contractors Association and he said, ‘Hey, you’ve got to do something. In order for our road contractors to do their work, they need stone. We don’t have any stone here in Delaware. We get it all from Pennsylvania, and Gov. [Tom] Wolf has shut down the quarries in Pennsylvania, so we can’t get any stone.’
So, I called Gov. Wolf and I said, ‘Governor, we have a problem.’ And I explained the problem. He said, ‘Well, we have a waiver process. We’ll see if we can fast track that and keep your guys working.’ And we were able to do that.
We had the similar situation in March of 2020, when Gov. [Larry] Hogan of Maryland shut down the bars in Ocean City, and everybody flooded into Delaware, because at that point we were still open.
It was around St. Patrick’s Day if I remember right.
I was the first Irish governor that ever canceled St Patrick’s Day.
What advice would you give your successor, Matt Meyer?
My advice would be to do what you said you’re going to do. People might not always agree, but they will reward you by kind of following what you want to do from time to time, you’ll feel better about yourself after it’s all said and done.
How would you characterize your relationship with Matt today?
It needs work.
I think a good relationship will be mutually beneficial. I think it will improve, and it will improve by necessity if we put our past lack of communication behind us and realize that in order for both of us to serve our constituents well we’ve got to work together.
I, as the mayor of Wilmington, and the city of Wilmington as a whole relies on the state in so many ways.
As mayor, there are some issues that you’re going to walk into on day one. Homelessness has become a topic of concern in the city, and one where Mayor Purzycki and city police have faced some criticism regarding their tactics. I’m curious how you assess the situation?
And, in your Mayoral Transition Plan, it’s suggested that you create a Council on Homelessness. What might that be able to do?
Yeah, I’m going to [create the council]. One of the big issues right now is we have people camping out in places where they shouldn’t right and where it’s dangerous. We’ve had to clear encampments that were under the Interstate 95 overpasses.
We just have to find a better way to manage the population. If you’ve seen or you know one homeless person, you know one homeless person – they all have different challenges, and many have mental health and substance use issues. And the fact that many of them won’t take your help is a problem.
But you can’t allow them to interfere with everybody else’s life. You know, one of the things that that I learned knocking on doors all over the city was that there are homeless people squatting in vacant houses all over the city that make life miserable for the people living there. There’s got to be some respect both ways there.
I think it starts with compassion and then moves toward responsibility. People have to be responsible, and they just don’t have full rein to do whatever they want and camp out, occupy bus shelters, etc. At the same time, we can’t just brush them aside. We have an obligation as human beings to try to to work with them.
I think the original idea around the Hope Center was a good one, even though greater communication would have been appreciated, because it really is state funds now that keep that operating.
Same thing happened with the Pallet Village in Georgetown. It’s a great idea, but they didn’t have any vision about how they were going to fund it long term, except that one day, they were going to wake up and call the governor’s office and ask for $1 million. Well, you just can’t do it that way.
The point is better coordination in needed, while starting with a compassionate approach. We need to get people to think a little bit out of their the boundaries of the world they live in, so that we can take into consideration the effect on everybody in our city and beyond.
We’re starting to see more progressive Democrats win seats, especially here in Delaware. Do you worry that the classic kind of Delaware Way position is starting to wane, or do you think it will endure?
I do worry.
I learned and came up in a Delaware political environment which was pretty balanced. Where we had 16 years of Republican governors, Pete du Pont and Mike Castle back to back, and haven’t had one since. And increasingly, the registration has become – as the National Republican Party has become more far-right driven – more Democratic in response. Most of the Republicans of my day were moderate Republicans, and they tend to be a little bit more pro-business. Then Tom Carper and Ruth Ann Minner mold were more of a pro-business Democrat, which is what I consider myself.
I think more worrisome, or what requires more work, is that the newly elected members of city council and the legislature are very young. They haven’t had a lot of real world experience, particularly in employment and the business sector.
You appear to be a man of your convictions. If you don’t believe in something, you don’t let the political winds sway you. But did you ever feel pressure to back some of the party’s initiatives that you didn’t agree with, thinking maybe specifically of your dissent on marijuana legalization or physician-assisted death?
It’s a combination of both. I’d be wrong in saying that I just do what I think is right, then the rest be damned. That’s not the way this works. I think you have to make some calculation about the competitive nature of our state, and the quality of life in our state.
I don’t think smoking pot is the worst thing in the world, and we weren’t sending people to jail anymore for that. But I don’t think it’s such a good thing, like alcohol.
In the city of Wilmington in particular, mayors and city council people have worked for years to close down certain liquor stores, and they were successful. Why do you think we’re having such difficult problems figuring out where to put the marijuana dispensaries? Because people think, ‘Oh, it’s OK, but not in my neighborhood.’ And it doesn’t matter what neighborhood you live in, nobody wants that liquor store, nobody wants that marijuana dispensary down the corner because people who go there to purchase pot or alcohol often hang out in the neighborhood and bring other challenges …
Do you feel like the challenges that some of the local municipalities have been putting forward on marijuana dispensaries supports your position that Delaware wasn’t overwhelmingly in favor of legalization?
Yes, absolutely.
The people that supported [legalization] – and I don’t say that they’re bad people, we just disagree on this issue – acted like everybody was for it. No, everybody is not for it, and this is an indication of that.
It’s not a great signal for our young people, frankly, and that’s that’s been my view of it. But at some point, you have to be pragmatic and put up the white flag when you’ve lost the fight.
The assisted suicide issue is just more a moral conviction. And I don’t fault anybody on either side of that issue, but … I think those are the kinds of issues that you just do what you think is right and let the chips fall where they may.
Lastly, you served in the National Government Association and you were a sounding board to President Biden over the last four years. Obviously, Democrats were not successful in November. So how are you and your colleagues around the country really talking about this incoming Trump 2.0 administration?
Well, I think people are really frightened.
I think from my vantage point here, as the next mayor of Wilmington, it will really be all about revenue, which is going to go away. That’s the reality.
Which is all the more reason to be in sync with the state government, because they’re going to be losing resources too. We talked about homelessness, and most of the funding for that comes from the federal government through the state government, and so there will be big implications of that.
But I think the bigger thing is just the attitude and division that the President-elect has brought to his campaign and will bring to his his next tenure, and that’s that’s just troubling.
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