Photo by Chris Militzer
Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson
On a recent rainy Saturday, Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson wasn’t quite ready to reflect or rest on his laurels as he nears the end of his elected service to the City. But he did concede that, with a team effort with staff and volunteers, the City has cleared some big hurdles under his leadership.
Construction on a new hospital, transportation, schools and the City sewer system are the big-ticket items completed under Wilson’s leadership.
“We’re not done, but we have made a lot of progress on a lot of fronts,” he said. “Getting Landmark Mall redeveloped was the big one, that’s something we’ve been talking about for 25 years in the city and I’m excited to have gotten that to the point that we have. But we have a plan moving forward. Construction will begin soon on a new hospital.”
Another check-off during his time as mayor: Getting construction done on the Potomac Yard Metro and surrounding area. “That’s finally happening, which is exciting,” he said.
School construction is another big achievement for the City, he noted. “We’ve been able to get two schools opening in just a couple of months of each other. MacArthur just opened and Minnie Howard will open later this year. It is the most significant era of new school construction in the city’s history. Essentially [we’ve built] five schools in a decade."
“We have the combined sewer project nearing conclusion,” he noted. “That’s the biggest infrastructure the city has ever undertaken. We have invested several hundred million dollars now in storm sewers to address the flooding issues in Del Ray and Rosemont. That’s one of the things you don’t see, but we’ve got a lot going on.”
Housing Decisions ‘Controversial’ but ‘Impactful'
“The reforms we’ve done around housing — creating committed affordable housing, working to change a lot of our provisions on how we create housing in the future, a vision to make sure Alexandria remains accessible for low and moderate income to live in the future — while those have certainly been controversial, they will be impactful for decades to come,” he said. “That’s something I’m proud of.”
Wilson is proud of how most of Alexandria got through the Covid pandemic. “Getting back from one of the worst eras of our history, I took office as mayor just before the pandemic,” he noted. “We dealt with the pandemic, kept the economy afloat, kept our residents alive and got ourselves back quicker than almost anybody ever thought. We had one of the highest vaccinations rates in the state and certainly the country.”
“We pushed out vaccinations as quickly as we possibly could and galvanized a whole army of volunteers to help with food, health and service gaps we had. I’m proud of that; it’s a team effort, we have a great city staff and volunteers.”
Should the Mayor Position be Full Time?
“It’s definitely full time in hours,” Wilson said. “The question is only ‘Is it full time in pay?’ I’ve always had mixed feelings about that. I feel like I have benefited by the fact that I live a somewhat normal life. I have a normal job, I take the bus and the metro, I pick up my kids and drop them off and go to sporting events. Having a real job and that experience helps me be a better City Council person.”
Wilson noted that having a professional city manager "not involved in day-to-day politics, insulated from that, is important. It makes our government less politicized, improves things from the ethical perspective, prevents ethical lapses you see in other jurisdictions. But I also recognize it does mean that there are people who cannot do this job because of their personal financial situations, I’m definitely sensitive to those concerns.”
Ward Representation?
“I’m not opposed categorically, but I do believe people who believe it would solve certain problems are incorrect. I say that to mean the people advocating for it are advocating for it because they think it would solve certain issues,” he said.
The two groups generally advocating for wards “are Republicans, they think that’s how they will elect more Republicans to Council,” he said. “The reality is in Alexandria, there is pretty much no way that you could draw a ward district in Alexandria where they would elect a Republican automatically. The most Republican area in Alexandria is still a 55 percent Democratic performance area. It’s unlikely to be able to draw that kind of district.”
A second group of people that Wilson hears about “are disappointed about different decisions on different development decisions. In reality, how it works, you have seven people on Council who have to listen to everybody, people who are in favor and people who are against something. If you had wards and localized opposition to a project, well, then there would be one person against it presumably and six people who wouldn’t care. I’m not sure it solves that problem that folks think it does.”
Another negative of wards, Wilson said, is “you tend to have very parochial kind of horse-trading and things like that. The advantage of our system is all seven of us have to look out for the entire city. And we can’t afford to ignore any particular part of the city."
Developing a Thick Skin
What comes with the mayor’s job — getting criticized by residents for the decisions you make. “You absolutely have to have a thick skin in this business,” Wilson said. “If you’re doing your job right, you’re going to face criticism, it requires that you be willing to deal with that. I certainly, in 14 years on City Council, I’ve dealt with people being upset with me about different things. I try not to take it personally. The tough ones are when it is personal friends who are disappointed with you for various reasons. That’s no fun."
The good news, he said: “People in politics have a healthy sense of themselves. You can’t have a fragile ego and be in this business. Over time, it’s sometimes not fun to get criticized. Alexandrians are a very highly educated, opinionated bunch and they expect a lot of their elected officials and you’ve got to clear that bar. It’s certainly a challenging environment at times but I find that fun.”
What has he Learned the Hard Way?
"I learned certainly, in 2009 when I lost the election, you’ve got to tell your own story. [I learned the hard way] that you can’t count on the press and word of mouth to spread information, especially good information. So you’ve got to get out there and communicate with people. I’ve worked really hard to communicate with residents and get the information and make sure they’re aware of what’s going on with their government. That’s something that took me awhile to figure out, how effective that was.”
Wilson advised his successor to talk to people who are in your camp and outside of your camp. “I have always had the feeling and the view that you talk to everybody,” he said. “Someone who’s against you on an issue today, might be with you on an issue tomorrow. So, you just constantly engage with people and over 14 years and six campaigns, I’ve had people who started out supporting me for my first few campaigns and stopped supporting me and I’ve had people who went the other way, who changed their minds and came on board.”
He’s able to see the bigger picture now, he said. “I used to get more spun up about little things and little criticisms and I’ve developed a thicker skin for sure.”
What’s Next?
“I’m looking forward to sitting on the sidelines. There’s no office I’m particularly interested in at the moment. I think everybody assumes I’m looking at Don’s (Congressman Don Beyer) seat and I certainly, Don’s a good friend, I’ve known him for a long, long time. I hope he serves in Congress for a long time to come.”
“As I told Don a couple days ago, I look at the U.S. House of Representatives and say ‘Why in the hell would anybody want to be there?’ They are literally fighting each other in the hallways, they just expelled a member, they don’t actually pass any bills. It looks miserable, absolutely miserable. I have no desire to go to Congress.”
“Part of the advantage of being in local government is I’m able to have a normal life, do my day job, see my family occasionally. Pretty much any other office that’s out there requires either getting rid of my day job or a sacrifice for my family I’m just not willing to make. Never say never, but at this time, I have no intent or plan.”
Q&A:
The hardest thing I’ve ever done: Getting a kid to college, a 19-year old and 16-year old through high school is a hard thing. And we’re not done, we’re not done, as my Mom reminds me, “you’re never really done.”
Three people living or dead I would invite to dinner: President Lyndon Baines Johnson; Congressman John Lewis and astronaut Sally Ride, I’ve got to have some political and science knowledge in there!
Favorite way to relax: Running for sure.
My favorite meal is: I’m a big fan of Chinese food (Peking duck); and I also love Vietnamese.
My pet peeve is: Negativity
My favorite movie is: “A Few Good Men”
Last book I read was: “Lessons from the Edge” by Alexandria resident Maria Ivanovitch, former ambassador to Ukraine.
My favorite U.S. president is: Franklin Delano Roosevelt
My favorite vacation spot is: South Africa. We had a great time; our next trip is to Greece.
A dream I have is to: Get a full night of sleep.
This article was first published in the May issue of Alexandria Living Magazine.
