Syracuse Mayor-elect Ben Walsh is hosting events to hear residents’ concerns before he takes office. Walsh has also organized a transition team and has begun hiring his administration.
Jack Adjemian of Syracuse is an independent cab driver. He and a few other cab drivers came to the downtown Café Kubal for a meet and greet with Walsh to talk to him about ride sharing companies like Uber and Lyft. Adjemian said he is vetted more than drivers for those companies.
“No proper insurance, no background checks, no fingerprinting," Adjemian said. "We just want an even playing field.”
Adjemian said Walsh seemed favorable to his issue and it was something Walsh said he would look into.
“I’m 72 years old; I never met a politician in my life, so this was a first,” Adjemian said.
Walsh said throughout the campaign he tried to make a point to be as accessible as possible.
“Just because I’ve been elected doesn’t mean that that should end, if anything it should increase,” Walsh said.
Walsh has selected a transition team that he said will address some of the greatest areas of need in Syracuse.
"I prided myself throughout the campaign on building a broad diverse coalition of supporters, so I wanted to make sure that translated from the campaign trail to city hall," Walsh said.
That team includes some of Walsh's mayoral opponents in the past election like former-Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins and former-Democratic candidates Alfonso Davis and Chris Fowler.
"During this campaign, at one point we had 10 candidates and I always felt throughout the process, everyone had something that they brought to the table, everyone added value in different ways," Walsh said. "When I put together the transition team, I thought it was important to include some of those folks and make sure that they will continuing to be engaged."
Walsh also announced the hiring of Sharon Owens of the Southwest Community Center to be his deputy mayor and chief of staff.
