Newark mayor runs for 13th straight term
Al ‘Mr. Newark’ Nagy says focus is always helping those in need
NEWARK >> Alan L. Nagy is a name Newark voters have seen on their ballots election after election since 1980.
But the current mayor and 40year City Council fixture prefers to go by Al to keep things simple, just like his style in campaigning and leading the city.
Only one challenger in the Nov. 3 election stands in 79-year- old Nagy’s way of winning his 13th consecutive term and entering his 41st year on the City Council.
“He’s really Mr. Newark,” said Dave Smith, the former 33-year mayor of Newark, who was first persuaded to run for council by his friend, Nagy, in 1976.
In a city with no term limits, Nagy may be the longest serving council member for consecutive years in the Bay Area, and there’s only a short list of people who even come close, including his buddy, Smith. Nat Bates has served about 38 years on the Richmond City Council since 1967, but not consecutively.
Friends, colleagues and Nagy himself say he keeps getting reelected because of his affection for Newark, affinity for helping others and propensity for doing what he says he’ll do.
“He was here before me ,” Smith said .“He wanted the best for the city, no matter what the issue was, and that is a philosophy that he has carried through to today.”
“People like him and there’s a rea son why,” John Becker, Newark’s former city manager for 28 years, said in an interview. “He’s a straight shooter, he treats people fairly and he follows up and follows through on things.
“His personal persona is exactly the same as his political persona. I don’t really separate the two because what you see is what you ge.,
Nag y, who spent his early years in Washington, D. C ., moved to the Bay Area with his family as a boy. He attended Carlmont High School while living in San Carlos and moved to Newark with his wife Connie, where they could afford a home and raise their daughter, Maryann.
He worked for 45 years at SRI International in Menlo Park before retiring as a project manager.
He spent his first 12 years in Newark volunteering and doing community service projects, mostly through the Junior Chamber International organization, known as the JCs, where he aged out in his late 30s.
“I still had a lot of energy. I wanted to do something,” Nagy said.
Even though Nagy said he never envisioned himself getting into politics, he decided to run for the council in 1980.
Nag y didn’t have to dream up a complicated campaign plan to win over people in Newark.
“As it turns out, the strategy was just to knock on doors and present your stor y to people,” Nag y said. “The fact that I had been working in the community for about 12 years, I think people saw that and appreciated that.”
It doesn’t hur t that Newark is small. While the city is growing, with thousands of new homes either built, under construction or in planning stages since 2015, its population still is less than 50,000.
“Newa rk is a sma ll enough community, where you literally — because we’re 3 miles end to end — can get to know the community very very well. And they can get to know you,” Becker said.
Since being elected to the council in 1980, Nagy said he focuses mainly on directly responding to residents who call or email him with questions about the city or requests for more services.
“You do your job every day and the people will remember that,” Nagy said.
“He loves the city and he gets on well with people, and he listens,” former councilwoman Shirley Sisk said. “So yeah, he’s a good mayor.”
After winning a 2011 election for mayor when Smith stepped down, Nagy won again handily in 2014 and was unopposed in both 2016 and 2018.
This time he’ll face Cornelius Lopes, who ran for the council in 2007 a nd picked up fewer than 4% of the votes. According to the Newark City Clerk Office, Lopes hasn’ t filed campaign f ina nce forms.
Although Newark is a relatively sleepy tow n, controversies occasionally erupt and Nagy has gotten into the thick of them.
In the mid-1980s he supported a ballot measure that would have authorized the city to use taxincrement financing to fix gutters, curbs and sidewalks in the Old Town section of the city and remove some older buildings and homes to create hundreds of new ones. Another councilman and a group of residents opposed the measure strongly enough to defeat it.
Last November, Nag y supported a developer’s plan to build almost 500 luxury homes on the edge of the city ’ s wetlands, drawing the ire of a steadfast group of residents and environmental advocates who sued the city over the plan.
“I’m just trying to do what I feel is best for our community. That doesn’t mean I’m always right or always wrong,” he said.
He was recognized as the city’s Volunteer of the Year in 2009, was a founding board member of both the Viola Blythe Community Services Center and the Newark Library League, and currently serves on a local graffiti cleanup team. He’s also a member of the local Rotary.
Even Margaret Lewis, a longtime resident who opposed the redevelopment of Old Town, spoke out against development near the wetlands and opposes the city’s ballot measure to renew a utility users tax, says she doesn’t have “anything bad to say about him,” and that “he has done a lot for the city.”
But she said, “there were dinosaurs in Newark” when Nagy first got elected and things haven’t changed much since.
“We don’t have any young blood; we don’t have any new ideas coming up through the ranks,” she said.
Some council seats have been occupied for long periods in the past and today. Smith spent 35 yea rs on the council, Sis k and former council woman Susan Johnson each spent 22 years a nd cur rent Vice Mayor Luis F re it as has spent 2 5. On the Newark Planning Commission, Bill Fitts and Karen Bridges have served a combined 61 years.
“Al is the golden boy and Dave is the silver boy and I am the bronze boy,” Freitas said in an interview, referring to their years of service on the council.
Nagy said he tries to limit his campaign spending to a few thousand dollars each elect ion, which come around every four years for council members and two years for mayor. He thinks it’s “crazier than heck” when some candidates spend tens of thousands on a campaign.
For this election cycle, Nagy received $ 1,525 in contributions and loaned his own campaign $1,500, according to campaign finance forms he filed with the city.
Though he gets campaign checks from loyal residents, real estate interest groups and the occasional developer, Nagy said he and his wife, Connie, pour much of their own money into the campaigns.
“It’s the only way she gets me out of the house,” Nagy said with a laugh.