Meet Your Mayoral Candidates
By Staff Reports
Incumbent mayor Susan Haynie, who has been serving in public office since 2000, is seeking another three years as the city’s top elected official and she is challenged by Alfred Zucaro, a former West Palm Beach city commissioner.
“My work on behalf of the residents of Boca Raton is not finished yet,” Haynie, 61, said.
Voters will go to the polls March 14 to elect a mayor and two council members. The Boca Raton Tribune will hold a Candidate Forum on Friday, March 10, at 6:30 p.m. at the Wayne Barton Study Center.
A general contractor who began working for the city in 1974, Haynie promises to push forward on her agenda of lower taxes, smart growth, and safer neighborhoods.
Zucaro, 67, who moved to the city in 2009, says he wants “to bring back common sense to City Hall.”
“We need a city government that makes good decisions for the resident of Boca Raton, not developers and special interests,” said Zucaro, who served eight years on the city commission and ran unsuccessfully as mayor in West Palm Beach.
“Boca Raton is a special town, but right now City Hall isn’t working for us like it should,” he maintains.
Zucaro founded BocaWatch in 2012 to “give residents a platform to stay informed and voice their concerns” about a major development boom in the city.
He said his BocaWatch team successfully campaigned to preserve city-owned land along the Intracoastal Waterway for recreation, increasing the opportunities for residents to enjoy unique green space.
Except for BocaWatch, Zucaro has not had any other city of civic involvement since moving to town.
He said after moving to the city of nearly 90,000, he had planned to live a quiet life with his wife, local philanthropist Yvonne Boice.
But after seeing what he called “mismanagement” in City Hall, he had to act.
“I could not stand by and watch what is going on at city hall any longer,” he said. “So, the questions of significance I faced were ‘If not now when; if not me who?”
Has maintained that if Haynie is reelected, she will abandon her seat next year to run for she wins, will leave the mayor’s job early to run for County Commissioner Steven Abrams’s seat. Abrams, a former mayor of Boca Raton and State representative, term ends in 2018.
Haynie, who has been mayor of Boca Raton since 2014, served on the City Council from 2000 to 2006, left because of term limit and returned in 2009. She served on the council until 2014.
As mayor, Haynie said she has worked to make sure its residents receive the services and quality of life they deserve. She plans to continue her “impressive agenda.”
“Fighting to make sure our neighborhoods stay safe and our city maintains the highest quality of life is something I’ve been doing for almost 20 years,” Haynie said. “It’s important to me that when I ask the voters for their support, they judge me on my record, not rhetoric.”
The Boca Raton Tribune would like to invite you to fill out this quick Election Survey to see who our readers plan on voting for in the March 14th election. Click here to fill out the quick survey. Please note: Participating in the survey does not count as an actual vote and we highly encourage residents to go out and vote on March 14.
