Julie Souza
Rye Dems Nominate an Experienced Slate for Council
The Rye City Democratic Committee announced its 2021 City Council ticket. Incumbent Mayor Josh Cohn and Councilmembers Julie Souza and Ben Stacks will be joined by first-time candidate Lisa Tannenbaum, who hopes to fill the seat vacated by Sara Goddard.
Goddard told the paper she made the difficult decision not to run for reelection in order to focus on her advocacy and volunteer efforts and new Green That Life blog. “It has been a true pleasure representing this amazing town and its incredible people,” said Goddard, who looks forward to continuing to spearhead important issues and policies in the many months remaining in her term.
Tannenbaum has been Marketing Director for Citi Cards and AT&T, served as Outreach Director for Congressman Eliot Engel, and held leadership positions on Democratic campaigns. Her passions include criminal justice reform and social justice. She received a B.A. from Carnegie Mellon University and an MBA from Northwestern’s Kellogg School.
Cohn, a retired partner of Mayer Brown, a global law firm, serves as an expert witness in derivatives litigation and devotes himself to his mayoral duties. The longtime Rye resident earned a B.A. from Columbia University and a J.D. from New York University School of Law.
Souza is Head of Sports, Global Professional Services at Amazon Web Services. A mother of three school-age children, she also finds time to be an active community volunteer. She received a B.A. from the University of Michigan and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
A commercial real estate executive vice president with BankUnited, N.A., Stacks serves on the boards of Breaking Ground, New York’s largest nonprofit supportive housing provider and the Real Estate Lenders Association. He earned a B.A. from Syracuse University and an MBA from American University.
As a team, the incumbents take credit for a record of achievements, including:
- “Finishing the 2020 pandemic year without a deficit
- Making clean energy financing available for nonprofits and a green power provider available for residents
- Offering residents extra time to pay property taxes
- Obtaining body cameras for police
- Creating the Pedestrian Plaza on Purchase Street
- Negotiating all four City union contracts, all of which had expired when they took office
- Restoring the Finance and the Senior Advocacy committees
- Establishing a capital reserve fund.”
Mayor Cohn said, “We look forward to continuing to serve our community with care, hard work, fairness, reasoned decision making, fiscal restraint, respectfulness, and responsiveness.”
