Four years ago, Josh Nathan met a young family new to Rye who had lost nearly everything during Hurricane Ida. As they spoke, unsure of what’s to come, Nathan shared a personal story of his own — that in his second year in the city, his family’s home was destroyed by a fire. What stayed with him, he said, was the gratitude he felt from friends and neighbors, and a community that rallied around them.
In the final hours of his mayoral campaign, one door Nathan knocked on opened to reveal a familiar face.
“I’m so glad we stayed,” the woman from four years prior eagerly told him. “We love it here.”
Sentiments like that, Nathan said, will carry him forward as he begins a new era leading the city of Rye as its mayor.
“That’s how I feel everyday — so grateful for what this community has been in our toughest times and our best times,” Nathan told a packed City Hall during his pageantry filled inauguration ceremony on Sunday. “I heard ‘we love it here’ at so many doors, I hear it from people all the time.
“I want to make sure that that love of place, that sense of joy and promise is something that endures for all of us.”
Nathan was ceremonially sworn in alongside his Democratic running mates, political newcomers Amy Kesavan and Marion Anderson, and James Ward, who was reelected to the City Council.
Looking ahead, top priorities, Nathan said, include comprehensive planning and sustainability, along with development of science-based initiatives to combat flooding and strengthen storm resilience.
The council will maintain a “neighborhood focus,” protect the character of every neighborhood, including quality of life, public safety, and access to recreation, according to the mayor.
Photo Alison Rodilosso
“We will be a council of gratitude,” Nathan added.
As the other new council members took their oaths of office, each offered brief remarks while thanking their families, the voters, and pledging to serve all of Rye — striving to make the community one everyone can be proud of.
Anderson, meanwhile, called her unprecedented victory as the first Black person elected to the council “a long time coming” and suggested Rye is more diverse than it appears on the surface. She said she and her colleagues are “committed to working together with the Rye community to protect our heritage while building our vision for the future.”
“That vision must honor lessons from the past, welcome new ideas and new perspectives, and ensure we work together as a community.”
It will take the city, town, village, county, state, and nation working together, she said, for everyone to succeed.
Rabbi Daniel Gropper noted Anderson in his invocation, calling her election “history” and pointing to her family’s roots reaching back generations in Rye.
“May policy be shaped not only by strategy but through wisdom. … May her presence remind us that history is not static, that belonging can deepen over time, and that leadership is strongest when it reflects the full story of a community,” he said.
Photo Alison Rodilosso
The ceremony, a who’s who in Rye politics, included remarks from U.S. Rep. George Latimer, state Sen. Shelley Mayer, and state Assemblyman Steve Otis. Latimer, who began his political career as a Rye City councilman in the 1980s, told his fellow lawmakers that bipartisanship is “sorely needed.”
“This city is a wonderful city, and it’s a wonderful city not because any one of us — because of all of us.”
The four members sworn in on Sunday join a council already occupied by Keith Cunningham, the only Republican, and Jamie Jensen, a Democrat, both of whom were in attendance.
One council seat remains open — Nathan’s old one. He is expected to appoint someone to fill the seat later this month.
Gropper concluded his remarks expressing hope for the new council and for the prospects of a “wonderful” city.
“Bless these public servants with the wisdom of Solomon to know when to speak and when to listen, with the courage of Esther to act when silence would be easier and with the humility of Moses who led not for his own sake but for the sake of the people,” Gropper said.
“May this council govern with integrity, may debate sharpen rather than divide,” he added, “and may the work done in this chamber bring safety, dignity and opportunity to all who call home to this wonderful city of Rye.”
