East Lansing Mayor Ron Bacon Will Not Run for Reelection
East Lansing’s Mayor Ron Bacon will not run for reelection to the City Council this November.
Bacon let ELi know of his decision this evening, writing only, “You can inform your readers that I do not intend to run this cycle.”
He said he would provide a fuller statement later this week.
Bacon first became a council member when he was appointed in August 2020 to one of the two seats that became open when then-Mayor Ruth Beier and Councilmember Mark Meadows resigned in the middle of a meeting in July 2020. Dana Watson was appointed to the second seat.
Both Bacon and Watson subsequently ran for Council and were elected in November 2021.
Just after that election, Council voted to make Bacon the city’s mayor. (In East Lansing, the five-member council elects one member as mayor and one to serve as mayor pro tem.) He became the first Black mayor of the city.
Bacon’s term ends in November of this year, as do the terms of Mayor Pro Tem Jessy Gregg and Councilmember Noel Garcia, who was appointed to Council in January 2023.
Gregg has not yet announced whether she will run for reelection. So far, five people have indicated they are running: Garcia, Meadows, Dan Bollman, Joshua Ramirez-Roberts and Rebecca Kasen. (The filing deadline is July 25.)
In his time as mayor, Bacon has focused efforts on economic development, business support, public safety, and diversity, equity and inclusion. More recently, he has been working on establishing a new Youth Commission to advise the Council.
Late last year, Bacon led the move to terminate the contract of then-City Manager George Lahanas and to hire former Fire Chief Randy Talifarro as Interim City Manager – changes that were voted through by Council on Jan. 17 of this year.
Starting a few months before that leadership change and continuing through the present day, the city has seen a wave of resignations of departmental directors and assistant directors.
Earlier this year, Bacon was the target of an anonymous complaint that claimed the resignations were due in part to Bacon allegedly violating the City Charter. The complaint was specifically about the charter’s Section 7.1(e), which prohibits council members from “interfer[ing] with the City Manager in the exercising of his or her judgment in the appointment or assignment of administrative officers and employees in the administrative service” or “giv[ing] orders to any of the subordinates of the City Manager.”
Bacon and Talifarro denounced the anonymous complaint as motivated by racism.
Bacon and the rest of Council voted in April to hire an independent investigator to look into the complaint. Since that time, Council has said nothing about the progress of the investigation.
In recent weeks, Bacon has strongly advocated for three amendments to the City Charter, including one to change council members’ swearing-in date, one to increase the size of Council from five to seven, and one to change Council elections from odd-numbered to even-numbered years. At this week’s Council meeting, Bacon said he believes that, if passed by voters, the last two amendments will improve the diversity of representation on Council and will engage more young people in city government.
This is a developing story and may be updated.