More housing, more police officers. What Raleigh Mayor Janet Cowell plans for 1st term.
Using photos from Raleigh’s past, Mayor Janet Cowell highlighted her plans for the future.
”Cities matter more than ever,” she said. “They are where we interface with the world. It’s where our basic necessities get met. It’s the clean water, right? It’s the transportation, the housing and, in uncertain times, it’s also where we find community, a sense of meaning and safety.”
The state of the city address, held Wednesday night at the Raleigh Convention Center, was Cowell’s first major address since she was elected last fall.
But, as she noted, this isn’t her first tour on the Raleigh City Council. She served two terms on the board starting in 2001.
On a screen were two photos of Cowell, some 20 years apart, showing each time she was sworn in to serve on the Raleigh City Council with her mother by her side and their family Bible.
Looking forward
Cowell, 56, wore a T-shirt that read “Watch More Women’s Basketball.” In the address, she continued to show photos from the city’s past and its present while outlining her plans for the city’s future as mayor.
One showed former Raleigh Mayor Avery Upchurch, a martini in hand, at the ground-breaking of New Bern Place, a housing development downtown.
“So, then, fast-forward,” said Cowell, clicking to photos from present day. “Here’s a lot of our counselors and some other familiar faces, and we’re all breaking ground. No martinis. Times have changed. But despite all of these groundbreaking and ribbon cuttings and effort by many councils, we have a 37,000-unit housing shortage in Raleigh today.”
Raleigh needs more housing, with a focus on high-density, mixed-used development near transit lines, to bridge that housing gap, she said.
In the next two years, the City Council will increase the pay for public safety employees, and increase the number of fire and police staff members, Cowell said.
And work will continue on Raleigh’s new 17-floor city hall building at the corner of Hargett and McDowell streets that will include a “customer experience center” to connect residents with city services.
“This council is focused on housing, on public safety, on transportation, and that quality of life and resilience that we all need,” Cowell said. “And I appreciate the partnerships, the community here today to help us all achieve an even greater city in the days forward.”
On the topic of transportation, the city is going to work to keep projects like its bus-rapid transit moving.
“We are going to be lobbying the federal government to try and keep our money,” she said, referencing a recent letter she and other Wake County mayors signed to the state’s North Carolina delegation in Washington. They asked to keep funding in place despite the federal government tightening budgets and making dramatic cuts.
First 100 days
Cowell, a former state treasurer and state senator, is one of 24 mayors selected for the Bloomberg Center for Cities at Harvard University, which prepares mayors for their first 100 days so they can lay the foundation for a successful term.
The organization gives participants a clock, she said, that ticks down the days of the mayor’s first term.
Highlights of the council’s first 100 days, as mentioned by Cowell, include:
- Launching Bringing Neighbors Home, a pilot program that gives residents of a former homeless encampment money for two years to help them get on their feet and find homes.
- Hiring Raleigh Police Department veteran Rico Boyce as the new chief.
- Approving 13 housing developments, including five with affordable housing, with a potential 3,000 units.
- Taking the first steps to move Red Hat Amphitheater and expand the Raleigh Convention Center.
- “Rethinking” how to bid the project to build the city’s bus rapid transit line in the New Bern Avenue corridor. The city has now bid the project three times.
This story was originally published March 26, 2025 at 8:29 PM.
