A week after election day, Suffolk Mayor Mike Duman appears set to return to office for another term.
Duman staved off challengers former Del. Clinton Jenkins and David Bosselman, maintaining a razor thin lead over Jenkins while mail-in and provisional ballots were counted. He took the race by just 161 votes.
Duman, who won the mayorship in 2020 by a comfortable 5948 votes, said it was “a long week.”
“I appreciate the citizens have supported me and I’ll have the opportunity to continue with some of the initiatives that we’ve started,” he said.
Jenkins ended with 34.5% of votes, and 30.2% cast their lot for Bosselman. The margin of victory does leave open the possibility for a recount, though a candidate must request it.
Jenkins did not respond when WHRO reached out.
2012 was the last mayoral election in Suffolk decided by less than a percentage point. 2008 was the last time a mayor won with under 40% of votes.
A swing also occurred in Suffolk’s Sleepy Hole Borough. Ebony Wright defeated council member Roger Fawcett by 7 percentage points. First elected in 2012, Fawcett ran unopposed in 2020 and received 96.5% of borough votes. He won by more than 23 percentage points in 2016.
Thomas Rein, president of Citizens Voice, told WHRO the difference partly stems from citizen concerns about the rate of growth in Suffolk.
“Suffolk’s done a lot of good things, it’s a great place to live,” he said. “But in the last two years, the growth has been exponential.”
Wright serves on the Citizens Voice board, though the nonprofit does not endorse any political candidates.
Groups of city residents have bristled about the impact of commercial and industrial development in that time, as well as the expanding presence of Port of Virginia activities and the traffic that comes with it.
Rein said that a significant portion of that is happening in North Suffolk, where the Sleepy Hole Borough is located.
“I think that sometimes we lose sight of the little things,” Rein said. “People wanting to get home to see their kids’ baseball game or football game on time. People wanting to have dinner with their family. People wanting to get to work on time or get their kids to school.”
“That has just been a big, big, big challenge over the last two years.”
Another group, CARE4Suffolk, has also publicly opposed the growth trajectory of the city and the working Suffolk 2045 Comprehensive Plan. City council will vote on the plan’s approval on Nov. 20.
Rein said the split results don’t spell a mandate for the reelected mayor. He hopes it convinces Duman and other elected officials to consider taking a second look at the city’s direction – and convinces residents to stay engaged, and not just on social media.
“(Duman) gets pushed a lot of different ways and he has to assimilate all that information coming at him,” Rein said. “From our standpoint, we just would like to be more a part of the solution. We want a spot at the table.”
Duman called the election an unusual one, facing a challenger in Jenkins that is “significantly associated with the Democratic Party” and one in Bosselman running on land use and traffic concerns.
“We had a lot of what I perceive as party-line votes versus land use votes,” he said.
According to Suffolk’s charter, its city council elections are technically nonpartisan.
Duman was first elected to city council in 2010 to represent the Chuckatuck Borough. He has a more than 40-year-old auto dealership business and strong relationships around the city and state.
Duman was endorsed by the Hampton Roads Black Caucus, the Suffolk Division of the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce, the Suffolk Professional Firefighters Local 2801 and other groups. Rein and Duman agreed his community ties helped him to victory.
“Obviously, name recognition is not a concern with me,” Duman said. “If you look at the voting precincts on an individual basis, I either came in first or second in every precinct – but never last.”
When asked if the results would lead him to think differently about city plans or initiatives, Duman said he will continue to make decisions to the best of his ability based on all the facts and data available.
“I’m not saying that I expect everybody to agree with me,” Duman said. “It’s never that it wasn’t recognized that we’ve experienced a significant amount of growth. It was pretty obvious to just about everyone.”
Duman said the city has been working to address the growing pains, adjusting regulations around warehouses and trying to simultaneously improve existing and get ahead of new traffic congestion issues.
“We'll continue to do whatever we can to address both of those things, while at the same time realizing that for our city to progress and to be able to provide the resources and amenities and the quality of life improvements that a lot of our citizens are looking for we need to encourage business and economic growth,” he said.
Around $2.1 billion of commercial property has been built in Suffolk in the past four years, which Duman said contributed to the city’s decreasing property tax rate.
Rein, though, wants officials to reconsider how they balance the sometimes competing interests and desires in the city related to growth.
“We’re not against growth,” he said. “We just think we’re going there way too fast.”
“People are mad. People are frustrated. You’re going to start to lose … the feeling of community and we can’t let that happen.”
Duman said he’s always been open to listen, but that in the end he has to do what he thinks is best between diverse needs and wants.
“Sometimes it’s hard,” he said. “It’s easy to make a decision between right and wrong – it’s a cakewalk – but most decisions aren’t like that.”
