When newly-elected Boise Mayor Lauren McLean was sworn into office in January, the word "pandemic" wasn't in her 100-day to-do plan. But how she governs in the shadow of COVID-19 — the biggest challenge in a generation that has triggered mass isolation and crippled the economy — will undoubtedly define McLean's first term in office.
In a conversation with Morning Edition host George Prentice, McLean talks about the importance of guarding the safety of Boise's public safety officers — namely the men and women of the Boise Fire and Police departments — and the long-term fiscal implications of the city's short-term needs during the coronavirus crisis.
“I am thinking daily about the decisions I have to make to respond to the crisis, and the tone and tenor that I have to set as mayor so that all of us recognize that we’re in this together.”
Read the full transcipt below:
GEORGE PRENTICE: On a Monday, it is March the 30th and it is Morning Edition on Boise State Public Radio News. Good morning. I'm George Prentice. Let's spend some time this morning with Boise Mayor, Lauren McLean. She joined us via zoom this morning. Madam Mayor, good morning.
LAUREN MCLEAN: Good morning, George. Thanks for having me.
PRENTICE: First off, I have to ask a quick health check. How are you, how is the family and friends?
MCLEAN: Oh, I appreciate that. We are all well trying our hardest to stay healthy by staying home, but also and to stay mentally healthy by getting outside as often as we can. And quite honestly, it's the small blessings. I'm having family time with college daughter who wouldn't otherwise be here and there's just four of us hunkered down in a house. So we're doing well.
PRENTICE: I'd like to start off by talking a bit about public safety, in particular our police force and our force of firefighters. They're exposed to the elements more than any of us on any day. Can you give me a sense of the health of the men and women of our police and fire departments?
MCLEAN: Yeah, that's a great question, and I hope that the public understands that all of the decisions I made in the last several weeks with regard to public health and safety or with the mind towards the importance of protecting our first responders, our health care workers that are on the front lines and you it's on each of us to stay home and stay healthy. And as a city, the fire department and police department are taking the actions that they need to take to protect our men and women who are on the front lines and keeping us safe. They are now asking different questions when calls are put into dispatch to determine whether or not somebody that needs help might be symptomatic.
The firefighters are limiting the number of crew members that conduct initial assessments of patients, just to limit potential exposure. And they're being screened as they come on and off shift to make sure that they don't have fevers. And the police department is taking some steps as well. They're practicing social-distancing and taking extra precautions whenever possible. They are changing to shift schedules to manage resources, but still, of course, responding to calls for service and performing their duties because they're so essential. It's critical that we keep our public safe and we keep our public safety officers safe. It's still our first priority.
PRENTICE: I was watching one of the council workshops a couple of weeks ago and your chief of staff, Jade Riley used the R word, recession and of course, since then the economy has tanked and nearly everyone agrees that we are in a full tilt recession. Can you talk a bit about making short term and critical decisions now, but the long term fiscal restraint that we may need to face soon?
MCLEAN: For quite a while smart economic people were predicting some sort of market correction. This of course, is not what anyone imagined. And the interesting spot that we find ourselves in now is that the tough decisions that have to be made in the short term do have both short term and long term implications. And it becomes this, at least for me, I look at the decisions I have to make. There's no perfect decision. There's decisions that I made to close restaurants and bars to institute social-distancing that closed salons and theaters and gyms and those have economic impacts on the community at large, but also of course, on individuals who are working in those establishments. And then there's the other decision that has to be made that if you don't do that, you're risking both the lives of so many people in our community.
And so, in balancing those in the short term, we know that we have paused our economy just like every other city and state in this country has had to do. And as we are planning to be ready to respond to the crisis as it arrives, we're making every decision with the long-term implications and the importance of recovery and resilience in mind. So we've already begun talking with the business community about what they foresee as needs that they'll have to restart. We're looking at many of the things that I talked about in the campaign, affordable housing policy, transportation policy, long-term strategic economic opportunity as all tools to resilience and recovery in the long run after we've dealt with the short term emergencies with paramount focus on public health and safety.
PRENTICE: I have to remind myself that this week will mark the three-month anniversary of your swearing in and I'm assuming that there are days that it seems like 30 months instead of three. The cliche of someone elected to office is, well, the first 100 days are so important to really kickstart so many things that came out in the campaign, but I'm guessing that you are rewriting your to-do list on an hourly basis.
MCLEAN: Well, what I said at one point with an executive in town who's also in his first 100 days is that neither of us put pandemic in our 100-day plan and it's required a different approach to leading this city. I am thinking daily about the decisions that I have to make to respond to the crisis, and the tone and tenor that I have to set as mayor, so that all of us recognize that we're in this together and that it's going to be a tough little bit of time. A couple months it won't feel short, but that we will get through this together and recover resiliently as a community if we stay focused on who we are, what we value, and how we work together.
And in many ways, that's what I talked about during the campaign, never expecting that this would happen to us. The importance of community engagement, accessible elected officials, that bring people together, and that are focused on the true needs that our community was facing related to growth, affordability, transportation, the need for better paying jobs that allow us to live here, all of those topics that came to a fall in the last election will be important parts of our recipe for recovering resilience.
PRENTICE: Boise Mayor, Lauren McLean, best of luck. Keep safe. Keep healthy. Thank you.
MCLEAN: You too, George. Take care. Be well.
Find reporter George Prentice on Twitter @georgepren
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