Naples Mayor Teresa Heitmann looking to future after winning second term

Reporter: Michelle Alvarez
Published: Updated:

Mayor Teresa Heitmann said she is relieved after winning a hard-fought race for a second term.

“It’s time to move forward and keep on with the citizens’ priorities,” Heitmann told WINK News Monday in a one-on-one interview.

The results became official Friday night.

“I’ve never been in a race where it affected my election, as every vote counts,” Heitmann added.

Mayor Heitmann says she’s disappointed in losing Ted Blankenship on city council, but is ready to get to work with new members.

“Wednesday is our first meeting and will be the swearing-in for the new council,” she said. “I look forward to that. It’ll be sad to see councilmember Blankenship leave because he was a great contribution to the council, but we’ll be welcoming those new council members, and we’ll get right to work on behalf of the community.”

She said some of the issues she’s prioritizing are resiliency plans, especially after Hurricane Ian, land use, employee retention, and staying focused on a growing city.

“We pay county taxes as city citizens, so we have a voice in our county commissioners,” Heitmann said. “So, we’ll be looking to them to give us the support we need to protect us from becoming a congested one of those top 10 congested areas. If you read just recently, we didn’t make that. And I don’t intend on our community ever making that top 10 congested areas.”

The City of Naples mayor has a two-term limit, so she knows this is her final term.

WINK News asked Heitmann if this term would look different than her last.

“It will. Hopefully, we won’t have the Ians, and we won’t have Covid,” she said. “So, we’ll be more focused in on really the land use, and how we make sure that our landscape doesn’t change. We don’t want to be fragmented. We have building codes that we just need to make sure we adhere to. And we want to be fair to developers.”

The city council election was also close. The three new members, who will meet for the first time on
Wednesday are Bill Kramer, retiree Linda Penniman, and Berne Barton.

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