Minneapolis mayor, city council sworn in, detail plans for 2022

MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - Minneapolis city leaders are navigating a new year with some new and old challenges.

Mayor Jacob Frey took the oath of office inside the Minneapolis Convention center on Monday. Due to COVID-19 protocols, the event was only open to city officials and their guests.

At the inaugural ceremony, Frey insisted he is ready to put politics aside and work with a city council that has seven new faces among its 13 members.

"Importantly, now the politics of this last year, they are behind us and they are over. The hard work of governing lies ahead," he said.

The mayor said it will take voices, ideas and opinions from across the city to build a better public safety system.

"To everyone: pull up a chair, pull up a chair," Frey said. "We need all levels of government at the table. We need neighbors at the table, and we need to be pulling in the same direction fully recognizing that our end destination is the same that every resident in every neighborhood of our city needs to feel safe."

As for the city council, Andrea Jenkins is the new president after a unanimous selection by her colleagues. 

"We have so much to do. I am confident, working together, we will achieve great things," Jenkins said. 

After Monday’s ceremonial inauguration Frey and the council now have the difficult task of pulling together a divided community still struggling under the weight of the COVID-19 pandemic and the murder of George Floyd.

"Minneapolis is coming back," Frey said. "We will rebound in fine form. Will it be difficult? Yes, it will. But we are up to the challenge because our city does not quit."