‘Sheer opportunity.’ Mayor-elect Anders Ibsen lays out his plans for Tacoma
Anders Ibsen thinks that Tacoma is “enough.”
Ibsen, 39, who recently won the election to become Tacoma’s next mayor, is a lifelong city resident. The City Council member turned real estate agent turned mayor said he hears from newcomers that Tacoma has everything they could possibly need – a quirky arts scene, an accessible waterfront, proximity to mountains, forests, the ocean and the city of Seattle.
Ibsen agrees.
It’s that love for his hometown that guides his view on leadership and public service as he gears up to become the city’s newest mayor in 2026. He’s taking on the role during a time of transition for Tacoma as it contends with an ongoing budget deficit and leadership changes. This year’s election meant two new faces on the council – in addition to Ibsen, Latasha Palmer won the at-large Position 6 seat. Plus, the city is in need of a permanent city manager and permanent police chief, both high-paid, high-profile positions.
Ibsen said as Tacoma’s new mayor he plans to prioritize filling those two crucial positions and making progress toward addressing homelessness and economic development.
“The sheer opportunity that awaits us, I think if we really activate it, that, to me, is what really excites me about Tacoma – what we are and what we could be also,” he told The News Tribune.
Outgoing mayor Victoria Woodards, who is wrapping up her second term as mayor this year, said Ibsen has demonstrated a “strong dedication to civic duty” as the city tackles an “important chapter.”
“His commitment to listening to residents is an important quality for leadership,” she wrote in a statement. “I hope his efforts continue to strengthen our community and bring positive progress for every resident.”
Plans for the future
In the short term, Ibsen told The News Tribune that he’s been focused on meeting with council members, city staff and city leaders as Tacoma’s mayor-elect.
But within his first quarter as mayor, Ibsen said he plans to confirm a new city manager and a new police chief.
Patti Jackson has held the interim police chief role at the Tacoma Police Department since March, one month after former chief Avery Moore resigned. Longtime city manager Elizabeth Pauli left the city in July, and city leaders have been working on the search for her replacement while interim city manager Hyun Kim does the job in the meantime. Woodards previously told The News Tribune that the city hopes to have selected a permanent city manager by April or May 2026, to be in place as the city begins work on developing a new biennial budget.
Ibsen said he’d also like to make progress towards the county’s unified regional approach to homelessness, focusing on addressing blight, litter and code enforcement. He’d also like to bolster economic development in Tacoma, hoping to make the city’s approach to economic development more focused on Tacoma’s unique advantages.
But city staff have a finite amount of time and resources, which can sometimes result in constraints for council members with specific goals they’d like to advance.
Ibsen said his experience serving for eight years on the City Council means he’s acutely aware of how staff time is just as much of a limitation as the city’s budget can be, but he’s prepared to find a way to balance the two. To tackle the challenge of limited staff time, Ibsen said he’s been in conversation with Harvard University’s School of Government to see if students at the school might be interested in interning with the city to help develop key priorities for 2026.
“My job isn’t to start from scratch and just act like the new sheriff in town,” Ibsen said. “At the same time, there is something to be said for new energy and new perspective.”
Ibsen would make $125,224.78 as Tacoma’s mayor in 2026, and his fellow council members would make $67,445.11.
Approach to the job
Ibsen is no stranger to the Tacoma City Council, having served District 1 for eight years. But at times he has been an unpopular figure.
When Ibsen was running for re-election in 2015, he received minimal support from his fellow council members – seven of the nine endorsed his opponent, now District 1 council member and Ibsen’s opponent in this year’s mayor race, John Hines.
“From a policy perspective, he can be difficult to work with,” then-council member Victoria Woodards said of Ibsen at the time.
He has also criticized the council’s much-whispered about “consensus culture.”
“There’s a real prevailing culture in city hall that prioritizes coming to a consensus before the vote and before the public process,” Ibsen told The News Tribune in 2015, in the lead-up to his election to his second term on the council. Today, while Tacoma City Council members do sometimes vote in a 5-4 split, it’s rare.
Ibsen has also, in the years he has spent away from the council and especially during his recent campaign, been critical of certain council decisions. He spoke on the campaign trail about his opposition to the city’s recently approved camping ban and criticized the city for failing to get a proposal for a “Workers Bill of Rights” on the November ballot.
Now, Ibsen said he’s more interested in fostering a culture of collegiality and respect.
“You can have 9-0 votes that are based on collegiality and that are based on making sure that we’re including everyone as much as we can. You can have 9-0 votes that are groupthink and that are the product of forcing people into a mold,” he said. “So for me, it’s really not a question of that. It’s about doing my job as a legislative leader to ensure that to the greatest extent possible we can separate the work from the person.”
He said his opposition to a previous council decision doesn’t mean he’s opposed to the council members who proposed the decision, and he hopes to foster that sentiment among the rest of the council as mayor.
“Councilman Hines, for example, is a member of one of our delegations for the regional approach to homelessness with the county. That’s huge. That’s one of my key priorities with housing. And he was one of the first people that I sat down and met with, and we had great discussions about what we could work on together,” Ibsen said.
He said Tacoma residents have often seen the city’s mayor as a largely ceremonial role. Tacoma operates with a council-manager form of government, meaning elected council members appoint a city manager to serve as a city’s chief executive officer and head of the city’s administrative branch.
Ibsen said he envisions himself serving as more of a “speaker of the house – like a legislative leader,” he said.
“I’m looking for areas of overlap between what people are already doing or already care about, so I can help people focus, and I can insist on accountability and accomplishment,” he added.
Maintaining a firewall
Ibsen, also a real estate broker and appraiser, found himself chased on the campaign trail by an ethics violation he faced in 2018.
Two people at the time filed a complaint with Tacoma’s Board of Ethics alleging that Ibsen used his position as a City Council member to advance his real estate business. Though the city’s ethics board ultimately recommended no penalty against Ibsen and he has since described the incident as a “marketing error,” it has given rise to questions about how Ibsen will keep his work as mayor separate from his work in real estate, especially when the position of mayor is a full-time commitment.
Ibsen said he plans to take a step back as an “operator” with his real estate business, doesn’t plan to list properties within Tacoma’s city limits and has reliable people in place who will manage things in the meantime.
“You could ask me the same question about how I was a mayoral candidate with constant availability, from morning until night, knocking on doors, going to meetings and having a full-time job of running a business and being a single parent,” he said. “I managed it. I won. So a lot of it comes down to prioritization, and above all, having a village of reliable people.”
