Wunderlich Sworn In As BH Mayor, Pledges To Boost Community

BEVERLY HILLS, CA — To describe how he felt being elected mayor of Beverly Hills, Robert Wunderlich, a soft-spoken scientist from Queens, switched up the lyrics to the famous Talking Heads Song “Once In A Lifetime.”

“In the slightly modified lyrics of philosopher and rock star David Byrne: ‘And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife, and you may find yourself as mayor of a beautiful city, and you may ask yourself, ‘How did I get here?’” Wunderlich said, noting he never imagined he would be elected mayor of the “best-known small city in the world.”

“The answer is: it takes community.”

Wunderlich, a Harvard-trained chemist and physicist first elected to the Council in 2017, said that he wants to orient his first mayoral term around bringing back a vibrant community spirit in the wake of one of the most turbulent years in Beverly Hills history.

“The timing of when I’m becoming mayor does feel kind of surreal - we’ve been through a year of lockdown, it’s been a year since we’ve been able to be socially engaged, so at least for the beginning of my term, a heavy emphasis is going to have to be on trying to recover from the pandemic,” Wunderlich said in a pre-recorded video that played during Tuesday night’s hour-long reorganization ceremony.

“I think looking forward, what I’d like to see as the overall theme of my term as mayor is trying to support the community feel of Beverly Hills that we all love so much. I look around the world at what would be regarded as some of the great cities of the world, and they share what my vision for the city should be: and that’s an engaged public. That’s a street life that’s good for businesses and fun for residents. I think of a city with safe streets, one in which families are comfortable walking around, one in which they’re comfortable with their kids being able to walk and bike around the city. We need that mix of generations living in Beverly Hills, and we need the mix of businesses in Beverly Hills.”

Wunderlich also said that the city can learn from changes made during the pandemic in order to preserve and enhance its reputation as a “sophisticated village in the midst of a large city” and a world-class destination for people to live, visit, and operate businesses.

“We’ve instituted a variety of measures during the pandemic, such as OpenBH, which has allowed the restaurants to operate in public space. I think that’s a great one to continue into the future - that kind of street life adds to the city, promotes our businesses,” he said. Wunderlich said he was looking ahead to events that can help revitalize the city’s businesses, including the arrival of the Metro stop at Wilshire and La Cienega, the Superbowl, the US Open, and the 2028 Olympics.

Tuesday night’s ceremony also honored outgoing Mayor Lester Friedman, who in an extraordinary optical illusion managed to pass the gavel virtually to his successor. Friedman’s Council colleagues praised him effusively for being a “steady hand” during a year of pandemic, recession, and widespread protests.

“He was Beverly Hills’ captain during stormy weather, steering the city through turbulent seas to safe harbor,” Wunderlich said of Friedman.

“You kept the Council informed, you kept the community informed,” said Councilmember Julian Gold. “Most importantly, you were calm, level-headed, and you were poised even in tough times. Even when the protests got literally too close to home and got very personal, you charted a course through chaos which was thoughtful, deliberate, and tempered...we in this community are very grateful for a job beyond well done.”

Councilmember Lili Bosse, who was also sworn in as Vice Mayor on Tuesday, called Friedman “absolutely among the best majors our city has ever had.”

“You were able to manage changing daily directives, the closures and openings of businesses, stay at home orders, hundreds of hours, hundreds upon hundreds of hours in our emergency operations center to keep everyone safe,” she said. “All this with your calm, fair, open mind, and open-hearted nature.”

Friedman cited accomplishments from his tenure that he was proud, including OpenBH, completing piling work on the Metro extension seven months ahead of schedule, passing a mixed use ordinance, keeping the city secure during large protests, and more.

“This last year has really shown to me that our community is very resilient, that we can come together and move forward as a community, even in these hard times,” Friedman said.

Click here to watch the full reorganization ceremony, which also included the singing of the national anthem by Kandace Lindsey, an invocation from Rabbi David Shofet, a poem by Beverly Hills High School student and award-winning poet Sophie Szew, and a musical selection by Ariana Escalante.