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Lawyer who is a political novice wins council vote to become Charlotte’s next mayor and succeed Vi Lyles
Rob Harrington, a partner at law firm Robinson Bradshaw, will become Charlotte’s next mayor. He will be sworn in July 1. (Screenshot from City of Charlotte YouTube)
by Tony Mecia
Charlotte will have a new mayor beginning July 1: Rob Harrington.
The Charlotte City Council selected Harrington on Monday night to complete the term of Mayor Vi Lyles, who is stepping down at the end of the month.
Harrington, 63, is a partner with Robinson Bradshaw, the city’s third-largest law firm. He has served as president of the N.C. Bar Association and as the board chair of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library, the Arts and Science Council and the Levine Museum of the New South.
In picking Harrington, the council made the rare move of choosing a political outsider to assume the city’s top political job. The last Charlotte mayor to take office with no elected political experience was department store chain CEO John Belk in 1969.
Harrington is the second Charlotte mayor, after Richard Vinroot, to come from Robinson Bradshaw, which is also where state Rep. Brandon Lofton works.
In an interview last week with the Charlotte City Council, Harrington cast himself as an experienced civic leader adept at navigating disagreements because of his background as a business litigator.
“We’re all going to disagree at times,” he told the council. “My career is, frankly — I put a kid through college largely on disagreements. That’s what we do, but respecting disagreements and being able to work through them to some resolution [takes] time, it takes individual conversations and it takes orderly meetings.”
He will preside over an 11-member City Council that has been close to evenly split on key issues. He is seen as a pro-business candidate but was careful to say in interviews that governing is a balancing act and needs to meet the needs of those who live here.
“It is particularly important that we do everything we can so that working citizens, particularly families, who have been here for generations aren’t lost in the growth,” he said. “We need to make sure that the shiny new things don’t overwhelm the things that have been here and the things that are distinctive about Charlotte.”
He said Charlotte needs to “maintain those engines that drive the growth” while also adding that “we need to make sure people don’t get lost.”
Harrington was backed largely by a bloc of council members perceived as being pro-growth and pro-business. The council majority chose him over civic leader Carrie Cook, longtime political figure and Mayor Pro Tem James “Smuggie” Mitchell Jr., former council member and county commissioner Harold Cogdell Jr. and state Sen. Caleb Theodros.
He will be sworn in July 1 and replace Lyles, 73, who is resigning to spend more time with family.
Like others who applied to be Charlotte’s mayor, he pledged not to run for election in 2027 when the term expires.
Harrington was selected on the second ballot, after no candidate won a majority of six votes on the first ballot. It was down to him and Cook on the second vote.
Harrington received his bachelor’s and law degrees from Duke University. He worked at a law firm in New Orleans out of law school for a decade before moving to Charlotte in 1999.
He has also won plenty of awards, including being named to several industry “best lawyers” lists, Business North Carolina’s “Power List,” the Mecklenburg Bar Association’s “diversity champion” award and the Duke Law Alumni Association’s award for public service.
He also won The Charlotte Ledger’s 40 Over 40 award in 2020, though it is unknown if that helped or hurt his case to become mayor.
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Learn more about Charlotte’s next mayor, Rob Harrington
Who he is: Harrington is a longtime Charlotte attorney and partner at Robinson Bradshaw who has held leadership roles with the North Carolina Bar Association, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library, Arts & Science Council and numerous civic organizations. In his application, he described himself as a consensus-building civic leader and community volunteer.
Why he applied: “Strengths that I would bring to the position include the ability to facilitate communication between members, the ability to communicate effectively with the public and experience in facilitating meetings involving persons with disparate positions. I view the interim mayor’s role as a bridge between now and the period that will begin with the election of the next mayor and council.”
Clips from “R&D in the N.C.” podcast interview with former council members Tariq Bokhari and Larken Egleston:
On service:
On the role of a mayor:
On data centers: