Cambridge City Council Elects Siddiqui Mayor, Mallon Vice Mayor for 2022-2023

CAMBRIDGE — January 3, 2022 — Cambridge's City Council inaugurated nine members and unanimously elected Sumbul Siddiqui as mayor for a second consecutive term at its January 3 inaugural ceremony. Siddiqui, first elected to the council in 2017 and who previously served as mayor from 2020 to 2021, received all nine votes for the top council post; the vice-mayoral race required multiple rounds of balloting before Alana Mallon prevailed with five votes, edging out Councilors E. Denise Simmons and Patricia Nolan. The ceremony was held outdoors at Starlight Square in Central Square at 27 degrees, an adaptation made necessary by the Omicron variant surge. Siddiqui told the assembled crowd that Cambridge had lost 128 residents to COVID-19, including two in the prior week, and named housing affordability, school equity, gun violence, and climate change as the council's defining challenges for the new term. Newcomers Burhan Azeem and Paul F. Toner were sworn in alongside seven returning members before the council unanimously adopted its rules of order for 2022-2023.