{"id":54585,"date":"2025-11-20T20:26:13","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T20:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/54585\/"},"modified":"2025-11-20T20:26:13","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T20:26:13","slug":"roger-chapin-is-running-for-orlando-city-council-stronger-than-before","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/54585\/","title":{"rendered":"Roger Chapin is running for Orlando City Council, stronger than before"},"content":{"rendered":"

After being defeated in 2002 when he tried to knock out an incumbent<\/a> on the Orlando City Council, Roger Chapin<\/a> figured that maybe elected office wasn\u2019t his destiny.<\/p>\n

So he found a different way to get involved, since he doubted he would run for public office again.<\/p>\n

Chapin became a leader on some of the community\u2019s most influential boards, including the Municipal Planning Board, Downtown Development Board and Orlando Utilities Commission, as well as an oversight committee for the construction of the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Fast forward more than 20 years later, and Chapin is running for the same City Council seat again.<\/p>\n

This time, Chapin said he is the most experienced candidate in the race. He points to his long r\u00e9sum\u00e9 built over the years managing multibillion-dollar budgets and being vigilant on public transparency. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Chapin is facing Mira Tanna<\/a> in the Dec. 9 runoff to represent District 3, which covers Baldwin Park, Audubon Park, College Park and Rosemont. The four-year term currently pays $79,343 annually for the nonpartisan race.<\/p>\n

A razor-thin margin of only 14 votes separated Chapin and Tanna in a crowded field of five candidates in the Nov. 4 election<\/a>, triggering the runoff.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Chapin argued his experience is needed more than ever as Orlando city government undergoes a major transformation with new leaders in charge. Buddy Dyer, the city\u2019s longest-serving Mayor, is not running for re-election.<\/p>\n

Longtime District 3 Commissioner Robert Stuart also did not run for another term<\/a>, which is what sparked Chapin\u2019s political comeback this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought, \u2018Maybe I should give this another shot,\u2019\u201d Chapin said. \u201cIt\u2019s always been in the back of my mind and in my blood.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

His campaign has dominated fundraising by raising about $260,000, more than three times his opponent\u2019s war chest.<\/p>\n

\"\"Linda Chapin.<\/p>\n

Roger Chapin is the son of former Orange County Mayor Linda Chapin, a legendary trailblazer in Central Florida politics.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can remember sitting in the back seat of the station wagon, watching my mom literally navigate and trying to get in other people\u2019s orbits. And back then it was all men,\u201d Roger Chapin said. \u201cShe was half-PTA mom, half-Junior League mom.\u201d<\/p>\n

Linda Chapin first ran for the Orange County Commission when he was 16. \u201cAt that point I didn\u2019t care about anything but my driver\u2019s license,\u201d Roger quipped.\u00a0<\/p>\n

By the time she was elected Orange County Mayor in 1990, Roger was in college, but he was starting to become more fascinated by politics and even worked in Gov. Lawton Chiles\u2019 press office.<\/p>\n

\u201cI caught the bug like a lot of young people do when you\u2019re a senior and you start to think about the rest of your life,\u201d Roger Chapin said.<\/p>\n

For his career, Roger Chapin worked at Mears Transportation until he became a consultant about five years ago. His one-man shop, Chapin Communications<\/a>, does work in public affairs, public relations, business development, government relations and strategic visioning. Currently, Chapin says he has two clients, Mears and another in education.<\/p>\n

If elected, Chapin cited Dyer as an example of the kind of leader he wants to be.<\/p>\n

Dyer is a Democrat, but doesn\u2019t make headlines for speaking out defiantly against Gov. Ron DeSantis or the Republican-controlled Legislature. (Dyer has, in fact, supported Republicans in past local elections<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Chapin described himself as a Democrat who wants to \u201cgovern from the middle,\u201d compared to Tanna, whom he said is \u201ccertainly on the progressive wing of the party.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tanna is backed by U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost\u00a0and state Rep. Anna Eskamani.<\/p>\n

Chapin, however, won the endorsement of Dyer and Chapin\u2019s other opponents<\/a>, Chris Durant and Kimber Kiss, who lost in the November election. Other influential groups, like the Central Florida Hotel and Lodging Association<\/a>, support Chapin.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s some people worried about City Council becoming a very partisan place,\u201d Chapin said, citing Dyer as \u201cobviously a Democrat, but can still pick up the phone and talk to Gov. DeSantis\u2019 head of transportation about SunRail.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we keep going down a partisan path of these partisan food fights, city government will suffer for it,\u201d Chapin said. He added that his focus is keeping \u201cOrlando\u2019s best interests always front and center.\u201d<\/p>\n

The College Park resident\u2019s priorities include focusing on the Main Street Districts \u2014 areas with busy traffic and thriving local restaurants and shops on Ivanhoe Boulevard and Edgewater and Corrine drives.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be very fully engaged with those within that business community and making sure that those areas remain strong and improve their walkability,\u201d Chapin said.<\/p>\n

Other focuses include expanding SunRail to nights and weekends and revitalizing the downtown, which isn\u2019t located in District 3 but plays an important role in the city\u2019s overall economy and health, he said.<\/p>\n

And has his mother given him any campaign advice?<\/p>\n

\u201cWhose mom doesn\u2019t want to give their son advice?\u201d he joked.<\/p>\n

Early voting runs<\/a> Dec. 1-7, with polls open Election Day, Dec. 9, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After being defeated in 2002 when he tried to knock out an incumbent on the Orlando City Council,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[8132,8789,8790,139,13534,8792,141,140,8793],"class_list":["post-54585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-buddy-dyer","tag-linda-chapin","tag-mira-tanna","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-city-council","tag-orlando-city-council-district-3","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-roger-chapin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}