Franklin voters elected a new mayor Tuesday, choosing Central Street Laundromat owner Desiree McLaughlin over incumbent Jo Brown by nearly a two-to-one margin.

McLaughlin will serve at the helm of Franklin’s government for a two-year term. After campaigning at all three ward locations while polls were open Tuesday, she watched the community turn out for her.

“It wasn’t me. It was everybody,” she said.

Brown, a retired Air Force veteran and fourth-generation Franklin resident, led the Three Rivers City for one term.

McLaughlin, who has been a vocal critic of Brown, has served as a self-appointed watchdog of Franklin city government on recent decisions, like amending the city’s trash collection policy, and a failed proposal to bond $20 million by the city’s economic development task force.

At city council meetings, McLaughlin has often taken to the podium during public comment periods, presented petitions to the council against and filed numerous right-to-know requests, which she shares on social media. She said she had no intentions to become involved in local government, but felt the current city leadership forced her to do so.

“The current city council is heavily weighted in councilors with a much different definition of progress than many of our residents’ definitions, including my own,” said McLaughlin, at a candidates forum ahead of the election. “Never had I been so motivated to represent a people.”

McLaughlin’s laundromat has become a hub of community resources, too, she said. It’s open 24 hours a day and aside from laundry, she hosts various community events that bring together affordable housing officials or recovery-based service providers.

With the day-to-day interaction she has with residents, chatting in between loads of laundry and serving as an encyclopedia of community resources, she sees a different side of the city than current elected officials do, she said.

“They’re completely ignorant to how 90 percent of their residents live. They don’t know their stories,” McLaughlin said in an interview with the Monitor in March, after the city council passed a new trash ordinance on a 6-3 vote.

Brown had asked voters to allow her to continue the progress made in the city in her first term. This included increased economic activity downtown, sparked by the construction of Mill City Park.

Although the first phase of the park is complete – and has led to an investment of$70 million according to Brown – the final two phases of construction were included in proposals for a $20 million bond.

City leaders argued this was the only piece of the proposal – which also included repairs to the opera house, Trestle Bridge and roads – that had a return on investment for the city. But vocal residents, including McLaughlin, said residents were promised at city council meetings that no taxpayer dollars would be used to fund the construction of the white water park.

Ahead of the election, Brown encouraged voters to head to the polls. In the last municipal election in 2021 turnout hovered at 5 percent.

“You hope there is more turnout because if the majority of people want direction in a different way, well, that’s how they do it, through the ballot box,” she said in an interview with the Monitor.

Voters chose McLaughlin by a vote of 730 to 424 for Brown, a 62% to 36% margin. A third candidate, Brad McLaughlin, who is not related to the new mayor, received 32 votes. About one-quarter of registers cast ballots in Tuesday’s election.

In Ward 1, incumbent city councilor Jay Chandler also lost his seat to Timothy Johnston. In Ward 3, Ed Prive beat a crowded field of four candidates for a city council seat as well.

“The record number of voters coming to our polls was the community using its voice,” McLaughlin wrote in a Facebook post after the election. “It was a beautiful thing to see.”

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