MINNEAPOLIS -- Newly elected Mayor Betsy Hodges on Monday said she wants Minneapolis to be "more than just a great city."
"That is our call, Minneapolis," Hodges said during her inaugural address, "to be more than just a great city, to be a new city: shining as a beacon brightly enough to show our nation and the world that when we come together as a people, in government and in community, it is possible to be transformed."
Hodges and City Council members were sworn into four-year terms Monday morning in the rotunda of Minneapolis City Hall.
Hodges echoed a campaign promise, saying: "It must be possible for white people and people of color all to thrive in one city and in one region, and that we in Minneapolis would be the ones to do it."
Absent from the ceremony was R.T. Rybak, the retiring three-term mayor who was hospitalized after suffering a heart attack Saturday. Hodges wished Rybak a speedy recovery.
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From the hospital, Rybak commented on Twitter about a line in Hodges' speech: "'One Minneapolis. One region.' Great call Mayor Hodges."
Even though Rybak was joking in the hospital, he is expected to have further procedures before being released later this week after what doctors call a serious heart attack.
