New Milford mayor sworn into office

New Milford Mayor Bryan Shupe has officially been sworn into office.

Shupe took the oath Monday night at Milford City Hall. He won the election April 26 by a 65 percent majority of the votes.

The new mayor was born and raised in Milford and is a 2002 graduate of Milford High School.

Shupe holds a political science degree from the University of Delaware and has spent years working on state and local political campaigns.

Shupe said he looks forward to bringing fresh and innovative ideas to his hometown.

“Being born and raised here, over the last 30 years, this town has changed quite a bit and right now were at a tipping point where I think with a lot of hard work and a lot of dedication from leaders, that we can improve quite a bit with economic development, with creating a stronger downtown and also with creating future leaders,” Shupe said.

At the top of his to-do list is creating new and better paying jobs.

“We need to bring some middle class jobs here,” Shupe said. “Unfortunately a lot of our younger leaders move away to other cities because the paycheck is higher, they have more opportunities for advancement, so we want to bring some jobs here where they can start at a comfortable wage. Also, just like any other city in the United States, we have some aging infrastructure so we need to make sure that were on top of the infrastructure.”

Shupe has spent the last year serving as a city councilman for Ward 1, where he had the opportunity to work alongside outgoing Mayor Joseph Rogers.

“The one piece of advice he gave to me was always listen to the people and that’s what I plan to do,” Shupe said. “The next month or two, I’m going to have several town halls within the city of Milford and ask people to come and give me their ideas about moving Milford forward.”

Rogers lead the city for nearly 30 years but decided to step down due to health concerns.