Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Former Rochester Deputy Mayor Len Redon has died

Rochester Deputy Mayor Leonard Redon
City of Rochester
Rochester Deputy Mayor Leonard Redon

Former Rochester Deputy Mayor Leonard Redon has died.

Redon had stepped down in June of last year to try and deal with his cancer; he was in the job for five years, serving under two mayors, former Mayor Tom Richards and current Mayor Lovely Warren.

Before that, Redon worked in executive positions at Kodak and Paychex.

Warren issued a statement calling him, “a great friend and co-worker and I extend my sincere condolences to his family and friends as well as to the host of community members who had the good fortune of knowing and working with him.”

She says that Redon called his five years with the City an important item on his “bucket list,” which gave him a chance to “be involved in something significant.” As Deputy Mayor, Warren says, “Len was faithfully responsible for the important day-to-day operations of City Hall and helped to ensure City operations ran smoothly.”

Richards says that Redon was a calm, solid influence in city hall operations, and he says Redon's business background helped when it came time to negotiate labor contracts, particularly health care provisions.  

“For instance, that’s one of the things that allowed him to understand and deal effectively with the health care negotiation because he understood it; he understood how it worked in the world outside of City Hall and was able to apply that.”

Richards says Redon will certainly be missed.

“He was a good guy and I very much enjoyed working with him; it was a pleasure to be around him and work with him and I trusted him, because things don’t always go your way , particularly in politics sometimes there are people rooting for it not to go your way but my time spent working with him was a pleasure," Richards told WXXI News.

Redon was 65.

Randy Gorbman is WXXI's director of news and public affairs. Randy manages the day-to-day operations of WXXI News on radio, television, and online.