Office of the Mayor.

Moises M. Rodrigues was sworn in on January 5, 2026 as Brockton’s 51st mayor, after winning the November 2025 election. He is the first person of color popularly elected to lead the city — a milestone in one of Massachusetts’ most diverse cities, where roughly 40% of residents are Black and large Cape Verdean, Haitian, and Latin American communities shape daily life. Rodrigues is a Cape Verdean immigrant who arrived in Brockton as a teenager, was elected in 2013 as the first Cape Verdean on the City Council, later served as a councilor at large, and led the Cape Verdean Association of Brockton for years. Many residents will remember he also served as acting mayor in 2019, after Mayor Bill Carpenter died in office.

Brockton runs on a mayor-council plan. The mayor is the city’s chief executive: overseeing city departments, appointing many department heads, proposing the annual budget, and setting the policy agenda. The City Council — ward councilors representing each of the city’s wards plus councilors elected citywide — votes on the budget, ordinances, and major appointments, so the two branches share power. Rodrigues has described his own role bluntly: “I am not the captain of the ship called Brockton. I was hired as the CEO, to run the business of the people of Brockton.”

In his inaugural address, Rodrigues named economic pressures, public safety, housing affordability, and aging infrastructure as the city’s central challenges. His early agenda includes an aggressive code-enforcement push against illegal dumping and litter, with absentee landlords held accountable for property maintenance; stronger education funding and student supports; community policing with a prevention focus; investment in infrastructure and small businesses; and reorganizing the Youth Advisory Council. He also announced a new Business Advisory Council and plans to bring back a Community Advisory Council, alongside a commitment to language access and culturally competent city services.

One issue you will hear about constantly is water. Brockton buys water from the Aquaria desalination plant in Dighton under a take-or-pay deal struck in 2008: the city pays roughly $9 million a year whether or not it takes a drop, and the contract runs to 2028. What happens next — negotiating a new deal, finding another backup supply, or the city buying the plant, which Rodrigues has favored — was a defining question of the 2025 race. Water costs flow through the city’s budget, so the outcome matters to every homeowner’s carrying costs.

City leadership shows up in concrete ways on any street you are considering. The budget the mayor proposes — and the council amends and passes — shapes the property tax rate, trash and snow removal, school funding, and parks. Code enforcement determines how quickly a dumping problem or a blighted building on the block gets addressed. The Building Department, which issues permits for renovations and additions, answers to the mayor’s administration. When you compare neighborhoods, it is fair to ask how each of these is actually performing right now, and KC can help you read the signals during your search.

City Hall stands at 45 School Street downtown — a brick Romanesque Revival building designed by local architect Wesley Lyng Minor and built in 1892–94, its five-story clock tower rising over City Hall Square. It has housed the city’s offices ever since and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976. Council meetings are open to the public, and the city posts agendas, budgets, and department contacts on its website. If you want to follow local government closely, the ward councilor for the neighborhood you are considering is often the most useful contact for street-level questions, and local coverage from The Enterprise keeps pace with City Hall week to week.