What is your hometown, what brought you to the Pensacola 

Bay area, and how long have you been here?

My hometown is Pensacola, where I was born and raised. I returned 

home with my wife in 2003 after spending time away in New York City.

What is your profession and give a brief description of what 

you do.

Real estate developer and politician. Currently, Mayor of Pensacola - 

As mayor, I manage a city staff of almost 800, a budget of over $200 

million, and work with members of the City Council to set policy and 

the city budget. In addition to managerial and policy duties, I also 

serve in an unoffi cial capacity in guiding local economic development 

initiatives, leading legislative advocacy efforts to state and federal 

elected offi cials and agencies, and ceremonial duties throughout the 

region.

What led you to choose this profession?

When I moved home from New York City, I was seeing Pensacola 

through a different lens. I knew Pensacola had incredible potential and 

upside, however, we weren’t reaching our possibilities. This drove me 

to campaign for positive change in the structure of our government and 

eventually run for Mayor.  I wanted to help catapult Pensacola into 

becoming the hub of Northwest Florida, and one of the fi nest cities in 

the country where people want to live, work, and play.

What do you like best about Pensacola? What makes it so 

unique?

There are many attributes that make our city great. We have built an 

incredible, vibrant, walkable downtown and we have all the amenities 

of a big city, including the ballet, the opera, the symphony, the arts, and 

the theatre. 
 What makes us unique is we are America’s fi rst settlement, and to top 

it off we have the best beaches in the world. 

Three words that best describe you.

 

Driven, Generous, Passionate

Favorite Things you like about Pensacola. 

My favorite things about Pensacola are its people and I know the future 

is bright. We are living in exciting times in our city, and we have made 

tremendous progress in the last eight years. I am confi dent that it will 

continue.  The quality of life in Pensacola is second to none with our 

culture, people, beaches, and the location in the great state of Florida 

are hard to beat. 

I AM PENSACOLA because… 

 

I have the good fortune to serve our great citizens every single day as 

the Mayor of our shining city upon a hill.

I AM PENSACOLA

Mayor Ashton Hayward

photo by City of Pensacola

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