Two Candidates Are Already Running for Mayor in 2027

Cary’s next mayoral election is a year away, and two candidates have already entered the race. Mark Stohlman, the former mayor of Morrisville, and Scott Lassiter, a former Apex Town Council member, have both formed campaign committees, which lets them start raising money. The filing window does not open until July, and Election Day is November 2, 2027.

Costs and spending are the focus for both candidates. Former town manager Sean Stegall resigned in late 2025, and an investigation by State Auditor Dave Boliek found that the town had “a pattern of excessive and often frivolous spending” that the council did not catch. The council commissioned its own independent investigation and is working through reforms to its oversight and financial controls (see: Moving Forward Dashboard).

Stohlman told INDY Week the spending scandal is what motivated him to run. He pointed to documentary-style videos, expensive meals, and council member Lori Bush’s graduate school tuition as spending that should have gone to essential services and staff raises instead. Bush has since repaid the town for her tuition. At a council meeting in July, he held up his property tax bill and criticized the council for letting the spending go unchecked, to applause from the audience.

Lassiter, who served on Apex Town Council from 2011 to 2015 and a term as a Wake County Soil and Water supervisor, says his campaign is about protecting what works and fixing what does not, and investing in infrastructure and core services while keeping residents’ costs down. He says he is more interested in getting things right going forward than in assigning blame for the past. He is also suing Wake County Public Schools in federal court, alleging the district sabotaged his run for state senate. He was suspended from his assistant principal job in September 2024, in the middle of the campaign, and says in the lawsuit that the suspension was strategically timed to hurt his campaign.

Mayor Harold Weinbrecht wrote on his blog in January that he fully intends to seek re-election in 2027. When INDY Week asked him about it in October, he did not respond.

Additional reading: INDY Week on the 2027 mayoral hopefuls