Van ‘the champion’ Robinson spoke softly, listened and carried a sledgehammer

Syracuse, N.Y. — Van Robinson never ran for mayor of Syracuse, out of deference to his wife’s desire for at least a smidgeon of privacy. Even so, in five decades of political activism and leadership, Robinson knit together the community in ways that rival the influence of many mayors.

Robinson died Saturday at age 87. His legacy remains.

Robinson’s long quest to remove the highway viaduct that splits Syracuse helped public officials see the harm that roadways can inflict on city residents.

His effort to push the city’s police and fire departments to hire more minorities contributed to a federal court consent decree requiring the city to improve.

His advocacy for equal representation changed the makeup of the New York State Fair, where the Pan-African Village is named for him.

Robinson befriended powerful leaders in state and federal government, bringing Syracuse and its issues to their attention. He mentored generations of Black leaders. Even his political adversaries liked Robinson and gladly took his phone calls.

In a lifelong pursuit of racial equality, Robinson’s guiding instinct was to bring people together. He listened. He didn’t yell. He didn’t belittle.

“He separated himself from the pack by his positive approach to people,’’ said former U.S. Rep. James Walsh. “How could you say no to the guy?”

Walsh, a Republican, defeated Robinson in the latter’s first run for public office. In 1983 Robinson, a Democrat, tried unsuccessfully to take Walsh’s seat on the city council. Walsh reached out afterward to encourage Robinson to keep trying.

“He ran for the right reasons,” Walsh said.

‘You’re not going out wrinkled’

Robinson arrived in Syracuse in 1968, a 31-year-old Black insurance executive from the Bronx. He was quickly struck by the stark racial and economic divisions in Syracuse, said his widow, Linda Brown-Robinson. And he was struck by the elevated highway, Interstate 81, that stood as a physical manifestation of those divisions.

Linda, who was also from New York City, joined Van in Syracuse after landing a job at the former Inland Fisher Guide auto parts factory in Salina.

Van Robinson’s employer, health insurer GHI Inc. (now known as EmblemHealth), sent him to Syracuse to establish a new office. At the time, the office was on Water Street, across the street from the state office building and City Hall.

Robinson soon became active in the Democratic Party. And in 1978 he joined the Syracuse/Onondaga County chapter of the NAACP.

In the early 1980s, then-Mayor Lee Alexander appointed Robinson to the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals. That set his political career in motion, Brown-Robinson said. As his influence grew over the years, Robinson’s demeanor always reflected values he learned from his parents, she said.

His mother, who cleaned houses for a living, died when Robinson was 15 years old. She deeply impressed upon him the importance of humility and compassion, Brown-Robinson said.

His father was a tailor, and Robinson always had a strong sense of style and decorum. Brown-Robinson recalls a day when they were preparing to take a stroll in Onondaga Park, across the street from their former home on Parkway Drive. Before they could go, Robinson insisted on ironing his wife’s clothes.

“He said, ‘You’re not going out wrinkled like that,’ “she said.

For the same reason, Robinson was always in charge of the couple’s laundry. As recently as two weeks before he died, he did the laundry.

He also was the one who packed their clothes for trips. Robinson served in the U.S. Navy after high school and insisted on rolling their clothes Navy-style.

The Robinsons were avid world travelers, visiting five continents and, in Linda’s words, “skatey-eight countries.” Translation: a lot.

They visited Australia, Tahiti, the Panama Canal, to name a few. They took two dozen cruises. They once drove to California and back. They slept in a tent on the floor of the Grand Canyon.

‘A dear, dear friend’

Van and Linda Robinson both have been prominent leaders of the NAACP, both in the Syracuse chapter and in the regional organization.

Robinson joined the local chapter in 1978. He soon got involved in efforts to boost minority hiring in the nearly all-white police and fire departments. The NAACP joined a federal lawsuit that resulted in a 1980 consent decree that set hiring targets for the departments.

Robinson served as president of the Syracuse chapter from 1986 to 1998. As president, he led massive voter-registration drives, fought racial discrimination in the local housing market, and pressured the New York State Fair to reflect the community’s racial diversity. The fair finally added a Pan-African Village in 1997. Twenty years later, then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced the new name: the Van Robinson Pan-African Village.

Robinson’s career on the Common Council began in 1999, when the council appointed him to fill a vacancy. Later that year, he kept the seat after winning election.

Robinson ended up serving 18 years on the council, including eight as its president. In 2009, voters chose him as the first African American president of the Common Council.

Mike Atkins, a South Side resident, joined the Common Council in 2000 and quickly became friends with Robinson. He said Robinson sought to promote Syracuse outside the city borders.

“Van wasn’t a councilor that just looked at Syracuse,” Atkins said.

Both men attended meetings of the New York State Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic & Asian Legislative Caucus, where they networked with politicians from around the state.

“We had relationships from Buffalo all the way to Harlem, Queens, Brooklyn, Yonkers,’’ Atkins said. “That’s what really pole-vaulted us to be able to talk to (former Gov.) Andrew Cuomo and others.’’

Robinson also developed a strong friendship with U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s highest-ranking Democrat. Brown-Robinson said she doesn’t know when the friendship began, but her husband “loved him some Chuck Schumer. He really did.”

Schumer invited Robinson as his guest for President Biden’s 2024 address to Congress. After Robinson died, the senator issued a statement honoring his “dear, dear friend.’’

Atkins said Robinson dreamed of Syracuse growing into a larger, more prosperous city. They remained close friends and confidants long after Atkins left the Common Council in 2006.

Atkins and two other friends were with Robinson when he died Saturday at University Hospital.

‘Van, the champion’

Sometime in the mid- to late-1990s, Robinson began talking about tearing down the I-81 viaduct, an elevated highway that polluted the air for nearby public housing residents and served as an ugly reminder that a vibrant Black community had been razed to make way.

The concept of environmental justice is well-established today, but Robinson’s quest to remove the highway as a matter of equity for low-income city residents was ahead of its time, said Bob Haley, an architect and long-time member of the city’s Landmark Preservation Board.

Haley, a fellow advocate for removing the viaduct, credits Robinson for leading the charge.

“We turned the tide on traditional D.O.T. planning through the center of a city, through Van the champion. He stood up,” Haley said.

The federal transportation department’s ‘Reconnecting Communities” program, created in 2021 to “reconnect communities harmed by past transportation infrastructure decisions,’’ was inspired in part by Robinson, according to Schumer.

“Future generations in Syracuse will know what it is like to live in a connected community, rather than one divided by a highway, and that is thanks to the extraordinary dedication of Van Robinson,’’ Schumer said in a prepared statement.

Golf with a president

Robinson was, by all accounts, a terrible golfer. But he had won a set of clubs at some point in a raffle, and luckily they were left-handed clubs to fit him, Brown-Robinson said. And when former President Bill Clinton was looking for golf partners in Syracuse, Robinson couldn’t say no.

Robinson got the call in 1999 from Jack McAuliffe, the Syracuse Democratic heavyweight, asking if he would like to join a foursome with Clinton, whose family was vacationing in Skaneateles that week. Robinson did golf, didn’t he?

Sure, Robinson replied. More than 1,000 onlookers watched the group tee off at Bellevue Country Club, according to newspaper reports.

“All I could think was, please just let me hit it, I don’t care where it goes, please just let me hit it,” Robinson told a reporter afterward. Clinton shot 84. Robinson’s score: 112.

Brown-Robinson said Clinton ribbed her husband about assuring McAuliffe he could play.

“Bill Clinton tells Van, ‘It takes a lot of balls to lie to the President of the United States when you really don’t know how to play golf,’ ‘’ she said.

In 2023, the Common Council named its chambers at City Hall after Robinson. Dozens of political leaders, Republicans and Democrats, turned out to praise Robinson. The consensus: He had served with respect for everyone.

Carmelita Sapp-Walker, a long-time administrative staffer in the council office, breaks down in tears over the loss of Robinson.

He was “the kindest political figure that the world could have,’’ she said.

Sapp-Walker’s father died in 1995, two years before her daughter was born. When she told Robinson that her daughter had no grandfather, Robinson stepped in.

“He was her grandfather, really. He never missed a moment of her accomplishments,” Sapp-Walker said.

Robinson also has two biological adult children, three grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Part of Robinson’s legacy will be the people he mentored.

When Pamela Hunter moved to Syracuse two decades ago from Washington, D.C., she wanted to get involved in community activism. At a networking event for African Americans, she met Robinson.

He later introduced her to leaders of the Democratic Party’s powerful 17th Ward committee.

“And that’s how, really, I entered politics in Syracuse – from Van partnering with me, calling to get me into the 17th Ward committee,’’ Hunter said.

Hunter went on to serve three years on the Common Council, before winning election in 2015 to the state Assembly. She has been in the Assembly since then.

‘The first slug’

Helen Hudson, who succeeded Robinson as president of the council, said Robinson was a “statesman” and a “gentleman.” Despite running a Common Council that was often riled by dissension, Robinson only raised his voice once or twice that Hudson remembers.

His advice to her? Listen.

“I picked up and learned a lot from him, because Van was a very, very good listener. He told me to listen, and he told me to keep my composure, because he always kept his composure,” she said.

Despite all his years as a successful political leader, Robinson never ran for mayor. His wife takes responsibility for that.

“I told him no,” she said. “Everybody was trying to convince him to run for mayor, and I said, no. I don’t want people trailing me. I don’t want to be followed. … Your life is not your own.”

As it was, the Robinsons often couldn’t be out in public without being button-holed by someone. At times, strangers would turn up at their door looking to speak with Van. Linda was afraid their life would be overturned if Van became mayor.

Brown-Robinson said she is happy that her husband lived long enough to see construction begin on the project that will ultimately bring down the 81 viaduct. Robinson kept a sledgehammer that he used as a prop during rallies against the elevated highway, and he had planned to take the first swing when demolition began on the viaduct.

Now Linda plans to swing the sledgehammer in his place. It’s stored in the basement of their James Street high-rise. If it goes missing, she’ll buy another.

“I’m taking the first slug,” she said.

Staff writer Tim Knauss can be reached at: email | Twitter | 315-470-3023.