Mayor-elect Mike McGinn is spending his victory night the same way he spent many nights of his campaign: at his Southeast Seattle campaign headquarters in a room full of volunteers, surrounded by phones and empty pizza boxes. “It looks like a phone bank night,” McGinn says.

McGinn credits his victory with his now legend staff of volunteers, several of whom he plans to hire as his new mayoral staff. “I would be foolish not to take advantage of some of the talented people who we found during the campaign,” he says. “We will also have to bring people with skills and experience that the campaign staff don’t have. It will be a mix of both.”

He faces challenges, however, establishing relationships with the individuals and institutions that historically have held leverage over the mayor’s office. Many key power brokers in Seattle—such as labor unions, veteran politicos, and the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce, whose former chair, Tayloe Washburn, actually joined Mallahan’s campaign—made their opposition to McGinn clear by pledging their allegiance and money to Mallahan. But McGinn seems undaunted by potential friction.

“I know that the folks who supported Mallahan had legitimate concerns about the direction the city would go,” he says, “and we are going to reach out to them, hear their concerns, and involve them in decision making.”

“Campaigns are different than building coalitions for government … when the passion of a campaign ends, there is the opportunity for people who care about the city to work together to solve problems,” says McGinn, extending a veritable olive branch. “The opportunity will bet there for everyone to participate.”

McGinn has already started mapping his transition from a neighborhood activist in Greenwood to the city’s most powerful politician at City Hall. Yesterday morning, he had breakfast with Ron Sims, the former King County Executive—and current Deputy Secretary of HUD in the Obama Administration—to discuss “tips on effective transition and the challenges ahead of us,” McGinn says. They discussed regional government planning, McGinn said, but he wouldn't share the details of their conversation.

Among McGinn's ambitions before taking office is influencing Mayor Greg Nickels's search for a new police chief (a political football in the campaign). McGinn says he wants to look at the selection committee to “see if I have any suggestions for who else might be involved,” he says. “I have an interest getting it started as soon as possible.” McGinn hasn’t named members of his transition team yet, but, he says, “We are talking to poeple who have been involved in campaigns and city government."