MOUNT VERNON — In return for the long-awaited key to the city, handed over to conservative news pundit Glenn Beck on Saturday, Beck bestowed the key to his own house to Mayor Bud Norris.

“You’re going to need a place to stay,” Beck told Norris in front of a crowd of nearly 700 people gathered in McIntyre Hall to watch the event, which drew national attention and criticism of the mayor.

Outside the performance hall, rowdy demonstrators spoke out both for and against the mayor’s decision to hand the key to the city to Beck. The outspoken Fox News talk show host recently called President Barack Obama a racist.

During the ceremony, Beck steered away from the brand of politics that made him famous.

Instead, after the mayor handed over the key, Beck talked to the crowd about small-town values that he said he learned while growing up in Mount Vernon.

Beck said he’s made mistakes in his life, but “all of the good things, all of the things that I hope for, came from Mount Vernon.”

His voice cracked with emotion as he spoke.

Beck, 45, was born in Everett and later moved to Mount Vernon, where his parents ran City Bakery. It was there, he said, he learned his work ethic that carried him to the top of his career and into televisions and radios across the nation.

As a youth, Beck marched in the Mount Vernon Volunteer Militia, part of his father’s effort to turn downtown into a historic attraction. His life growing up was a far cry from his new one in New York City, he said, where he now lives with his wife.

“Now I would give my right arm to live in Mount Vernon,” he told the crowd. “And I learned today there are a ton of people who are ready to cut it off — and they would. But it doesn’t bother me because I have the key to their house.”

The audience was quick to laugh at Beck’s jokes and stood repeatedly to applaud as Beck quipped about Mount Vernon and as two of his childhood friends reminisced about their experiences with Beck.

Beck complimented the mayor, saying he is one of the rare people who “actually has a spine.” The crowd then stood to applaud the mayor.

Along with handing Beck a golden key secured to a plaque with Beck’s name on it — admittedly “much to the chagrin of some people” — Norris officially declared Saturday “Glenn Beck Day.”

But Beck said the day wasn’t about him. He said the event was really about the Lincoln Theatre, the venue where he watched “Mary Poppins” with his mother and “Star Wars” for the first time.

The event raised $10,000 for the theater, and Beck announced he will match that amount, donating $10,000 of his own money.

* Tahlia Ganser can be reached at 360-416-2148 or at .