The City Manager

Friday I was at a meeting of the Roseville MN Optimists (Roseville Optimists ).  I’m not a member, but came as a guest, interested because the program was a group of Ukraine students, here for a short visit under the auspices of YouLEAD (Youth Leadership Engagement and Development Program: YouLEAD.

This was a large meeting – over 100 of us in attendance.  We were assigned to tables, and my ‘next door neighbor’ for lunch was somebody I didn’t know.  Mark and I were of the same generation, shall I say.  Two retired guys….

We’ve all been to many meetings like this.  In our brief time together, Mark and I found out the tiniest snippets about each other.  In his case, his career was in city management, part of the time in the small city where my own office was for 10 of my staff years; also my Minnesota “home town”.  We didn’t know each other then – no reason to – but I remarked that a colleague friend had, I thought, a brother who’d been a Minnesota City Manager as well, and I verified that later.  Mark knew of him, but he’d come to Minnesota a bit later.  Small world….

In the same 24 hours, I watched the League of Women Voters televised Q&A of six candidates for two city council positions up for election on Nov. 5.  There are eight candidates on the ballot; the other two didn’t show for whatever reason. All of the six I viewed presented themselves very well, and all seemed to be accomplished people, with track records of community engagement.  I’m pleased with how my city runs, and I didn’t say any of them who I’d consider a liability, so I have a quandary, still,  which two will get my vote.   I’m sure I’m not alone.

Then, of course, came Springfield, Ohio.  I need not say more: front page news, a mayor in the spotlight, doubtless a City Manager working in the background to deal with a community crisis, which has become a national item of news and a political crisis as well.

In the course of about 24 hours – a day – I’d come across the simplicities and the complexities of living in our society.

It’s a bit like driving a late-model car these days.  The driver assumes everything: that the car will run efficiently, and start, of course, and that there will not be a flat tire, or an accident, or anything else interfering with a climate controlled journey from here to there.

In the background, always, of course, is a backup team to try to manage imperfections and disagreements.

In our town, it is a Mayor and City Council who receives flak, probably, about most every grievance.  And because there are over 80,000 of us – larger than Springfield – these problems need to be shunted over to somebody, probably the City Manager, whose job it is to figure who, and how, to resolve whatever the issue might be.

We are a nation full of unsung heroes, and we too often forget this.

Back at the meeting, four of this years visiting students from Ukraine reflected on their five weeks here.  They are the third group I’ve seen in person, starting with the first in 2022 – the year Ukraine was invaded.  They all have represented their country extraordinarily well.  One of them, from Lviv, was at our table.  He said he knew four languages, and his English was very good.

Another at our table was a young woman, an American, involved with YouLEAD.  Awesome young person.

At the beginning of the session, another Ukrainian student, who’d been here for the first gathering in 2022, and who’d sung a song for us at that gathering, sang the Ukrainian National Anthem for our group.

Is there hope for the future?  Absolutely yes.  We were all young once, and among us, then, were leaders like these kids are today.

Thank you.