BLOOMINGTON - After 15 years, Bloomington City Manager Tom Hamilton has one more City Council meeting to attend. His last day at City Hall is Jan. 23 when he officially retires from a job that has always provided plenty of work and opportunities to meet a variety of people. | Quick bio: Tom Hamilton | Stockton, Smart on city manager's tenure | New manager to be at Monday's meeting

A native of Rockford, Hamilton came to the Twin Cities as an Illinois State University student. He was hired by the McLean Regional Planning Commission in 1978 and was selected as city manager six years later. During his tenure, he has seen the city's population grow by about 20,000 people, and been a part of everything from park and road projects, water and sewer extensions and subdivision developments to grander plans like creating the Center for Performing arts, improving the Main Street corridor and building the controversial U.S. Cellular Coliseum.

As he winds down his career, Hamilton sat down for a question and answer session to talk about his years in City Hall.

Q: When you look back at your 15 years as city manager, what do you see as Bloomington's best accomplishment?

A: How we've been able to handle the rapid growth we've had over that 15-year period. That's been the biggie, without sacrificing maintenance of the existing infrastructure and facilities. And when you look at the changes that have happened in downtown over that period of time - that's good evidence of that. And because of the growth, we've been able to situate the city so that such things as major sewer facilities are in place now. The city won't have to invest in that in a long time. There are a couple of pieces, but for the most part the systems are in place, or the planning is in place.

Q: In your 15 years, the city's population has gone from about 57,000 to 75,000. How do you manage all of that and keep up with the growth and the demand on city services.

A: It's all about balance. Everything is. It's about choices and it's about balance. You have to understand that you can't just direct all your resources in one area and I think the councils over the years have been really good at understanding that need for balance.

Q: With your specialty in planning, what do you see as Bloomington's biggest challenges in its future?

A: I think the biggest challenge we are going to see is the fact that we are not that isolated, bubble community that we were years ago, where national trends in the economy and national trends in other things did not effect us. Our economy as a city and the Bloomington-Normal area has grown enough now and the economy is diverse enough now that we do feel those things now.

Instead of growing our revenues 5 to 6 percent, they'd drop down to 3 to 4 percent, which was still healthy growth. But now we are seeing flat to declining growth in our revenues.

We are still very fortunate compared to a lot of other places … we still built 250 new homes last year. That is a lot less than what we are accustomed to, but there are a lot of communities out there that would love to have that type of development.

Q: This is the second year where the city is going into a budget cycle where the economy is tough and prices are going up. How does the city face that challenge?

A: I think the city's budget situation a year ago was a bit overblown. It wasn't nearly as critical as a lot folks made it out to be.

This year, things are a lot tighter because…not only do you have flat revenues but you have huge increase and volatility in prices in fuel, salt, asphalt, gravel, concrete - all the raw materials that we use to do maintenance and to build projects - are all getting extremely expensive and going up at significantly higher rates than normal inflation. You can go through (the budget currently being drafted) and any department where you see an increase you can point to basically a commodity that went up significantly. And that doesn't include any of the obligated pay raises we have under the multitude of union contracts we have.

Q: The city has a lot of nice parks, golf courses, the Bloomington Center for the Performing Arts and U.S. Cellular Coliseum. How does that play into improving the city's quality of life and how will it help the City Council meet its future goals of adding businesses to the community?

A: It's important for many reasons. It's important not only for economic development and an economic impact to attract new businesses, but also to support existing businesses. If you look at the convention and visitors bureau's analysis that they put out last fall about the Coliseum, in a short period of time the economic impact solely from out-of-town people was over $12 million. That is a third of what the thing cost coming back to the community in a short amount of time.

If you asked the business community if these things are important, I think you will find definitely they will say it is not only important for them as revenue for their businesses, but also existing businesses like the State Farms and like the universities. When they are attracting employees, these are things they expect from a community because in most cases that's what they had in the communities they are leaving.

And it is also important to keep people here when they retire. You want to have facilities that they can enjoy so hopefully they will stay here and bring their kids back here.

Q: Among the city's detractors, their common issue is the City Council's decision to build the Coliseum. As part of that you've taken a lot of flak over the project and its operations. What is your reaction to that and what do you want to say about the Coliseum?

A: It doesn't matter whether you are talking about the Coliseum or any major public investment. I remember back in the day when Jumer's came here and we brought that in with the first real convention center in town. We had the same type of detractors then. It's been good for the community and I think the Coliseum, the Performing Arts Center, long-term will be great for the community.

It is very short-sided to look at these things on a one or two year basis, because the building is going to be there whether people like it or not for another 50 years.

The other thing I find interesting, too, is that when you are talking about critics of projects, it is usually a small group of people over and over.

If the entire community was truly unhappy, we'd know about it. I think if you talk to most people, they are pretty happy with the way things are, that's why you don't hear from a lot of different people.

Q: In a letter to The Pantagraph, former Mayor Jesse Smart praised your ability to work with several different City Councils and carry out their wishes. He also said it was unfortunate that some of the current City Council members have not appreciated you as previous councils did. What is your reaction to his comments and do you agree with him?

A: I'm not going to get into talking about personalities or relationships. But I've been here through a lot of different aldermen and three different mayors. I think that says something for the fact that I've been able to satisfactorily carry out the wishes of those councils and those mayors.

And I think the other thing that is important is people sometimes don't sometimes realize that I don't vote. I do what the council directs me to do, whether the vote is unanimous or whether it is a one-vote majority. And I don't always agree with the decisions they make, but that's not my job. My job is to carry out what they approve.

---

Who is Tom Hamilton?

Age: 52

Hometown: Rockford

Family: Wife, Darla; son, Philip

Education: Undergraduate degree, Illinois State University, geography and urban studies; graduate work, University of Illinois, urban planning.

Work experience

• 1978 to 1986 - McLean County Regional Planning Commission

• 1986 to 1988 - Bloomington director of community development

• 1988 to 1993 - Bloomington assistant city manager

• 1993 to present - Bloomington city manager

Served under following mayors: Jesse Smart, Judy Markowitz and Steve Stockton

---

Saying goodbye

What: Reception for retiring Bloomington City Manager Tom Hamilton.

When: 2 to 4 p.m. Jan. 22

Where: Bloomington City Hall, 109 E. Olive St.