By Ryan Berry

DailyAdvocate.com

GREENVILLE — Mayor Steve Willman will officially relinquish the reigns of the city to Jeff Whitaker at the stroke of midnight on Jan. 31, but Willman remembers the last seven and a half years as being a time of change for the city. He was also mayor as the city and country endured COVID.

As is the goal of every mayor, Mayor Willman believes he is leaving the city in better shape than when he came in. Not only in the city building, but throughout the city.

Willman’s ascension to the mayor’s seat started earlier in the year prior to him taking office when he won election to serve on Greenville City Council. Eight months later, Mayor Mike Bowers announced he was leaving that position to become Darke County’s economic development director. Willman and about six other candidates went before the Darke County Republican Central Committee vying for the position and in the end, the committee chose Willman to serve. He went on to receive the public’s support when he was on the ballot and won the election to retain his seat.

The mayor put a strong emphasis on cleaning up the city and did that through several efforts. The most recent, of course, has been the plan to fix and repair sidewalks in the city. That was the culmination of his efforts, but cleaning up the city began almost the first week he took office. Willman pushed to get several buildings cleared out and had a lot to do with getting Speedway to tear down their vacant buildings on North Broadway and at the corner of Martin and Ohio Streets. At least one of those buildings was being used by homeless individuals. He said it took a lot of phone calls to get that done.

Willman said, “We’ve done a lot of good, but we still have a long way to go.” He had hoped the city could do more with some of the buildings that have been deteriorating, but reiterated there is only so much the government can do.

The one complaint Willman had about serving in an elected office is the time it takes to get things done. He said it is frustrating. The time it takes to apply for grants, the time the city waits to hear if they’ve received the grant and then the time it takes to get the project started. He pointed to the Sweitzer Street project that began discussions three years ago. He said it will probably be another three years before it gets finished. When they started the discussion, the project was going to cost $6 million and now it costs $9 million. He expects the price tag to go higher by the time the project gets underway.

Willman said he has been pro-business throughout his time as mayor and has made an effort to meet with some of the retailers downtown. He was also very supportive of Main Street Greenville and attended most of their meetings. “I appreciate their work. That’s a big deal for our downtown,” he said.

During COVID, Mayor Willman put an emphasis on helping Greenville’s businesses. Since the city could not host fireworks that year, he redirected the money into grants for the businesses. With the assistance of other donors, the city was able to distribute $60,000 to 60 businesses. Each received $1,000 to help with expenses while their businesses were shut down.

During the shut-down the city was able to continue beautifying the city. An empty downtown was the perfect time to complete the decorative sidewalks downtown.

Another area that has changed over his mayorship is the morale of city employees. When he first came into office there wasn’t as much goodwill being shown by the different departments as there is today. “We lost a few people that we needed get rid of,” he said. “The last three or four years, we’ve had a great group of people.” He remembered talking to Roxanne Willman, the auditor for the city for the last 11 years, and the mayor’s wife. She’d come home and tell him about the people that were mad or arguing. Mayor Willman is pleased to say, “We don’t have that. You’re not allowed to do that here. It’s business, you talk about business. If you don’t like it, you try to work it out. Nobody is allowed to be yelling and making problems.”

Willman shared the culture has changed to where the employees from other departments will now come in to say to the other departments and everyone seems to get along.

When asked about Ryan Delk, safety service director, Willman said Delk has continually taken on more projects. “I hired him at first to help out as interim. He showed his abilities then and just took over. He’s still taking over. I was doing a lot more until the last six months to a year and then he took over. When you saw his work ethic, he was definitely going to be the one,” Willman said.

That work ethic is seen throughout the city. “Everybody talks about over the years, come to Darke County and they have a great work ethic, and they do,” said the mayor. He went on to note the quality of people working for the city and the work ethic is better than any place else. “Everybody has a good mood, almost every day.

One of the people he had the most praise for was Nancy Troutwine. Troutwine serves as the secretary for the mayor and safety service director. “As soon as something comes up, she has a plan,” he said. She also takes care of schedules and she is the first person everybody sees when they walk into the building. “She’s fantastic,” he concluded.

The one thing Willman said he will miss is having his voice be heard and planning for the future.

In his retirement, he and Roxanne plan to spend some time in Florida but they are not leaving the city altogether. They will be back from time to time to keep an eye on how the city progresses.

To contact Daily Advocate Editor Ryan Berry, email [email protected].

Mayor believes city is in better shape now