HomeMy WebLinkAboutSTATEMENT FROM COUNCILPRESIDENT ZASTAWNY 12/2/2019 Councilman Ed Z comments December 2"d 2019
When I was elected to the Jeffersonville City Council I had one simple goal and that was to leave
the city better than I found it. During my 16 years on the city council I focused my efforts on 4
key long-term goals.
1) increasing Jeffersonville's Political clout and Financial strength,
2) improving Jeffersonville's physical appearance,
3) improving Jeffersonville's parks system
4) and improving the city's management structure
1- Jeffersonville's Political clout and Financial strength
To me increasing Jeffersonville's political and financial strength was very important. It was for
this reason that I strongly supported annexation and why annexation was so important to
Jeffersonville's future.
When I first got elected to city council Jeffersonville's population was about 25,000, the city
was wasting money paying for infrastructure and parks outside the city limits, people living just
outside the city limits did not feel part of our community, our city budget was less than $15
million and we didn't even have our own city hall since were paying rent to sharing space at the
county building which used to be called the city-county building.
Today after annexation and other successful decisions over the years we have a population that
has nearly doubled to about 50,000, we have our own unique city hall, we have a budget of
over$50 million dollars and we have new ideas and new blood leading the city. Without
annexation many of our city leaders would never have been elected including Mayor Moore,
Councilman Owen, and Councilman Hawkins.
2- Jeffersonville's Physical Appearance
Since being elected I supported many street scape projects and focused a lot of time on
improving our planning and zoning ordinances with an emphasis on building standards,
sidewalk requirements, green space requirements, and establishing signage standards to
improve our city's appearance. Also during my time on the council I took a leadership role
along with Nathan Samuel to create an expectation and mechanism for expanding visual art in
Jeffersonville and helped to create and fund our Jeffersonville Arts Commission.
I'm very proud to have played a major part in improving our city's appearance taking an active
role in updated planning codes and helping to create and expand our public art scene.
3- Jeffersonville Parks
When I was first elected in 2004 the city was spending parks dollars on parks outside the city
limits, Vissing Park was an overgrown scary place, the Woehrle Athletic Complex did not exist,
Big Four Park did not exist, the city had no large city parks and there was no long-range park
plan. The problem with city parks back then was a lack of funding by the council and a lack of
consistent Parks leadership. Each time a new mayor took over the city the city's park resources
and plans would shift into a new and different direction.
With the creation of the Jeffersonville's parks authority controlled by the city council in 2009
the issues of instability and funding were corrected and there was a new focus on long term
planning and the need for larger and better planned city parks. Although parks oversight has
since gone back to the Mayor's control the seeds that were planted by the council back then
took root and have blossomed.
Fast forward to today and I'm very proud to have played a part in improving our city's parks via
the complete renovation of Vissing Park, the Creation of the Woehrle Athletic Complex, the
push for parks long range planning,the growth of park events at River Stage, and the creation
of a large destination park in the east end.
4- Improving Jeffersonville's management structure
Many council members, employees and citizen's take for granted the various city processes,
procedures and functions that occur thinking they are the Mayor's responsibility or that they
existed for decades not realizing much of this structure was created by the city council. One of
the biggest examples of this was the creation of the Human Resource department which lead to
job descriptions, which led to salary ranges, which led to new hiring standards and procedures.
When I was first elected there was not a HR director position, there was no job descriptions,
there was no salary ranges, and there were no hiring standards. All of these functions were
under the mayor's control in that as long as the Mayor could get a majority of the council to
fund a given position he could hire whoever he wanted. Needless to say the city used to be
involved in employment related complaints and lawsuits on a fairly regular basis.
Fast forward to today and I'm very proud to have played a part in improving our city's
management and financial structure via creating our HR department, creating our risk manager
position, expanding our planning and zoning department, and designating a financial structure
that designates a certain amount of funds for streets, sidewalks, public art and for the
homeless.
Closing remarks
City decisions don't happen in a vacuum and over the years I have been blessed to work with
some great elected officials and some fantastic city employees. There is not time to name
everyone but I do want to give a shout out to a couple of the past city councilpersons that I was
blessed to work with and believe greatly improved our city and helped to create Jeffersonville's
renaissance over the last 16 years. They include councilpersons, Ron Grooms, Phil McCauley,
Connie Sellers, John Perkins, Mike Smith, and outgoing council persons Lisa Gill and Nathan
Samuel. I also want to thank Mayors Tom Galligan, Rob Waiz and our current Mayor Mike
Moore for all the positive impacts each one of these Mayors made over the years.
When I came to my first Jeffersonville City Council meeting in 2004 I walked into a shared city-
county building representing a city of about 25,000 citizens and into city with financial
challenges and no real momentum or identity. As I leave my last Jeffersonville City Council
meeting today in 2019 I will be leaving a city with its our own city hall and identity, a city with
nearly twice the population, a city with solid management structure, a city with better zoning
codes, a city with a public art scene, a city with a very strong balance sheet and a city with
much positive momentum.
As I look back I believe that I fulfilled my goal of leaving the city of Jeffersonville better than I
found it and I hope the new city council will keep the positive momentum and after 4 years will
also leave our city better than they find it today.
Good night and God Bless. Meeting adjourned.