New Mayor Tim Bruce said his priority this year is to balance managing new developments and growth with keeping costs low for residents.
Bruce has been on the commission since 2015, and has lived in Eudora since 2011.
The City Commission unanimously chose Bruce to be the town’s next mayor at its first meeting of the new year.
In an interview with the Eudora Times, Bruce shared his thoughts on topics around town and his vision for Eudora’s future. The interview was lightly edited for clarity.
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What was your original reason for running for the commission?
I ran for commission to help the community. I’ve been in commercial construction and infrastructure for 20 to 30 years and thought I had value to offer. I love this town and wanted to give back.
Did you ever envision becoming mayor?
No, that was never on my radar, to be honest with you. If you’d asked me when I originally ran for commission if I’d still be doing it, I’d have probably told you no. But we’ve got a lot of big things happening, and I’m trying to just see things through. So, I have two years left in my term, and we’ll see where things go from there.
What is the biggest thing you’ve learned during your time on the commission?
Probably how hard the city staff works and how underappreciated they are. A lot of people assume things just happen. Nobody cares until it causes them a problem. Then nobody — staff or commissioners — can get it right.
The power blips, for example, have been an ongoing issue we’re actively working on. We’re not the only community with problems like that. It’s unfortunate. I live in a neighborhood it affects greatly. They hear about it from me, too. I’m trying to do everything I can to help.
Back when Evergy had the gear issue here a year and a half ago, I could hear my air conditioner reacting to the power fluctuations. That can’t be good for it, and it’s going to cost me money at some point. That situation was unfortunate — they initially said it wasn’t their problem, so we spent two or three weeks trying to solve an issue that wasn’t ours. Then we found out it was something they had overlooked.
It happens. We’re all human. We’re all trying to do the best we can — staff and commissioners. You may not agree with us all the time, but we’re trying to do what’s right for the community. Maybe what we’re doing isn’t right, but it seems we have more quiet supporters than vocal advocates.
I have to continue doing what I feel the majority is asking: keep costs reasonable. That’s hard. Everything is more expensive to operate. My household budget has changed drastically in the last five years — groceries, everything. It’s hard, and I feel the community’s pain. I’m just trying to do right by as many people as I can, because not everyone will agree on everything.
In the last couple of months, there have been a lot more people coming to City Commission meetings. It seems the reason for that has often been frustration from people about certain decisions. But do you think there’s been a benefit to having them there?
I’m very thankful for it. I remember countless meetings where no one was there. If people come out and spend their time telling us how they feel, that’s important to all of us.
There will always be people who feel they weren’t heard because we didn’t change course in their direction. That’s not it at all. We’re in tune with what we’re trying to do, and we hear what people are saying. But when a very small minority wants us to go 180 degrees in a different direction after we’ve done the research and understand the problem and solution, we still have to try to do what we can to make the community better.
What do you see as the role of the mayor in a community?
For me, I’m there to help the commission. I’m now the most senior member, so I probably have the most historical knowledge of why we did what we did. If I can remember, I provide that information. Sometimes I think, “I know we did that thing, but why did we do it that way?”
My role is to help new and existing commissioners fill the roles they’re trying to fill on the commission.
How do you see the mayor’s role in working with city staff?
I’m more of a facilitator. Very rarely, before I was mayor, did the commission come together and say, “Tim (Reazin, former mayor), you need to take care of this.” We all had our own voices.
There may be times when something doesn’t warrant an executive session, but it’s important that staff knows where we are as a body. Beyond that, I’m there to help make sure everything runs as smoothly as I can.
What are your thoughts on the development happening around town and what it means for Eudora?
It’s important. With any budget, it’s a chicken-or-the-egg situation. A family might have three kids before they have a house big enough for three kids. Development is similar. If we’re not growing as a community, we’re dying. I don’t think that’s what anyone here wants.
There are varying opinions on how and where we should grow, and those are important. But at the end of the day, we need growth. We need to develop the tax base to lower the tax burden. Right now, we’re a community that puts most of the tax burden on single-family homes. One reason I got on the commission was to help with commercial development.
I’ve learned why we struggle with commercial development — it comes back to rooftops and all of that. We’re trying to do the best we can with what we’ve got. It’s hard to get folks to come to town. That may become more of my role.
I’ve always been involved in development because of my background in construction and understanding what it takes to put in sewer and water lines. I know that firsthand. It’s about convincing someone on the edge of whether to come here and helping them understand why they should.
What is your vision for the Nottingham development as it moves forward?
It’s hard because it’s an infill project. Neighbors have looked at either a school or an empty lot for nearly 10 years. For them to see a three-story building isn’t necessarily ideal. However, if that’s what it takes to get the project done, we have to look at how to do it right.
How do we protect those folks? Maybe change landscaping or use different building elevations so they don’t feel it’s so intrusive. There are ways to protect the existing community without compromising growth to the point where there is none.
How do you balance desires for growth with those who want Eudora to maintain a small-town feel?
We have to be conducive to making sure downtown is thriving and that if a mom-and-pop business wants to do something here, they have every opportunity. But we can’t lock someone else out either. That’s capitalism.
I don’t want to run anybody out of town. I don’t want to run someone out before they start, and I don’t want someone who’s been here three months or 25 years to feel pushed out. This is home to them, and I want to help them be successful.
Taxes remain a concern among residents. What do you see as strategies the city can implement to try to keep taxes reasonable?
You know, that is a really good question. And the hurdle we’re up against is, for a long time in the ’80s and ’90s, from what I can tell, that commission did everything they could to keep taxes probably below where they should have been, at the cost of deferring a lot of maintenance that should have been dealt with that wasn’t, that is now costing us a lot to fix.
And so I think all we can do, the biggest strategy we can do, is just be smart about the assets we have and take care of them. I know there’s been concern in the past about, you know, why are we milling and overlaying a street that seems perfectly fine versus, you know, tearing up a street and redoing it. And it’s really just cost. I can mill and overlay that street and maintain it for where it’s good to go for another 20 years for a fraction of the cost of what it costs me to tear the street out — new subgrade, new asphalt, new curbs, new sidewalks. While we have to do those things as well, those come at a much slower pace than, ‘Hey, we’ve got this road that’s 20 years old. Let’s mill and overlay it and it’ll be good for another 20 years.’
There is a housing shortage in the county. What role do you think the city has in addressing this?
I think all we can do is be responsive and responsible to developers and not make it harder for them, driving their costs up. They’ll set their prices. There’s nothing we can do about that.
I’m not a big fan of the term affordable housing, because what does that mean? Affordable to you, to me, to who? It’s misleading.
As for what the city can do, we need to have our codes clearly lined out, updated and spelled out: expectations for sidewalks, streets, sewers — all of it. So we can hand a book to a developer and say, ‘These are the rules of the game. If you want to play, we’d love to have you. If not, we understand, but we’re not going to compromise how we maintain and move the community forward.’
What do you see as some of the biggest objectives for the city to accomplish this year?
I’d love to see Nottingham with a solid development plan for moving forward. I don’t think they’ll break ground this year, but having a plan so they could break ground maybe a year from now.
I’d love to see us figure out other commercial or industrial developments. That’s still a wild card.
We’ve got two new commissioners who were born and raised here. Jason moved away for a time but is back. This community, obviously it’s important to them. I know it’s important to the other three commissioners for us to find cohesion and build a Eudora that all of us are proud of.
Do you have any other thoughts on your vision for Eudora moving forward?
My vision for Eudora is just that all the citizens are proud to live here, excited to live here and that people want to come visit us, and maybe even move here also, because they’ve heard such great things about our community and the way we share everything together and work together.
That’s my vision for Eudora, just to find happiness and growth together.
Reach reporter Cuyler Dunn at [email protected]
