Newspaper Clipping - Newspaper Clipping Scan - St Peter City Administrator Tom Hedges goes to Eagan - 1/1/1976
L;ity's experiment was a success
St. Peter's administrator moving north
By PATRICK LARKIN or develop a new one. "He's been a great guy to work ways," Hedges said.
Free Press Staff Writer "I can't believe we won't im- with," Lurth said. "I really hate But he is unsure about life in a
ST. PETER-After more than mediately hire someone else, to see him go." metropolitan area.
four years as city administrator said councilman Bob Swedberg. "Tom is an awful loss, it's a "I may like living in a met-
here, Tom Hedges plans to Due to the increasing complex- tough blow," Swedberg said. ropolitan area and I may not,"
submit his resignation to the city "He's going to be a terribly hard he said, "but it's something I
council Monday. man to replace." have to find out for myself."
Hedges, St. Peter's first city "We're all sorry to see him
administrator, has accepted the go," Reid said. The new job is a step up the
job as the first city adminis- For Hedges it will.be his first ladder in Hedges' profession.
trator of Eagan, a Minneapolis experience in a metropolitan Eagan presently has a popula-
suburb. Tom ' area. tion of 19,000 and is expected to
The new job will start the mid- Hedges Hedges left Spirit Lake, a town double its size within 10 years.
dle of July and will mean Hedges , of 3,500, for school at the Univer- As Eagan's first city adminis-
will not see the completion of sity of South Dakota in Vermil- trator, Hedges will be responsi-
some of the projects he has lion, a town of about 7,000. He ble for reorganizing the city's
helped get under way. Among earned a B.A. degree and an government under the adminis-
the projects are the Riverside M.A. in public administration trator system, much as he did in
Park, the community center and and after a stint as assistant city St. Peter.
the new street garage. ities of city government and new manager under an internship As far as the future of St. Peter
But he has seen the completion legislation from both state and program in Vermillion, Hedges goes, Hedges thinks the pros-
of a number of important pro- federal governments a profes- came to St. Peter in 1972. pects are good.
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reorganization of city govern- he said. the new job, but when the oppor- good future because of the
ment placing the departments "The position of city adminis- tunity presented itself he had to people," he said. "St. Peter will
under the administrator. Prior trator is here to stay," said coun- make a hard decision. be a progressive community
to his arrival the city depart- cilman Robert Reid. "I thought about it for several that will grow at a moderate
ments were directly under the Councilman Mel Lurth ag- weeks and finally decided I clip. The growth will be well ba-
city council. reed. "I think we'll try to replace should make the move for my- lanced."
The new system has worked Tom," he said. self and St. Peter," he said. And he doesn't rule out a re-
well enough to please several The councilmen also expres- "When you stay in one place turn to the home of five gover-
city councilmen and there ap- sed their regrets about seeing too long it gets hard to come up nors. "Who knows, in five to ten
pears to be little, if any, senti- the 27-year-old Spirit Lake, with new ideas and fresh ap- years I may be back in St.
ment to revert to the old system Iowa, native leave. proaches-you get too set in your Peter."