Mayoral duties

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Mayor Bill Currin slips in the side door of Townhall and heads into the conference room.

It is late afternoon and he has already had a full day.

“In Hudson, a political office is giving back to the community,” he says, after getting settled. “We should do this because we believe in our community.”

Currin is an extremely active mayor. Most of this can be attributed to his interpretation of the position and his willingness to do it.

Lying on the table in front of him, Currin’s day planner is completely covered. Each block marked meetings, trips and appointments.

At the end of April, he met with representatives from the University of Akron, had dinner with WKSU members and headed to Ashtabula for a day. Then he left for Minnesota, only to return two days later to a day full of meetings at Townhall.  He also was speaking to the Ohio Association of Tax Administrators and at an event in Pittsburgh before heading to a retreat at Salt Fork for the Northeast Ohio Mayors and City Managers Association.

To top it off, he also cuts ribbons, writes columns, meets with residents, attends ceremonies and performs weddings.

And these are his golden years, his retirement after 35 years with Johnson & Johnson.

“I think it’s wonderful,” says his wife, Debbie. “I think the more active you stay, the happier you are and the longer you live. We are almost 40-year residents. There is a long history. I think it’s fantastic.”

A future mayor

Born in Panama in 1943 to a soldier and the daughter of an army officer, Currin and his family moved around a lot.

After his father’s discharge, the family headed to Wyoming where his younger brother was born. Currin also has an older brother.

His father was then drafted into the Navy Seabees and headed to Guam, while the rest of the family went to San Francisco. Then came Texas, New York, Oklahoma and numerous other spots.

The family moved for two reasons — the job was complete or the rent was due, Currin says.

He remembers being a sophomore in high school and a member of the football team when “dad called for us” to come to Oklahoma. Each move involved storing what they couldn’t take with them and driving across the country.

This time the family moved to Oklahoma for six months and then returned to Western New York where Currin finished high school. “That was the only time we backtracked,” he says, adding that his brother had been a senior at that time and the school district postponed prom until the family returned.

“My mom said when I finished college that I had been to 18 different schools,” he says.

After graduating from high school, Currin worked for 1 1/2 years for Shoe Corp. of America before heading to college.

“They [Shoe Corp. of America] told me that if I went to a Columbus-area school, they would have a job for me. They did,” he says, adding that at the time, only 10 or 12 of his classmates went on to college right after graduation.

Life-changing events

This is the part of the story where Currin says two events changed his life.

The first was his decision to attend college. Currin chose Otterbein College where he earned a degree in economics. The second event was meeting Debbie Ewell, now Debbie Currin.

“We just celebrated our 40th anniversary,” he says. “That was a huge benefit — having someone who loves and supports you.”

Debbie agrees.

“My personal feelings about him?” she asks. “He is one of the most honorable and ethical men I have ever known. He takes it [being mayor] very seriously. He is totally dedicated to Hudson and I support him 110 percent.”

After graduation, Debbie taught kindergarten in Maple Heights and Bill worked for Republic Steel. Though he served in the Air Force reserves during college, Currin was ineligible to join the Army due to childhood asthma.

He was soon recruited away from Republic Steel by Johnson & Johnson.

“I made a really good choice,” Currin says, of his decision to go with Johnson & Johnson.

He worked his way up the sales and marketing ladder through local, regional and national steps.

“I traveled a lot,” he says. “After the first five years, I was probably gone a couple nights a week.”

The trips ranged from midwest locations like Michigan, Pittsburgh and New York, to national destinations like Los Angeles, Seattle and Dallas.

The Currins also added two daughters to their family — Kristin and Bethany.

“I didn’t miss anything my daughters were involved in,” Currin says. “The company made family a priority. They [Johnson & Johnson] also encouraged me to be active in the community.”

To illustrate his point, Currin says Johnson & Johnson even flew him from California back to Hudson for a School Board meeting.

“I flew a red eye to attend the meeting and then flew back to California the next morning,” he says.

Currin served on the Hudson School Board for 12 years before serving for six years on Council. When former Mayor John Krum stepped down from the position, Currin was sworn in as his replacement in 2003. He later ran a successful campaign and has now served as mayor for six years.

While much of Currin’s work these days focuses on the Northeast Ohio Mayors and City Managers Association, he also performs a wide array of duties in town like ribbon cuttings, attending social gatherings and performing wedding ceremonies.

And though each wedding is special, one in particular stands out in his mind.

“I married my daughter Bethany,” he says, adding he wasn’t sure he could do it. “My daughter said, ‘Dad, you can do it. We really want you to.’”

Currin flips to the front of his planner and pulls out a stack of photographs. One features a sunny day with rows of chairs lined up on a beach. In front of the chairs, a bride and groom stand side by side with Currin in front of them.

Other pictures show his daughter Kristin, now living in Oregon, who was married in May.

“I’m not doing that ceremony,” Currin says smiling.

Another photograph shows Debbie with their two daughters.

He gathers up the photos and tucks them back into his planner.

Creating a stronger region

A large portion of Currin’s time these days is devoted to the Northeast Ohio Mayors and City Managers Association.

The association — which includes Cuyahoga County and the counties surrounding it — began as a loose affiliation before being formalized in 2000.

At roughly the same time, Currin joined Hudson Job Search as a volunteer. “I had several clients who had trouble finding equal-level jobs here,” he says. “I thought, ‘you know what? We can’t sit back here. We have talent here. In order to have a vibrant Hudson, we need to have a vibrant region.”

Then in 2004, Currin remembers the debate in Cleveland between John Kerry and George Bush.

“There was a blimp going by overhead and Cleveland had just been named the poorest city in the United States,” he says. “It was clear that we had to step up to do something.”

Currin answered that call and was later named chairman of the association. He is the first leader not from Cuyahoga County.

The group has been busy.

They rewrote their by-laws, clearly defined their goals, and commissioned a regional economic revenue study. Once the study was complete and accepted, the next phase was to implement it.

“This is huge,” Currin says. “It’s not a merger. It’s a collaboration — smart land use and infrastructure planning, new  growth and revenue sharing — a metamorphosis.”

According to its Web site — www.neo-rpi — The Regional Prosperity Initiative will “provide the structure for coordinated, regional land use planning and new growth revenue sharing in the 16-county Northeast Ohio region.”

But the group needs help and they ask for volunteers to further their efforts.

“We have got to start investing in the region and ourselves,” Currin says. “This is our time to step up.

“In order to function better, we need to look at best practices around the world; setting the groundwork for this region to come out of the downturn like a rocket.”

And Currin seems determined to make that happen.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 20th, 2009 at 12:57 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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