Confessions of a Retired Public Servant

Leave it better than you found it.

Leave it on your own terms.

Leave it with your integrity intact.

I’m retired. Or am I repurposed? Maybe just redirected. Since I’m 76 and more worn than not, I may even be just a retread: “A person retrained for new work or a superficially altered version of an original.” Wow, now there’s a thought. Intending to go a few more miles, I may be just a two-legged version of a recapped vulcanized steel-belted radial. Given where my head is today, I’m guessing I’m a combination of all the above; A repurposed, redirected, retread. Whatever I’ve become, It’s been going on for ten years plus. That’s right, ten f&#king years. Along with those old twelve-hour days, my former self, my professional careerist self, ended with a lunch, a plaque, my name on a street sign, and a whole bunch of commentary that ended with: “We’ll miss you.” I would like to think the majority actually did.

That was back in the Fall of 2014, just a couple of weeks shy of my 65th birthday. Nearly forty years of managing, planning, financing, and advising local and regional governments came to an end. My oh so tailored two and three button Hickey Freeman’s were left hanging in the closet. They had nowhere to go. The day of the suit, a tie with a single Windsor knot, and a Nordstrom’s powder blue or white pinpoint dress shirt was over. As if petrified, shoe trees had become permanently entrenched within the confines of Allen Edmonds finest dress leather.

Mind you, I wasn’t pining for the day per se, but it was time. What had been rewarding was less so. Four decades of work-related repetitions had become routine. Challenges, even major ones, were not nearly as challenging. Most emergencies were not really, well, emergencies. Fortunately, I had long since learned not to overreact. Prioritizing and identifying what’s important and what’s not, was one of my acquired skills. Dealing with the lesser distractions, those without end, became chores. Still, as once was said to me, “We address the small so we can accomplish the big.” Understood, but I was growing more impatient for many cannot distinguish between the two. When everything is a priority, nothing is a priority.

Based on my own length in service, the answers periodically came before the questions. Minuses began to outnumber pluses. At the community level, civic ignorance combined with the consternations and rudeness of the public forum was getting old. At the intergovernmental level, authoritative non-cooperative territorialism had only grown deeper. On both scales, competing self-interest was ignoring the idea of good governance. Regardless, my word and obligation as a meritocrat kept me in the game. As the final days, weeks, and months were slowly coming to an end, I was acutely aware, that faithful professional dedication was no longer enough. My accumulated stress related anger had become uncharacteristic and more frequent. I needed to step off, move on, and above all, regain my optimistic youthful step. Long since ignored, it was also time to look after my own well-being. Besides, I had a plan with a foundation already poured. With the future comfortably funded, the economic reliance on my own labor was no longer a necessity. Time, albeit late, finally took its rightful place as the most prized commodity. After all, there were places to go, grandchildren to see, and new and better contributions to be made. Since I had already served more than 50 local government agencies in California, it was time to let the next generation take the reins. There is nothing like youthful confidence and hope.

All in all, what kept me going was a promise I made to myself at the beginning of my career:

Leave it better than you found it.

Leave it on your own terms.

Leave it with your integrity intact.

For the most part, I did and then some!

So-What Is the Post-Retirement Plan?

Stay in the Classroom—(That Worked)

It was nothing out of the ordinary. It was classic lifestyle retirement planning without golf. My long-standing avocation would replace my day job. Professor was the name. Professing was the game. Afterall, it was the classroom that I enjoyed most. By the time I hung up my last full-time gig, I already had ten years classroom instruction under the belt. I had been lecturing graduate students in the art and science of public policy, urban management, economic development, globalization, and building sustainable communities. Come retirement, I had already provided instruction to roughly 1,000 graduate students in 54 courses at three universities. This new phase of life, the one Gail Sheehy called the “Age of Integrity-The Age of Giving Back,” would center, and mostly still does, on my continuing part-time appearances at the lectern. Although the subjects, audience, and institutions have changed, I’m still doing what I enjoy the most, interacting in the classroom. Since 2014, I presented an additional 16 graduate courses enrolling another 250 students. However, in the Fall quarter of 2016, I commenced trading graduate students for adult lifelong learners. By 2018, and now with a complete focus on those over the age of 50, I’ve presented 23 courses (37 sections) in various subject areas to more than 500 enrollees. Since most are repeating students, the actual head count is closer to 300. Before COVID, my courses were averaging between 40 and 60 students. Apparently, my actual academic background and true interest in political history, eastern European studies, and comparative politics is a hit amongst my peers. I’ve needed them probably more than they have needed me.

So-What’s Also In the Plan?

Do a Little Volunteering! (That Didn’t Work)

The original thought was to balance the days volunteering on the boards of local non-profits. After all, I’ve been a city manager, a president, a vice president, a department head, a chief cook and a bottle washer. Public sector, private sector, professional associations, academia, I had perused the biggest and the smallest. I’d sold personal care products for Colgate Palmolive, worked the irrigation lines on my grandmothers Colorado farm and unloaded 60-foot trailers on postal docks. I thought I had a lot to offer. Apparently not. What I didn’t know, where my naiveite led me to believe, that non-profits were like the functioning of cities. You know, public purpose and all. Yes and No! I’ll try to explain with my limited experience.

Local non-profit boards are mostly insular, exclusive not inclusive. They are usually populated with long-term and even multi-generational pillars of the community. The older the community, the more this is the case. Newbies, however well meaning, are unknown quantities. Without recognizable direct and indirect positional authority, active participation in community and civic events, membership in local service clubs, or are a recognized big donor, newbies are just a face in the crowd. Having lived in, and worked for, the likes of the Cities of San Diego, Pasadena, and Santa Ana, I know this all too well. I also went about this board thing all wrong.

First, I am not interested in being seen. At my age, I’ve been there and done that. Although most causes are worthy, I have no desire to attend the continuous stream of obligatory community and civic events. I never did even when it was an expected professional obligation. I did it. But I rarely enjoyed it. Without that participation, and especially without some level of positional recognition, no one knows the newbie from Adam. No one really knows me from Adam. For a non-profit, especially where the primary responsibility of board members is fund raising, a newbie is somewhat ignored. There is no connectivity. Without an active business card for membership, the path to recognition is a long one. Quite frankly, I have neither the time nor the inclination to be a member of the club.

Second, I expected the staffs to operate by the professional standards that I had experienced in my career. That was not the case. Sarcasm and a know-it-all attitude were traits of two of three clearly inexperienced executive directors. They forgot they work for the entire board, not just a select few. Mind you, I went out of my way not to interject my personal professional opinions. I was surgical, not prolific, with my commentary.

It became clear to me that I no longer play well with others. I used to but for some reason I seem to have lost that skill. Boards that fail to listen to new options, that constantly repeat the same mistakes, are in the position they are in for a reason. It’s an echo chamber for those with the loudest voices. I clearly was no longer good at this. It was an unpleasant learning experience that I volunteered for.

As an aside, my wife and I are newbies. Having only been in the community for six years, we are neither a part of the structure nor do we want to be. We just wanted to contribute. At the end of the day, she has been much more successful. Her approach has been to volunteer as a board member and chairperson of our HOA and as a worker bee at two local non-profits. She has been more than successful on all accounts. I should take notes.

P.S.

On a personal level we are both adjusting to the aging process. As evidenced by my eight days stay in the hospital a couple years back, she has clearly been better at taking care of herself than me. She swims and does her yoga. I now strain to walk my morning two miles. We live in a great small community and have made several new friends. Our adult children are incredible human beings. Both are parents and accomplished professionals. Yes I’m bragging, they are impressive and just plane nice. Most people should be so fortunate.

In the post COVID world, we have resumed our travels. But we have a lot of catching up to do. We make efforts to stay in touch with our true friends recognizing if we don’t do it, it won’t happen.

What is sobering, that at my age I’m officially old. Even a year ago I never thought of myself as old. This notion of age is evidenced by a recent conversation I had with a man that works at our local nursery. Dragging our Christmas tree over to be wrapped, he asked me how old I was. I told him, 75. He responded and not jokingly, “It’s all downhill from here.” He’s 88. He contributed his longevity to activity. Rightly or wrongly and until my time in the hospital, I have never been aware of my own mortality. Not at 55, not at 65, even at 70, I just didn’t think about it. For now, the trials, tribulations, joys, and sorrows of life will continue. That, I have learned from those that are further down the road. Those that are younger—well, they’ll learn eventually. Hopefully I’ll still be around to give them a little nudge.