More than 40 years worth of leadership and experience in governing the city of Carthage left the Carthage City Council this week.

With experience going back to before Carthage became a charter city and when City Hall was one fourth of the second floor of the Jasper County Courthouse, four people, all of who decided not to seek reelection, took part in their last meeting on Tuesday.
Three left to return to private life, while one hopes to take a new public office in Jefferson City.

• Bill Johnson has by far the most experience of any of the exiting council members, having served a total of 20 years from 1982-1998 and again from 2004-2008.
Johnson's experience stretches back to the days when citizens rode the historic elevator in the Jasper County Courthouse to the second floor to conduct city business.

"We stuck our necks out to build city hall and get out of the courthouse," Johnson said. "Because there were people who thought the courthouse is Carthage. Well, the courthouse is Jasper County. We had one-fourth of one floor."

The current city hall was built in 1993, a few years after a fire devastated the east side of the Carthage Square, burning several historic buildings.

Johnson said UMB bank owned the property where those buildings stood and tried to sell it for a couple of years before offering it to the city.

"It was dying downtown as a retail center and no one would buy it, so UMB finally offered it to the city if we would build a city hall," Johnson said. "So we wound up selling our interest in the courthouse for $100,000 and applied that towards building the building that's there.

"One of my disappointments is not finishing the second floor and getting a tenant in. Tom's office is up there in that small conference room and some bathrooms and other than that, the second floor is as big as the first floor and there is just Tom and his secretary."

Johnson said he wished more people would take part in city government. He said many times the city schedules meetings to let the public speak on topics and few people show.

He pointed to meetings 1993 when the city charter was being developed to give the city the ability to govern itself.

"It's really embarrassing, you go there, your ready to give the people all this information and they don't show," Johnson said. "We met at least once a week for three or four weeks on that charter and no one came to that last meeting."

He said he's enjoyed his time on council and he felt it his responsibility to give back to a community that has given so much to him.

"I'm going to miss the feeling that you are doing something to repay the city for what it has done for you," Johnson said. "When we moved here we didn't have virtually anything, but I never have wanted to live anywhere else.

• Tom Flanigan has nine years of experience on the council spread out over two periods 20 years apart. He served from 1983-1988 and from 2004-2008.

He also served on the Home Rule Charter Commission in 1993, the parks board, the tree commission, on the McCune-Brooks Hospital Board and the McCune-Brooks foundation.

Flanigan is running unopposed at this time for the Missouri State House seat currently held by Steve Hunter.

Assuming no one files as an independent candidate, Flanigan is virtually assured of being elected to represent Carthage, Webb City, Carl Junction and northwest Jasper County in the Missouri House.

Flanigan also remembers when the city was debating moving out of the Jasper County Courthouse.

"We didn't have as much room as we have in here," Flanigan said looking around the small conference room at the Public Works Building. "The fire was bad, but the timing was good for us. That east side of the square had a major burn and UMB tried to sell that property for two or three years, but no one bought it. I wasn't on the council when the city hall was built, but it really was a big event, because it was demarcation point for the city having it's own identity with a city hall."

Flanigan said in more recent years, he was happy to see the improvements made in a variety of areas in the past few years.

"You've got the library that came on board," Flanigan said. "And when that tax passed to build that library, that spurred some activity and civic pride that allowed the hospital to be built, it spurred the high school to be built after several attempts to pass that levy, it spurred the renovation of Memorial Hall. So there has been a lot of that kind of activity and I look back and see when the library people got together and said they need that renovation, and that worked, that just really was a launching pad for a lot of civic activity."

Flanigan said he's enjoyed being a part of the city council and the decisions it's made.

"I've always enjoyed it because I've enjoyed people," Flanigan said. "I've always enjoyed being a part of my own community and having a voice in what was said. I've enjoyed having a voice for my neighbors and I've just had a sense that this is what I wanted to be a part of and wanted to help guide and I've done it."

• Mike Harris also has nine years on the city council, but all his service is in a more recent time than some of Flanigan's experience.

Harris served on the council from 1995-1999 and 2003-2008.

"I really have enjoyed it," Harris said. "In the time I've been on the council there's been some major changes in the city, nearly all of them positive. Working with all the departments and the department heads has been uplifting to me. Being involved in the direction the city has taken has been good."

Harris talked about some disappointments with some decisions the council has made, but that hasn't detracted from his time on the council.

"I really have enjoyed being a part of the public safety committee," Harris said. "That's been one of my pets as it were. I also have enjoyed the other committees I've been on. Budget/Ways and Means has been very interesting too. There's just so much that the average citizen doesn't realize that you have to address before you can make these, to them, stupid decisions."

Harris talked about some of the specific accomplishments he's been pleased with.

"I'm proud of the obvious things, the growth that we've seen," Harris said. "Myers Park had a slow start, but it looks like it's beginning to pick up now. The new high school, the new library, we built the new police station during my time on the city council. The interchange, the roundabout, I mean, everything is just pointing positive right now. Everything is moving ahead and for many, many years, I was born here, and Carthage has just basically stood still. Things are moving now and I think it's important to have as much influence as you can to move it in the right direction."

Harris said he was disappointed he couldn't move the city towards replacing the old Myers Park Airport, but the need for that local airport has diminished over the years.
Harris said he's glad to be coming off the council, but he might run for a seat again in the future.

"I think it's good every now and then to get some new people in," Harris said. "I'll probably be back though because I like it too much. I already miss it and I haven't left yet. There's just a lot of information and being on the inside and learning that, I'll miss that."

• Cyndi Curry is the relative newcomer to this group, having served from 2006-2008.

Curry thanked a lot of people for her experiences at Tuesday's council meeting.

"I first want to thank the citizens of Carthage, particularly the citizens of my ward for allowing me the opportunity to serve them and all the citizens who have been supportive of me and taken the time to let me know how they feel about issues that we were contemplating at the time," Curry said. "I'd also like to thank all the department heads, all of you have been wonderful to work with and certainly offered me any explanation that I have asked for to any question that I might have had and I really appreciate that a lot. I'd like to thank all of the council members who were patient with me, who worked with me if I didn't get everything quite right."

She said she's leaving because of time.

"I've got too many time constraints," Curry said. "I own my own business so a lot of times I can't expend the necessary time to do this. It takes a lot of time and I feel like the citizens need the representation of someone who can be here and devote the time to do this."

Curry looks back positively on some specific achievements.

"I can't really cite one specific thing, we've worked on so many things, we've done the compensation study, that's well underway," Curry said. "For me personally, I wanted to see nuisance and abatement moved to the correct department which now it is, and I feel like they have the correct person in there to monitor the city properties better and that was a huge concern for me when I cam on the council."

She also remembers the disappointments.

"Probably having a plan of action for houses that are condemned where we don't have them sitting up for years and years and years," Curry said. "I would have liked to have seen something move forward a little bit faster on that, but we initially did some work on it, but it didn't meet well with some citizen groups so that was the end of that. I think it will come up again in the future, but I think the timing has to be right on something like that."

She has some advice for those who replace her and the others on the council.
"Just have lots of patients, be willing to keep your ears and eyes open, and always remember that the citizens are the ones you are representing," Curry said. "Sometimes their views are going to conflict with your own, but you're going to have to remember that you're there to represent the interests of the citizenry."