(Oregonian continued)

"Charlotte is going to be a very tough act to follow," said Ray Phelps, chairman of the Wilsonville Chamber of Commerce government affairs committee and a member of the city planning commission. "She was dynamic without appearing to be so. She didn't come through like a whirling dervish. She shows up, becomes engaged, gets involved and, the next thing you know, people are moving and acting. Whoever follows her will have that challenge."

Integrity. Caring. Dynamic. Communicative. A consensus builder.

Ask what makes a good mayor and Wilsonville's civic leaders describe similar traits -- traits that would be desired of any mayor in any town. But Wilsonville faces issues that call for special strengths. To handle the reins of growth. To defend the city's transportation needs.

Celia Nunez, appointed to the City Council last year, listed three criteria for a strong mayor.

"Someone who has a sincere interest in serving in the public's interest," Nunez said. "Someone committed to the well-being of this community. And someone who is competent and can work in an urban environment. We are a recognized force at the table, whether it's with other elected officials or regional agencies."

Add to that:  Someone with time.

Lehan became a respected voice in county, regional and state issues because she made being mayor a full-time job. Almost 20 years ago, John Ludlow spent 20 hours weekly on mayoral duties.

Ludlow, a Wilsonville Realtor, said he couldn't imagine how someone today could juggle a full-time career and being mayor.

"There's a lot of things flying at Wilsonville -- big-city stuff," Ludlow said. "An attorney down south said Wilsonville is a city on steroids. It has grown up so fast. Even when I was mayor, it was moving so fast. We were record-setters on new buildings."

Growth is ongoing. So are transportation issues.

The city is prepared to fight if a proposed connector between Interstate 5 and Oregon 99W is located where it would simply funnel traffic jams onto I-5. It has less control -- but similar worries -- over the growing inadequacies of the interstate freeway.

THE LEHAN YEARS
1991: Lehan appointed to Wilsonville City Council
1992: Wins election to the council
1996: Elected mayor
1999: Threatened with recall for her support of a $48 million water
treatment plant on the Willamette River
2000: Re-elected mayor
2002: Survives recall election --a group led by former mayor John Ludlow attempted to oust Lehan for, among other things, her support of a new $6.9 million City Hall
2004: Re-elected mayor
2007: Announces she will run for the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners

"The entire metro area is 'hourglassed' onto the Boone Bridge," where I-5 crosses the Willamette, said Councilor Tim Knapp, as of last week the only announced candidate for mayor. "As the whole region continues to grow, how can you expect that one bridge to bear the whole load?"

A mayor must be able to reach the city's 17,000 residents -- and the high-tech and industrial companies that employ more than 17,000.

While residents might love their city's beauty, safety and good schools, they have consistently opposed levy efforts to pay for library and police services. Without levies, the city is dependent on fees for income.

"I would like to see a mayor who could take something to the city -- anything -- and have it passed," Ludlow said. "I'd like to see more communication and government with less cost."

The mayor and council have to work consistently on a two-way conversation with citizens, Knapp said.

"The council doesn't just listen," Knapp said. "They should inform citizens about how things work. And citizens should not just listen. They should inform the council about what's important to them.

"I'm interested in the process," he said. "How do you make the process work to get the most valid consensus?"

Whoever the mayor will be, it will be a high-profile job.

"We are players now in the acronyms -- Metro, JPAC," said council president Alan Kirk of the regional government and its Joint Policy Action Committee. "They know where Wilsonville is and where we stand on the issues."

Really, the city council is what sets vision and policy. But the mayor adds personal style.

Lehan was fortunate to work with strong councils that withstood controversy -- including two recall attempts. Teamwork is essential in city government. Councilors will pick up some of the duties Lehan was able to accomplish with her open schedule, Kirk said.

The current Wilsonville mayor already is fundraising for her Board of Commissioners campaign. She travels Clackamas County, meeting residents who might never have heard her name. Running for county office is a new challenge -- not that there aren't plenty of challenges left in Wilsonville, Lehan said.

"I don't think there's a time, when you're an elected official, that you say, 'There, I've accomplished everything I've wanted to do,' " she said.

Mayor makes her list of works done, to do

"Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one."

Charlotte Lehan evoked Dr. Seuss in her final State of the City address last week, fitting for a civic servant whose 12 years as Wilsonville's mayor were marked by equal parts enthusiasm and determination.

Lehan will complete her final term as mayor this year. She is running for a spot on the nonpartisan Clackamas County Board of Commissioners, which expanded to five positions after voters in November approved adding two seats.

Speaking before a full house at the monthly Wilsonville Chamber of Commerce luncheon, Lehan eschewed the conventional State of the City format that looks back at the past year and ahead to the year to come. She looked further back -- and into a wider future.

When Lehan was appointed to fill a vacancy on the Wilsonville City Council in 1991, the city had about 7,000 residents, 6,500 jobs and a real market value of $600 million. It now has about 17,000 residents, 16,000 jobs and a real market value of $2 billion.

"I like to think of it as disciplined growth, even though it's been huge," Lehan said. "We've worked to make growth pay its fair share of its impact on the community."

The biggest challenges during her tenure were siting of the Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, securing a permanent city water source, the battle with Metro over industrial lands, and the closing of the Thunderbird Mobile Club, which displaced several hundred residents, many elderly and low-income.

"I was very pleased with the results of the first three," Lehan said. "I will forever be saddened by the tragedy of the last."

Other projects over the years had more satisfying outcomes.

Lehan's Top 10:

10. Burying all utilities the length of Wilsonville Road.

9. Building City Hall and turning the old city hall into a new home for Public Works and Wilsonville police.

8. Partnerships with the West Linn-Wilsonville School District.

7. Growth of the Wilsonville Public Library, which checks out a half-million items yearly.

6. Partnerships with the Chamber of Commerce and the business community. "We're very much more powerful when we line up and approach regional problems with a united front," Lehan said.

5. Development of the Villebois planned community.

4. The growth of the Smart transit system. "In 1991, we had a couple of vans named WART that wandered around the city with no set routes," she said.

3. The three water features designed by Robert Murase, "a mecca of summertime play."

2. The urban forest. "Our trees are always in the top three -- along with 'clean and safe' -- of reasons why people like living in Wilsonville," Lehan said.

1. The 230-acre Graham Oaks Natural Area, destined to become a jewel in the Metro regional parks system.

Lehan will still be in office to celebrate the opening of the Boeckman Road extension over the Coffee Creek wetlands. A two-day party is planned for mid-June on the bridge.

She'll also represent Wilsonville when the commuter rail service opens in September.

But someone else will lead when Wilsonville builds a bike bridge over the Willamette River to French Prairie, when Barber Street is extended to Villebois and when the busy Wilsonville Road-Interstate 5 interchange is improved.

Lehan thanked residents and praised the City Council as diverse and forward thinking.

"I don't intend to get all maudlin and sentimental about it because, shoot, there's 11 months left in my term and anything could happen," she said.

n      Abby Haight; abbyhaight@news.oregonian.com

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Mayor to give her last State of the City address By David Jagernauth, The Wilsonville Spokesman Sunday February 24, 2008 Every year, for more than a decade, Mayor Charlotte Lehan has informed the citizens of Wilsonville about the state of their fair city. Photo By David Jagernauth Charlotte Lehan addressed the chamber of commerce for the last time as Wilsonville’s mayor.  But this year’s speech is more meaningful than the others, because it is her last. The State of the City address will take place at the next city council meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 21 at City Hall. It will be her second address. Last Tuesday, Lehan gave a similar speech for the Wilsonville Chamber of Commerce at their membership luncheon, sponsored by Portland General Electric. “As most of you realize, this is my last time for this particular gig,” Lehan told the crowded conference room at the Holiday Inn. “Next year there will be someone else standing up here giving you this address. In fact, the person who will be giving this speech may even be here in this room today.” Lehan is running for a vacant seat on the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners. “For me, and for Wilsonville, it feels like the right time,” she said. “I know I can bring to the county some of the growth management principles that have worked well for Wilsonville.” Since this was her last State of the City address, she decided to look back over her long career in Wilsonville. Lehan first joined the Wilsonville City Council in 1991. She was appointed to fill a vacant seat, and was elected to a full term in 1992. The city was a very different place then, she said. “At that time Town Center was just under construction. Village at Main was still a holly orchard. Wilsonville High School was just a big, open field. Dammasch Hospital was still full of patients.” Since then, Wilsonville's population grew from around 7,000 to more than 17,000; the number of employees more than doubled from approximately 6,500 to 16,000; and real market value of the city more than tripled from approximately $600 million to more than $2 billion. “We have had tremendous growth and development here, and I think most of it has been pretty good,” Lehan said. She described Wilsonville's philosophy as “disciplined growth.” The city has self-imposed concurrency rules requiring infrastructure to be planned and funded before development is green-lighted. Concurrency has resulted in moratoriums or partial moratoriums three times during Lehan's tenure, twice for road capacity and once for water. The city also has taken measures to make sure growth pays a share of the cost of growth. “I believe this disciplined approach is the major reason why Wilsonville has not seen a community backlash against growth, as we have seen in a number of cities around us,” Lehan said. She also noted construction has slowed down regionally, but in Wilsonville new homes continue to be built and sold. “This is partly because we have paid attention to the quality of life and to the infrastructure that makes people want to live and work here,” she said. List of challenges In many ways Wilsonville has been fortunate, the mayor noted. While many other communities have had to deal with natural disasters and serious violent attacks, Wilsonville has been spared. But the city was not without its share of challenges during Lehan's term as mayor. She mentioned her top four: prison siting, water treatment plant construction, industrial lands battle and Thunderbird Mobile Club closure. The prison siting controversy, which eventually led to Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, unified the residents of the city, she said. “It felt like it was Wilsonville against the rest of the Western world,” Lehan said. “We were all together here and everyone on the outside thought we were nuts.” The water treatment plant controversy, however, was more difficult, “because it split the community so badly.” “In the end,” she added, “I know the community made the right decision and we have a beautiful water treatment plant and no impediments to continued development in the future.” While the other challenges resulted in positive outcomes in the eyes of the mayor, Thunderbird is a different story. “I will always feel saddened by this tragedy,” she said. “I have never been prouder of my city councilors and city staff than I have been during the legal battles over providing adequate compensation for this fragile population.”  List of accomplishments Before listing her accomplishments for her term as mayor, Lehan told the audience that she often gets credit for three programs begun and championed by her predecessor, Jerry Krummel – commuter rail, the tree ordinance and the road utility fee. Of the road utility fee, she said, “It has worked so well for us we not only have some of the best pavement conditions you will find anywhere around, but it costs us less now to maintain our roads than it did when the program was launched 14 years ago.” She added: “In some way we are all building on the accomplishments that preceded us.” With that caveat, Lehan went on to present her Top 10 list of accomplishments in the style of David Letterman. “While I had a hand in all of them, certainly none of them was accomplished single-handedly,” she said. Her list included some obvious projects like construction of a new city hall facility, Villebois, one of the largest current housing developments in Oregon, and Wilsonville's string of three parks designed by Robert Murase. Lehan boasted about the expansion of the Wilsonville Public Library, with children's programs she described as wildly successful. “Our library has expanded in size by over 400 percent, circulation is up 160 percent in the last decade, and we now check out about a half million items every year.” She also praised the city's transit system. “In 1991, it was a couple of vans named WART that wandered around the city on no fixed routes,” she said. “And now, SMART is the Metro region's second largest transit district with over 300,000 rides annually.” It is still fareless within the city borders and operates with a lower payroll tax than TriMet, she added. Other accomplishments have since faded from the public's memory. These include the undergrounding of all overhead utility lines along the full length of Wilsonville Road. “It took most of 10 years to finish, and now it looks so ordinary that it is hard to remember how messy and awful it used to look,” Lehan said. Her second favorite accomplishment is the city's urban forestry program. “Mayor Krummel may have started the tree ordinance,” she said. “But subsequent councils and staffs have embraced it, expanding an urban forestry program that has become a national model,” she said. Finally, the accomplishment Lehan is most proud of is the Graham Oaks Natural Area. She said she started working on this project even before joining the city council. “Metro is now moving forward with its first full scale restoration project to make it one of the crown jewels of their regional parks,” she said. “I think as time goes on this will only become a more valuable asset to the community.” Lehan ended her speech by talking about change. “For the past 11 years as mayor of Wilsonville, it has been a privilege to serve you,” Lehan said. “This final, twelfth year will be a transition for all of us. But I am confident it will be a positive one.” She then closed with a quote from Dr. Seuss: “Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one.”