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Sedam oversaw leader change, entry sign project
By Richard Reeder
This document was published online on Monday, January 05, 2009
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| Outgoing mayor Roger Sedam and his wife Pat stand inside their house Monday. Tuesday will be the end of Sedam’s term in office as Nancy Tia Brown takes over. (Photo by Sara Loven) |
Mayor Roger Sedam’s tenure ends Tuesday night when he will turn the gavel over to Nancy Tia Brown.
Sedam served one-term as mayor.
“I have mixed emotions,” Sedam said. “I’ve served on the council and the Yellowstone Regional Airport Board in addition to this term.
“The many things I will miss include the people I work with every day,” he added. “The people are what have made this special for me.”
Sedam, long active in radio, business and real estate, said there comes a time when everyone needs to step aside.
“I look forward to the freedom to do whatever I want,” he said. “There comes a time when you become stale in public service and you need to turn it over to a younger generation.”
Sedam said he’s pleased with what he’s accomplished as mayor.
“We’ve finally been able to start the storm drain project on 19th Street,” he said. “We were talking about that in the 1980s when I was first on the council.
“The state is being more generous with funding and that allowed us to get this going,” he added.
A community assessment gave Sedam the direction to start another struggling project.
“One of the things the community said it wanted was public transportation,” he said. “So we bought the big pink COLT bus and started offering that.
“We put it out there, but hardly anyone was using it,” he added. “Later we had to bite the bullet and park the big one and bought the small one.”
Sedam continues to be a strong supporter of the COLT.
“I know there are groups of people who need it,” he said. “But despite the state providing 50 percent of the funding, it still loses money.
“I’m not sure how much longer the current council will keep the COLT (operating),” he added.
Sedam said the city is in good financial shape.
“We have built reserves in all our accounts,” he said. “And there’s money in reserve for emergencies in all departments.
“We have the second cheapest electrical rates in the state,” he added. “And we keep improving infrastructure as we can.”
One of his proudest accomplishments is remodeling the city entrance sign near the airport.
“I really felt like Powell was outshining us with their entrance signs and we have more people coming into Cody than they do,” he said. “It took us three years to get the money and complete the work, but the new signage is beautiful and provides a better greeting to visitors.”
Sedam also helped with new downtown Christmas lights.
“The Cody Events Committee came to me and said they were going to do fundraising to buy new lights for downtown,” he said. “I told them that should be the city’s job “ that private groups shouldn’t have to raise money to decorate the town.
“The old lights had been torn up by the wind and we set out to replace them,” he added. “We’ve spent $53,000 the last three years and they look great.”
Sedam oversaw the first big change in city administration in a decade when City Administrator Laurie Kadrich left in October 2006.
The city council terminated her contract and she didn’t accept a new one. She moved on to eventually become city manager of Grand Junction, Colo., and was replaced by Andy Whiteman.
“I campaigned for mayor based on a change in city government,” he said. “It wasn’t directly aimed at one person.
“There wasn’t communication between the administrator and the mayor and council,” he added. “I’ve always believed the mayor and council needed more input into things.”
Sedam said when he became mayor, the problems really stood out.
“The turnover in all departments was substantial,” he said. “We had people leaving who were almost to retirement age and I knew something was wrong with that.”
Sedam said communication with Kadrich was difficult and that led to changes.
“We offered her and some others new contracts, and some were refused,” he said. “The biggest thing was we needed more communication.
“I was finding things out about people leaving second- and third-hand on the street,” he added. “The council agreed we needed things to be different and that led us to where we are.”
Sedam said he’s always tried to keep an open door to the staff and public, and the staff wasn’t using it.
“Department heads and staff weren’t being allowed to talk to me or the council,” he said. “I have an open door and I believe the buck stops here.”
Administrative Services Director Jenni Rosencranse says turnover among city employees in 2006 was 22 percent. In 2007 that dropped to less than five percent and currently is around the national average of 10 percent.
“Some of that turnover can be attributed to retirement and family issues,” Sedam said. “But everyone seems to be happier now and that’s what important.
“It shows how well things are going because we’ve been competing with the energy industry for employees and we’re keeping them,” he added.
Sedam said he supports the city administrator style of government.
“I believe this is the right government (for Cody), but the mayor and council need to stay involved,” he said. “When someone has a problem they don’t talk to the administrator, they want to talk to the mayor or their councilmen.
“And we need to have the information to provide them answers and help solve whatever the problem is,” he added.
Sedam said he’s thankful for the council members he’s worked with.
“I need to impress on people all the good changes haven’t been just me,” he said. “They’ve been generally supportive of the changes and we’ve worked well together.”
(Richard Reeder can be reached at richard@codyenterprise.com.)
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