Now the 490, with Gretchen de Becker, Matt Killam, and Kevin Mullin all.

Welcome in to the 419.

Powered by.

I'm Kevin Mullin and Becker.

Matt Killam it is Mayor Mario.

Yeah.

Where's the all coming from?

Are we going south?

We're going We're going to Northwood.

Okay.

And I feel like the all the think you could probably guess where it is.

What?

It's not south, right?

Northwood.

East ish.

It's actually east, which is just very fitting of northwest Ohio that we don' really understand the compass.

Yeah.

We're not going to learn No.

That's right.

It's a mess.

That's our project I heard years ago.

And this was fascinating to me that if you take the compass and tilt it to follow like north, south, east, west, Gretche and tilt it to follow the river.

Yeah, that's north Toledo, west Toledo, south Slater.

Like, it's it's it's all turned right.

I know we got four minutes to fill in the.

But but that's you not going to feel it.

It's not fascinating.

Yeah it.

Is true.

Yeah.

Well even saying the word compass was okay.

All right.

I got you.

We are going to be heading to North Ohio today talking to Mayor Ed Schimmel.

Yes.

And then we'll also have Bob Clum with Clum Brothers Excavating, a local business owner, entrepreneur.

Family business?

Yes.

Big business.

Taking down really big buildings.

Do you think you'd let us drive an excavator?

I do, well.

Hang on.

So I saw Matt behind the wheel of.

Not an excavator but I think you could have done just as much damage.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Kevin and Tata, there was a promo to some degree for for hiring for our beloved transportation agency.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Gretchen.

I don't know what we.

Do with that.

And the message was, if Matt can do it, anybody can do it.

That's right.

Yeah.

I want to see that billboard.

Yeah.

Here's the deal I did.

Okay.

You're supposed to think of the cones as children.

Right.

So one of the children suffered, you know, a we suffered a horrible.

We suffered a lot.

Horrible.

But if you were to line up all the cones.

Right, the cone that i no longer with us was the worst.

Yeah.

Talk to me about the the route.

Right.

So was it.

Set my compass down.

Okay.

Right.

And then it was.

I don't remember the dumb thing you said.

Yeah.

Yeah, I felt at the compass, bu no one would hate you so much.

So.

Yeah.

Get in line.

So, yeah, I was we wer brought on and asked to do so.

These are EV busses.

So just another knock or notch on a real leadership win for the people at Tata.

But was it easy to drive?

It was not easy to drive.

Okay.

Did you have to like did they make you parallel park it or.

Oh good lord.

No We are on the obstacle course.

It might surprise you, Kevin, but people almost never have to parallel park busses for every conceivable reason.

But just being said, it wasn't like a new test.

Yeah But we just three point turned.

You know what used to commonly seen busses do.

So it was there's a training course that they actually made simpler for us and it was still pretty difficult.

Yeah.

The usage of the mirror this is going to surprise you.

Those busses are long.

Yeah.

So the fact that I hit one cone was a miracle.

Win win.

I was with it.

There were only three cones on the entire.

Yeah.

No, I brought my own cone center in front of it.

So anyway, the great people at Tata, their training and safety lead, was incredibly patient.

But it gave you a real idea.

Yes.

Well, post the picture on our social media pages of met Behind the wheel.

I mean, impressive, you took that.

You took the chance to do it.

I was bumme I was not able to to be there.

My kids had a field tri to Fifth Third Field for the Mud Hens game, which was a blast.

And you drove them in there in the bus.

And I did not run over any kids in the process.

Okay, so the one upper.

But I did parallel park.

Yeah.

Okay.

Actually I didn't.

Oh yeah, I didn't.

All right.

When we come back, we will kick off mayor Monday, the mayor of North, Mayor Ed Schimmel, back on the 419.

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Welcome back into the 419.

The Mayor Monday edition.

And we're taking a trip to Northwood, Ohio, where we're joined now by the mayor of Northwood and Schimmel.

Thank you so much for being here.

Thanks for having me.

Welcome.

You have been the mayor for a minute and been in public service for a little bit.

Why don't you just kind of catch us up on what your your political career has looked like?

And then we'll talk about Northwood and kind of why you did this to yourself.

Sure.

Yeah.

I was on city council fo two terms, so for eight years.

And then I decided to take a chance running for mayor.

And I've been doing this for my 11th year.

You're attorney by trade?

That's right.

So that is difficult in itself.

Why bring on a second full time job, other than I'm sure that you wanted to have more praise and thanks as council people are inundated with.

Oh, sure.

But why?

Why plug in to this community in that capacity?

So there's an interesting story there.

I will decide if it's interesting.

Well, yeah.

That's true.

Opened my law office when I moved back here from southern Ohio on Woodville Road, right by where the old Woodville Mall was.

And then I partnered up with some guys out in Savannah Township.

So we had two offices Savannah Township in Northwood, and Northwood had a red light camera on the corner of our busiest intersection right by my office.

And you wouldn't believe how many people would call and say, well, I want to come meet with you guys, but you guys got that red light camera.

Northwood.

Can you meet me in the Savannah Township office?

Yeah.

And that' when I decided to run for mayor.

That's city council.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

Yeah.

What was.

I mean, you're born and raised in Northwood.

So talking to yo about childhood, kind of.

What?

That what that looked lik a little, little Eddie Schimmel run around the neighborhood called the red lights and the red light.

Yeah.

I grew up on our family farm, which is kind of in the outskirts of Northwood.

So Northwoods mainly houses, but in the middle we have some open industrial area, and on the far eastern side it's all farm ground.

So that's where I grew up.

What were you farming?

Soybeans, corn, wheat, alfalfa.

You know those staple crops in this area?

And I lived a few miles from the Woodville Mall.

So growing up, it was always begging the parent to take us down to the Woodville Mall, to go to the arcade and the movie theater and, you know, get your soft pretzel and that kind of stuff.

So that was kind of childhood.

That was Northwoods.

Downtown was the Woodville Mall.

Sure.

We talked about family.

Family.

My, you know, my parents.

My mom grew up in Toledo.

My dad grew up in Northwood.

I think I'm like the fifth generation in Northwood or Ross Township, what it was before.

And I'm married to my wife Carolyn, who's also a Northwood grad.

I have two boys who graduated from Saint John's twins, and they're attending the University of Miami.

And my daughter is a freshman at Northwood.

Okay.

I have one daughter.

Two.

Just one daughter.

Yep.

Two boys, one daughter.

I was going to say, folks, I mean, it's certainly possible that you blazed your own trail and bucked the Schimmel tradition but usually we find people that demand of themselves giving back in public service to be standin on the shoulders of their folks.

Your parents, one from Toledo, one from Northwood, where civic oriented, they wanted to make sure you plugged in.

What what drove you to giving back other than wanting to support the people that have been unjustly accused of running red lights?

Well, I went to the University of Toledo and got a degree in political science.

So it's just something that's always interested me, whether it's mainly running small government.

Sure I was always interested in that.

I did not get a focus in public administration but I really thought about it.

So I've always had that interest there.

My mother was a school teacher, third grade at Washington Local Schools, and my father, he was still a farmer.

So he farmed all those years and then just ran different businesses.

So I kind of got plugged int the entrepreneurship of things.

So is there any belief or period of time where you thought you would take over the farm and work that in that career?

Well, that's kind of my third job.

Yeah.

You still run it?

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, it's in my blood, I guess.

Yeah.

How helpful have your dad's tips been?

To do things better.

And how frequently?

How frequently you get notes or tips.

You know, he's he's pretty supportive.

Things have changed a lot in the agricultural industry.

Technology has changed a lot.

He still helps, but he mainly just, you know, runs the machine working up ground or things like that.

He lets the technical stuff brought us younger guys.

So as we move through City council, some of the things that you work with in there.

Give us sort of the upsides and some of the challenges of that relatively long term terms.

Yeah, a couple terms.

So on City Council, the first thing we really tackled was the red light cameras.

We tackled the red light van.

Northwood actually had a van that would go around in different areas and do a speed.

It was a speed van.

So that was one of the big things we dealt with.

And then after that, it was kind of the economic turmoi that everyone faced in the area.

Yeah, and Northwood was like most other governments, we had to lay people off and we had to cut our budget.

And that was not a fun time to be on city council.

What years was this?

Well, Kevin, you had a red light district van.

Is it the same?

Very similar.

Very similar.

I actually bought the old Northwood.

Yeah it was a windowless white van.

Right.

That's that's a that's a misdemeanor.

Yeah.

The good news.

The good news is half of the people on the show today are attorneys.

It might be able to help me with whatever.

I don't think, no matter how, even with their wizardry I don't think they can help you.

And they shouldn't.

Tell us a little bit about the city of Northwood government.

Is it a strong mayor?

How many council members, how many employees that that kind of stuff.

So I think total employees were maybe around 100.

If you include the fire department, the city council has seven members on that.

Who's your least favorite member of council?

Please look into the camera.

I better keep.

That seat.

Okay.

That's fine.

We can skip right over that.

Would you like to borrow Kevin's?

He has one.

Not going to say.

That's right.

You know who you are.

I slipped up on that.

Yeah, yeah.

That's okay.

No one listens to this show.

So, 100 employees, is there a is is the mayor of full time position?

Is there a city manager?

We have a city administrator.

He runs the day to day operations.

So he listens to me sometimes.

But you know Yeah, it's about how things go.

How long has he been at the helm in that role?

So Kevin came to us from Wood County.

He was down there for a long time.

So he's been with the city I think about two years.

Okay.

Yeah.

Relatively new.

Yeah, yeah.

How many residents did live in Northwood?

About 5200.

Can you give us just sort of the genera geographic outlines of the city?

So the city is bordered by Ottawa County on the far east, and then north of the city you have Oregon and then you have East Toledo.

So it's kind of half and a half there.

On the western side, you have Perrysburg Township.

On the southern side, you have some of Perrysburg Township in Lake Township.

So we have lots of neighbors.

Yeah, absolutely.

What are some of the notable businesses that people would.

Because I think it's, you know, I mean, Northwood is one of those places that I mean, it' a small, small village, right?

And so it's one of those you drive through and you may not realize that you've just driven through north.

Right.

But what are some of the the milestones or the major places people are like, oh, all right, I know where that is.

Well, first of all, I mean, because I'm pretty sure that I come to Northwood was real regularly.

The Tractor Supply store is in Northwood, correct?

We do not have a tractor supply.

There's a family farm and home that is just outsid of the Northwood limits.

Okay.

That's the one that I'm take to almost every other weekend.

But if it's not part o your district tonight, it's not just outside.

I've never liked.

I've never cared for that.

Keep going on part of the instrument.

Well, I'd.

Say the one of the big businesses that people maybe don't even know about because they're all kind of hidden back in our industrial parks would be Na Yeah, that sounds right.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah.

They were the largest employer in all.

Private employer in all of Wood County for probably 20 some years.

They make automotive parts.

So I think they're now surpassed by Amazon.

But they were.

Yeah.

Who uses but.

They'r certainly the largest employer.

And then we have a lot of places back there that people just I don't think you've residents there.

Back there, we have more employees tha come into the city of Northwood during the workday than we have residents.

Interesting.

That's allowed Northwood to really keep our income tax rate at 1.5% full reciprocity.

So if you're paying taxe where you work somewhere else, you come back and live in Northwood.

You don't pay Northwood a nickel.

We don't have any levies.

So there's no millage i the Northwood on people's homes.

From the city side.

We we don't have any trash fees.

I mean, literally only I think about 6% of Northwood residents pay any taxes to the city of Northwood.

How do you pay for everything then?

I guess all those employees coming in every day.

It really is.

It' having so many employers.

Yeah.

So then.

Is that then a priorit then of mayor and city council is then driving more businesse to come in to bring employees.

Is that keeping them.

Yeah presumably.

Yeah.

Retention.

Definitely.

Absolutely.

But it's a tough gig.

It is.

That's almost as important as attracting new.

1%.

Sure.

But that's that's been our big thing is bringing more businesses into our industrial parks because they are the real drivers of economic.

That's that's what's allowed us to keep this low income tax rate and to give so much to our community without really charging the residents a whole lot.

We're talking with the mayor of North Ohio, mayor, when you got into office.

And I guess we can talk about city council first.

But then, Mayor, what was the first kind of moment that you were like, oh, I don't know if I, I know what I signed up for.

Probably kind of right off the bat when I realized I had kind of an agenda set out that I wanted to accomplish in a short span.

And thing just take a lot longer than you anticipate especially in local government.

It's unbelievable.

Yeah.

Things don't move fast.

Do you think you know it?

But then you're in it and you're like, oh, this is what not fast means.

Exactly, exactly what?

Ville Mall project was probably the most difficult thing I've had to deal with.

The Woodville Mall was the first enclose mall in all of northwest Ohio.

I mean, Northwood was the place to go for any retail back in the late 60s, early 70s, and that place was like I had mentioned before, it was great.

We all begged our parents to take us down there because there was so much to do, and it was Northwoods downtown.

But as all the enclosed malls kind of went by by, the city was left with this structure, 900,000ft, and most o it was just plastered with hats.

Besties.

So you kind of just share it down.

You had to have specialized people come in there, and what an awful job these poor guys are in there spraying this asbesto stuff down with like, scrapers.

And then you have to bag it all and then you have to double bag it.

And the cost and the time it took was just wild.

So what is the redevelopment of that space been?

What is it now?

The city created a TIF tax increment financing district.

So the real estate taxes the new places that are going in their pay are redirected to paying down the bonds the city had to take out to put in new roads.

So we put in because the mall was our downtown, we had to put in, we thought was created downtown.

Let's put in a bowl of we put it in a rec center.

So that was about a $9 million structure we put in.

And then we found partners that are working with us to build new stuff there to recreate and re-envision that site.

So we have townhomes going in right now.

They're working on phase three.

There's going to be about 140 townhomes.

We have senior living.

They are currently building a senior living assisted living facility.

That's going to be about 140 full time residents and about 50 employees.

Jeep Federal Credit Union bought a spot there.

So we're starting we've gotten some residents coming i and we're starting to get some.

Subtraction there.

Yeah, yeah.

Good for you.

You brush past very quickly the tiff, and I think it's one of the most inventive.

Economic development tools.

Yeah.

Can you talk a little bit about what a little bit more about what the TIF does and how it benefits the cities that that put them in place in these areas?

Sure.

Yeah.

It really gives you a tool to borrow money when you go out and get bonds issued.

They want to know how you're going to pay them.

And it's hard to pay those jus right out of the general funds.

So setting up this TIF can give you a avenu to guarantee some funding coming in there and redirect money that would otherwise be going other places to help pay down the debt for the improvements on that site just where your TIF is located.

Pay those improvements.

The other thing we've done on the northern part of the property is we've put in some Cras, so things that are buil there could have a tax exemption on your real estate taxes for anywhere between a few years, up to 15 years.

So another tool to kind of drive economic development.

The mechanism for retention.

Talk to me a little bit about that.

What are the things.

It is an interesting challenge.

You have meaning.

The upside of everything you said about living in Northwood also doesn't provide you the easy or low hanging fruit, meaning we have a great school system, right?

So that will keep or keep employers there because they're interested in seeing their employees kids to school.

You don't have that.

So talk to you about the strategy and how Northwood has thi has to have a slightly different path in terms of keeping businesses there.

What does that look like?

So we have some employees that certainly help us on that side of things.

Talking with business owners.

Find out what they need.

Kevin, our administrator, goe out and talks to these places.

We used to do quite a few visits.

I haven't done as many the last couple of years just because we've.

Done their request.

No.

Yeah, yeah.

We basically just kind of had so much other stuf going on that that kind of fell by the wayside for the last little bit.

We're going to bring that back because, I mean, I just thought it was the coolest thing to go to these places.

Nor Plas, for instance, I had mentioned part of the reason they don't have as many employees is because they've automated so much.

It's just wild to go in there and see these massiv robotic arms doing so much work.

That's how people just grab my arms.

That's one of the interestin conversations.

I always think, and this is really gonna put you on the spot.

But people talk about getting jobs back.

Well, some of these jobs just don't exist.

Right, right.

Please continue down that vein.

It's always fascinating to me.

Indiscriminate of what the widget is, how it is made or how it was made, how it is mad now in the intricacies of that.

But again, that it's a great place to live.

And we'll get to that in the second segment.

But face to face tim as an intrinsic value of course.

But how do you keep selling them.

What is the what is the make up of infrastructure investment you just made?

Which certainly is a plus, but tell m some other elements of the fact how this is working for you.

So we definitely have good partners that we work with at Wood County, Northwest Water and Sewer.

They help us at all the, you know, getting water in and getting the bad stuff back out.

Yeah.

So having those partners all lined up, the Wood County Port Authority, they're they're a huge help.

It's just having a lot of different team members that you work with in conjunction to, to get businesses there and to keep them there.

We're talking with Mayor Ed Schimmel from Northwood, Ohio, here on a mayor Monday on the 419.

We're going to take a break.

When we come back we'll continue the conversation, get a little bi more of a picture of what life.

Is like.

What a typical day could or should look like in Ohio.

And then, of course, we're going to throw at him the 409 quiz and we'll see how he does.

All right.

We'll take a break.

We'll be right back on the 419.

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Welcome back into the 419 powered by.

It's a mayor Monday edition, and we're spending the day in Northwood, Ohio with Mayor Ed Schimmel.

There is.

Mayor Monday has become a sneaky favorite public offering.

People talk to me.

They stop me and say, I'v actually loved the mayor Monday.

So they asked you to quit the show, don't they?

That's right.

Yeah.

It's mostly Gretchen's mother who does a lot of drinking, so it's always fun for us.

I am also surprised how much I've enjoyed this.

One of the things that is infectious is people talking about their towns, right?

You could just live there.

And sure, some mornings you're like, I would prefer to just live here, but your bride is from Northwood.

Originally your high school classmates or you were in the high school.

We knew each other.

I mean, we weren' that close back in high school.

So this is almost a Rockwell in, I think, conversation.

And we get that with some frequency, as you can imagine, with either villages or cities.

But talk to us about your hometown that you've now made your hometown again.

What's it like to live there through your words?

Your kids live there.

Tell me why this is important.

Well, you know, it's one o those things where you grow up.

You always think, I want to move somewhere else to do something else.

And I did that.

I lived in Toledo for a few years, going to college there in law school, and then I moved down to southern Ohio when I became a lawyer, thinking, you.

Know where were you in southern Ohio?

I was down in West Union.

It's thriving.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

They got a subway there.

That's awesome.

That sandwich.

That's right.

Okay.

Yeah.

A lot of artistr there.

Yeah.

Please keep that.

So lived down there a few years.

I worked on some campaigns down there.

The gentleman I worked with was an attorney, and he was running for state representatives, so it was kind of like, oh, I can lear more about politics down here.

And I just thought, well, I don't this place doesn't fit right.

So I took the Florida bar an I was going to move to Florida.

And then I just decided I just missed home too much.

So I came back.

Like, what am I going to do with all this sun?

Right.

Yeah.

How do you if you're traveling, how do you describe Northwood to somebod who's not from northwest Ohio?

So I mean, Northwood is about only a mile wide, but I think it's like eight miles long.

So you pass through Northwood quickly when you're on I-280 or 75.

But Northwood is a kin of a rare area in our community that does have 75 and two, 82 major highways that run through it.

So that really helps us bring businesses to the city, having that connection to all these, these routes.

And that's, you know, I describe Northwood as a it's really a community with a lot of homes and good people who are know each other.

Yeah, really.

You can go around and just if I go to Meyer, I' going to know 10 or 15 people.

How do you balance that?

Right.

We have asked this with some regularity you'd probably expect.

But, you know, you are talking your grocery shopping or you're out to dinner.

You can't be a shut in, right?

Although I'm sure that does sound appealing.

Yeah.

So how do you be just head and not the mayor?

Have you found a balance yet, or you're still seeking that?

I mean, you've been in public service for a long time now.

It really doesn't bother m if people want to come up to me, you know, a football game or admire something and talk about city issues, that's okay with me and I, I enjoy talking about those issues.

And hopefully if people have question or things they don't agree with, I just try to convince them why the city is moving in the right direction.

Sometimes it works, sometimes they yeah, they still don't agree with me, but.

That's life.

But you're available, right?

And that's something.

I try to talk it out with everybody.

Yeah.

What kind of relationship.

Do you have and do you work on with.

Cities.

You talk about al the border cities that you have, but also with the county, because so much of what you do is regional and affects your what your neighbors do affect you.

So what do you do to sort of communicate with those folks?

So the other cities, other elected leaders.

Yeah.

Partnership.

What does it mean?

What does it look like?

So we have some really good people in this area that help with those sorts of things.

I think you ha Tim Pedro on here at one point.

He is.

In behind the bookshelves right now.

He's hiding here.

Yeah, okay.

He's in charge of Noma, the Northwest Ohio Mayors and Managers Association.

So they have dinners.

They have events where kind of the mayors and the city administrator get together, and we hear about what's going on, what's working, what, what our community can try that others have tried.

Another thing that we have, it's a great asset to our area is Lake Erie West Regional Council of Governments, which was Sandy Spang over there, does a great job putting together events.

And at those events we literally have caucuses where you'll have a city caucus, a village caucus, and you'll sit there and just talk with everybody in northwest Ohio and southeas Michigan about what's working.

So I think that's really been the driver, those those kinds of organizations to get everybody together.

When you sit around the table with other, you know, village mayors, what are you finding that you've all got the same pretty much the same.

Themes.

Same same issues same issues in every community.

Matt made reference to the fact that there you don't have schools.

Is there not a Northwood schools?

Oh, okay.

Yeah we have Northwood school system.

Yeah.

I thought you said something opposite of that.

No, I was just saying that, you know, one of the things about keeping employers there, the school system continuing to suppor that is, is is a nugget to keep.

We don't have that right.

So Gretchen is not a strong listener.

And it was a bad question.

Yeah.

But walk.

Us through.

One of our favorite things is if you were taking somebody through through the town, walk us through a day like that, you can't miss spots or even events or even if they were ephemeral, right?

One that's gone by.

Tell me about a walk throug a day in in your beloved town.

The first place I would definitely take somebody to is the new Northwood Rec center.

Yeah.

All right.

Talk to me about that.

We wanted to make something that had something for everybody in the community, whether it was, you know, a five year old kid coming there and having areas they could play at.

We have a the splash pad outside that we did a lot of work to tha is really popular with the kids.

And then we also wanted to have things for adults to use.

So we have workout facilities, we have a gymnasium, we have a track like a second floor track people can use, and then a lot of senior programs.

So we really wanted it to be something for everyone in the communit to meet at and to, to utilize.

I think.

You should make an adults only splash pad.

That is a good idea.

I like that.

Adults only splash pad.

Welcome to.

Yeah.

I mean, yeah, now I feel like my windowless van just.

Passed that suggestion that this woman just closed on your schools.

So getting input and serving everybody is usually the recipe for disaster.

But even.

After the rec center, what would you do?

Yeah.

I'd probabl take them over to the schools.

Yeah, yeah, we had new schools built maybe about I don't know how long it's been.

Ten years maybe.

Yeah.

And it's a really wonderful facility.

Like facilities are really, really cool too, right?

Yes.

They've done a great job over at the school district.

My wife's on the school board.

You know, I got to say that.

You do?

Yes.

They are wonderful.

Yeah, absolutely.

Everyone's talking about it, but those make a big difference, right?

Are you at the home football games on Fridays?

I probably go to.

Half of them.

Sure.

That's a lot.

Yeah.

For not having an athlete, necessarily.

That's a plug in and fun.

I enjoy them.

Sure.

Where's a great place to eat in Northwood?

So there's a new place on Woodville Road called Senior Jalapenos.

I've only been there once, but.

Some food.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

I've only been there once, but a buddy of mine been open like two weeks.

He's been there five times.

Some people are really liking the place.

Sounds like at least that guy.

Is trying to earn the title.

Mr.

Monk.

Yeah, yeah.

Senor senior.

We're talking with the mayor of Northwood, Ohio.

Digging through your bio.

You also are a you're an Eagle Scout?

Yeah, I'm sure am.

What was your project?

A building, senior elevator.

Wish.

Yeah.

Put in drainage at a par in Northwood nature trails Park.

That was our project as my project.

An interesting fact.

Both my boys are also Eagle Scouts.

That's cool.

So I help them with their projects.

Just a couple years ago.

My dad and nephews are both are all Eagle Scouts and I think it's a telltale sign of a of a good man.

Tell us a little bit about your law practice.

Where where is your law practice?

What kind of law do you practice?

So we're in an gone.

So just next door to Northwood and I do bankruptcy, probate, estate planning do a little bit of real estate.

You know, a lot of us attorneys, we do kind of anything some client calls and got a traffic citation.

I'm down there.

Municipal court dealing.

With that.

That's going.

To call you today one more time.

When you first recording your wife, did you bring up this drainage project?

Because I hear that is a real gold.

It's just.

Yeah.

People love you, right?

Yeah.

What are some of th the lessons that you learned as a, as a scout that continue to kind of translate to your political, you know, professional life.

Community service, helping everyone in the community with different things?

I think that's a big thing.

Scouts really push.

And I've always going to Saint John's, you know, hearing everything that Saint John's talks about is kind of the same things that they learned as in scouting.

Yeah, we've talked to some.

I know we're jumping around topics here.

This is sort of rapid fir as we watch the clock wind down.

But we talked a lot of the other mayors about housing and including mayor and some of the other smaller city mayors about it being really their priority, investing in the current housing stock, trying to buy other housing as you're bringing businesses into the community.

Is housing a priority for Northwood and what is what is being done on that?

It is.

And a lot of the older areas of Northwood, we created CRA overlay districts into those, and we've had some residents actually take down a house or two and build a house there and have no taxes for quite some time.

So I think that has helped a bit at the enclave.

That's what we call the old Woodville Mall area.

We created the tips, as I mentioned, and we went out and we found developers to come in there because it just seems like, you know, what comes first.

Do you have a commercial downtown building going up or do you have housing in it?

I think you need to have the housing first.

So you have the traffic coming through there.

For anybody to want to build an office building or things of that nature.

What's what's your dream for?

For Northwood.

You know, before the end of your next term.

So we're I'm reall trying to get done is more work on the old Woodville Mall side.

Yeah.

If we could get a senior living done, which it's going up right now, it's going vertical with those 50 employees, those 140 or so residents and all of their family members coming in and out.

It's going to have so muc traffic down our downtown road.

I want to see that that build up.

That's great That is my vision for that area.

And I think that's going to be good for the whole communit because we need that downtown.

Northwood was founded in the early 60s, and they didn't have downtowns then, just like Oregon's trying to do the same thing.

They were found about the same time as Northwood.

And to not have your, you know, typical downtow in a city, it's kind of rough.

So that's been our vision this whole time.

All right.

All right.

Transition into some real buffoonery.

There's no patience.

This isn't awkward at all.

This is what our show is defined on, which might also be awkward.

It's now time for.

You guys are totally off today.

Yeah, we're doing it Doing the best we can.

Gretchen.

All right, I'm going to ask for rapid fire questions.

Gretchen's going to ask you t describe Northwood in one word.

And then you and Matt are going to list off the nine best things in Northwood.

Okay.

Question number one.

What is your dream house look like?

Dream house, probably a boat.

Okay, I like that.

If you were staring at stranded on a desert island, which two thing would you want to take with you?

Oh, geez.

A monopoly board game.

And.

Well, that would take up the rest of your life.

Yeah, exactly.

You never kno you were stranded.

Yeah, right.

And maybe a water filtration system.

Okay, there's the Eagle Scout.

That's right.

Yes, that.

Is good.

If you could teach any subjec in school, what would you teach?

History.

Government.

All right.

Final question.

What are some what what's a phobia?

That you have something you're afraid of?

Germs, I suppose.

All right.

You're going to want to drive.

Amelia.

Urgent care.

For.

The one word you would use t describe the city of Northwood?

Opportunity.

Good.

All right.

This is the most challenging part.

We know what?

Number nine is.

I won't let you blow that, but let's go through eight.

Okay.

Your favorite things about your beloved city.

I would say number one would be my family.

Yep.

All right.

So that's actually going to be for answers, right?

Yep.

You've got we got you got twins and a daughter.

So now you're blazing throug this.

I'm blazing.

Keep going.

Yep.

I think, you know, anothe big thing would be our people.

Your people love it.

Yep.

My coworkers on city council.

Yes.

They are like the drivers of ideas in our community.

Except for the one.

Yeah.

Except for that one.

Yeah.

Keep going.

The schools.

The schools.

Because they really do bring the community together.

There are identity.

100%.

Our parks.

Yep.

We have some fantastic parks in the city.

What's your favorite part?

Nature trails?

Probably.

Yes.

That's kind of a more laid back.

To the trees.

And.

Yes.

Yep.

I have some expertis in that space, and it is great.

I know you do.

Yeah.

All right.

Brother goes out strong here.

What's your last favorite?

What's your name?

Carolyn.

Love it.

There you go.

There you go.

Nine.

Mayor.

All right.

Mayor.

As part of mayor Monday, we also the mayor's help us bring on other great people doing good work in the community.

No one is available.

So you brought this guy.

After the break, we're going to talk with Bob plumb with Club Brothers Excavating.

Why?

Why did you want to bring Bob on the program?

Well, they do some good work in our entire northwest Ohio, taking down structures.

Northwoods had a lot of experience and having to take down structures, so I think he's got some good insight into those types of projects in our area.

Awesome.

All right.

Mayor, thank you so much for joining us.

Thanks.

You're on a mayor Monday on the 419.

We'll take a break.

We come back, we'll be joine by Bob glum from Club Brothers Excavating here on the 419 powered by wheat.

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Welcome back into the 419 powered by E!

We're joined now by Bob Clu with Clum Brothers Excavating.

And I know where this is going because one of my co-hosts, Matt.

No.

No, it is not.

Matt.

I won't say which one it is, but it is not mad.

This is the type of person that didn't realize that when we had Brian Wilson, that was an actual person's name.

And when Bob Clum with Clum Brothers, you do know that's where the name came from.

I do know that.

And I want to know if there's really a brother.

There is a brother.

My younger brother, Ron and started the business in 19.

89.

And so who is your parents favorite?

Depends what day of the week it is.

That is an absolute true.

That is a fact.

Your brother and you always got along.

I mean, family businesses are tough.

When we first started out, we would be.

Scrapping in people's front yards.

Yeah, sure.

And it was all a matter.

Of.

Evolving into defining.

Whose role was what.

That's right.

In building a. Business coupled with a ton of stress.

I mean, you're figuring out who you are as people and also figuring out what the business is righ in the market fluctuates a bit.

And our business is evolved over the years.

We started.

Off.

With two push mower in the back of a pickup truck, mowing lots in a mobile home park.

Yeah.

And just kept.

Growing and growing.

Do you wish you could go back to that sometimes?

No, no.

Back up a little bit and talk about the actual company and and what it is and what what it what you do now.

Currently we employ about 120 people were broken into four divisions at the excavating demolition side.

We also have a waste side, a heavy trucking side, and the the original landscape company.

That is kind of a catch all for everything else.

Where did this.

Kind of.

Entrepreneurship bug come from for you guys to go?

You know, I mean, you say it started with a couple of push mowers, right?

I mean, is that was that the first job that you were out cutting neighbors lawns.

And getting out of law in high school?

I would mo neighbors lawns.

Yeah, I went to Saint Francis.

So my parents expectation was we sent our kid to a college prep school.

He's going to go to college.

And after about two months there, I realized.

That.

Wasn't wasn't my path.

Sure.

And so it became a bit of a proving game, proved that we could do something without the higher education necessarily.

And it used that as a tool to propel.

Yeah, incentives.

But your folks know they are salt of the earth people.

They are to describe them a little bit because although you did blaze your own trail, I'm sure you stood a little bit of the.

Parents were as middle class as middle gets factory work.

Yeah.

And very traditional values.

Where did you grew up?

In town, in the Reynolds Corners area.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah.

And is it just you and your brother?

Yes.

Okay.

So why would someone call your company?

Why would they?

What would someone need you to do that they would give you a call.

It's actually a broad base.

So in the trash division, it's for not so much like in the city of Toledo.

But when you get into the townships, it's individual subscription for weekly trash pickup or commercial trash pickup.

But demolition is our mainstay.

So it's anythin from a residential structure to we put it on some of the bigger buildings in town.

Riverside Hospital we've done a lot of demolitio at University of Toledo, Bgsu.

Every day we're wrecking something.

Talk to me about this process because I. Me too.

But not by.

That is also in the demolition business.

That's right.

Talking about so taking dow a structure like what is that?

What's that process.

Right.

I mean, because obviousl I've seen videos on YouTube of this building imploding on itself, but that's not I mean, that's not doesn't happen.

Is not a great candidate for implosion.

Dynamite.

Yeah.

It's typically all mechanical where you're reaching u with an excavator with a tool of one sort or another.

Do you think that is a goo campaign slogan for the mayor?

Not designed for implosion, right?

Yeah, well, I'll write it down just in case.

Those yard signs.

Those are gonna look great.

Please keep it going.

Forgive me.

Demolition.

And I know that this was teed up in Northwood in particular the work there that you've done.

Knocking stuff down is certainly to some degree fun.

But you are also part of the rebirth of things as well, right?

It doesn't get it doesn't happen if the club brothers don't do their job first.

There's got to be pride in that.

There is.

Talk to me about that.

One of the things that we take a great deal of pride in is our level of recycle.

In the demolition industry, we have mobile concrete crushers.

And so one of the things we like to do is we tear down a building, will crush all the block brick foundations, footings, everything, reincorporate that material as the aggregate for the new building pad.

Oh, that's so good.

And what that does is it mitigates truckin all that material to a landfill, then importing new material.

So it's enjoyable to watch an old building become the.

Literal foundation.

Right.

The subgrade for a new building.

Yeah.

This this this business i so it seems to me much involved with really heavy equipment, very expensive machinery.

How did you figure out how to finance all of these huge pieces of machinery?

And I mean, that's.

That's a lot of lawns undertaking.

It was.

A lot of lawns.

And we started out wit some of the most horrific junk, worn out equipment.

That's how I just grabbed these gear.

And I'm just on my own out here.

So we would buy worn out bulldozer and start doing grading jobs and ru it till it would run no longer.

But that would give you enough seed money to springboard into a later model on and eventuall into newer equipment, which now we run the latest and greatest from altitude of reasons.

It's a lot easier to retain and attract employees if they're in something a condition, climate control and running flawlessly versus something rickety.

I mean, you are obviously on the top of the food chain, but talk to us a little bi about stuff that you still enjoy on the more granular day to day level.

I mean, Gretchen just mentioned this as a child.

I was always fascinated by heavy equipment.

Do you still like to look?

I do.

Fortunately, I am the worst equipment operator within my company simply because I don't get the day to day opportunity to run it.

I can, I can pretend, and but.

It's just cool to have.

Yeah.

I mean, I've got a very talented crew and there's no point in me trying to.

You it.

Yeah, but so what what are the things that you still occasionally I mean it's a lonely spot on top right.

The advantages are obvious but the disadvantages are not intuitive to most know.

I get stuck in the office more than I like to.

I bet I do enjoy spending time out on the job sites and mingling with customers.

Yeah, I mean, that's one of the most enjoyable parts of owning a business is the tim to get to spend with customers.

You can't say that you work in Northwood, so we'll let you off the hook a little bit there.

But talk to me a little bit about some of the favorite things of yours.

I know there's probably a laundry list you've been at since, you know, 89, 90.

So tell me about some of the things that you've been the most proud of or most excited about.

You can't say the Northwood one.

No.

So we'll give you we'll give you that.

There's been some very memorable projects and we really liked the old Riverside Hospital.

Yeah, it was a big, robustly built building.

Yeah, I'm down there now every day.

It was challenging to get down and we liked that challenge.

We did the parking garages at the University of Toledo.

Yeah, that was.

A lot of cement.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

B.G.

we turn down administration building, and we were literally working on a postage stamp next to the honors dorm, where they didn't want a lot of noise and commotion because you were coming into finals week.

So, yeah, we finally got back at those snobs.

Yeah, yeah.

Tell me, you know, you day one, you know, when you're looking at a site or taking on a job, is there literally anything that is too big now for yo or anything that you know that?

What is the fundamental start of a demolition project of this scale look like?

The first thing we assess i how do you safely get this down?

The last thing you want is somebody getting hurt.

And so when you get into a challenging situation where something and it never fails, somebody wants a building that's this tall and there's a building this tall next to it.

Because how do you and I equate a lot of the decisions I make, like the shell pawn stars?

Okay.

How are we gonna do this?

We're going to call them an expert.

Yeah, right.

We'll work with other contractors who can assist us in protecting this building and safely getting this one down.

And so that's what we look at first is how do we mitigate collateral damage when tearing something down.

When.

You're driving around town?

I mean, are you when you see a building are you already thinking.

About.

Like, if I had to take that down, this is I. Find mysel sitting in auditoriums and stuff looking up, saying, wow, this is not that.

I could have this down 20 minutes.

I question that.

That's the opposite.

Have you ever been asked to take something down that you didn't want to, that you thought should be saved.

To rare?

Good question.

From a like a historical.

Or any reason for any reason like hey, this could be used as something.

Not really people inside this building.

Typically there winds u being a lot of public sentiment if you're going to take down cornerstone of of the community.

But buildings do hit a useful life and you can throw good money after bad.

And no matter what you do, it's not going to resurrect it.

That's right.

And a lot of it has to do with you start a lot of the larger buildings we've taken down were WPA projects, Work Progress Administration, and two things must have been very cheap then labor and concrete, because they were built like bomb shelters, but unfortunately they weren't built to accommodate air conditioning internet right into, oddly enough, t retrofit these older buildings to modern standards, cos more than to demolish, rebuild.

This may be the dumbest question you've ever heard.

It will be good.

When you are driving by an you see something coming down.

Why are they spraying water on it?

Dust suppression?

So you don't want that?

I thought it was for something for fire related.

Nothing to do with fire.

It's to.

Fire for a building coming down.

It's to control the dust.

Going into the other areas.

I mean.

That's not the dumbest question.

No.

Okay.

Thanks, Bob.

Well, she's not yet, Bob.

All right.

We've got five strong minutes left.

Then what would be the dumbest question if that wasn't your dumb question, I'm going to up it.

You talked about.

From a. Technological.

Perspective, some of the.

Advances, but.

Really focused on more comfort.

You talked about you know, some of the vehicles.

Having.

Air conditioning and some of those things.

But talk to me about the role that technology has played in, in your business in the time that you've been in it.

And I'm.

Curious if you guys do anything with AI, is there.

Not much with AI?

But we're incorporating a lot of technology currently with using drones, actually.

Interesting.

If you call and say, hey, I have this monster stockpile of soi I need to remove from the site, you call three contractors, one's going to tell you you've got 40,000 yards.

One's going to tell you got 50, one's going to tell, you got 80.

And so what we like to do is we go out and we say, we're going to put this drone in here quick.

Topol of it.

We can tell you within the cubic fee how many yards of dirt they are.

And this is the cost to remove it.

And it builds a lot of confidence with the customer that okay, now I know accuracy, what I have her and what it's going to take to.

To everything in your home and car in a specific place.

Are you an absolute neat freak to all those corners?

Have my desk looks.

There's stuff piled everywhere.

Like bringing a wrecker in.

Yeah, yeah, just hold it down with water.

And air controller who has a desk next to me.

His is.

Yeah.

In the.

Still have the decks.

That's next to you?

Yeah, well, we set about ten feet apart.

But if you look at my desk and look at his.

It's two.

He doesn't probably doesn't do any real work.

So he doesn't have any left.

What is he.

Yeah, sure.

Why was it important going back to what you said before?

Why was it important for you to invest the time and money in repurposing some of that cement that you were taking down?

Were you?

Is it is it purely cost savings?

Was it.

Do you have an environmental concerns?

It's both.

It's we can provide tremendous cost saving value.

And secondly, it there's no point in filling landfills with a reusable product.

You know, we view broken u concrete broken up that we view that more as a raw material than a than a waste.

Do you have the abilit to sell that?

Yes.

Other people.

We sell it.

Who else uses it?

Like all of the asphalt we grind.

And it's super popular for rural driveways where you're in the country.

You put down a stone driveway, and every time the wind blows dust where the asphalt tends to bond back together, attack AFIs.

It's so interesting.

And so.

You must have learned so much.

I mean, all the hard way.

Yeah, sure.

What?

Learning is learning.

You don't have to.

Yeah.

If as long as you learn, who cares how you got there?

Go ahead.

I'm sorry.

Talk about building.

Buildin a business is one thing, right?

Building a community.

Building a home is another.

What?

Outside of work?

Right outside of excavation.

What are some of the community projects that Clum Brothers have been involved in, or that you and your brother.

Just.

Personally are involved in the care about?

We.

Well, I wind up gettin involved in some local politics.

I'm currently a trustee in Springfield Township.

I've served as a trustee in Spencer Township.

I'm on a community improvement corporation.

I do like getting involved in the small level government just to add a construction perspective.

Sure, a lot of time you have people with very strong administrative backgrounds but maybe not the nuts and bolts of what we're putting together.

That is, I don't want to blow by that.

Having an idea of how things work in the actual cost of things is not just helpful for the taxpaye and the people who you volunteer your time for but other administrators, right?

Everyone can play an important role, but the idea of cost and you live this every day.

I we are a part of multitude of projects from the Metropark perspective and at face value.

If I wasn't involved in them, I would not believe how expensive they are, and that's only been increasing in the last five years.

So having that knowledge and having not true see each other things are not, you know, untruths or lie, certainly, but providing context and a practical approach to that is saving people real money.

So you must be very proud of that.

So I mean, I'm able to, through trial and error over decades.

If I look at a project, here's a potential pitfall where this could get expensive if it's behind door number two, is this is not what we're assuming it is.

That's what happens a lot of times in municipal projects are the hidden cost, and they've got a projected budget.

And because it's no being assessed properly.

Yeah.

And when you find an unforeseen anything it can it can be a curveball.

Yes, sir.

What's something you like to do for fun when you're not working?

Where do you watch some favorite restaurants that place you like to do in your leisure time?

I'm an auction junkie.

Okay.

I go to heavy equipment auctions.

Who doesn't.

Look familiar?

For some reason that is what I find enjoyable.

Yeah, but I enjoy spending time with my daughters.

We have two daughter that both work in the business.

Cool.

How old are they?

27 and 29.

Are they going to take over?

Do you think?

Potentially.

Yes.

We'll see.

Yeah.

You got to do a rebrand.

Yeah.

It's got to become the club sisters.

Well, we've already got some.

Some of the branding seems lik it's leaning into the feminine.

I love it.

All right.

Awesome.

Bob plant brothers excavating.

Thank you so much for joining us.

If people want more information on your business, where can they find it?

Com.

Awesome.

Thank you so much.

We're going to take a break.

When we come back, we'll wrap up thi Mayor Monday edition of the 419.

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Welcome back into the 419 Powered by.

As we wrap up, mayor Monday edition of the 419.

I know we say it every time, but it's like, this is just such an enjoyable way to to meet and visit other communities across northwest Ohi and to see them through the eyes of of the mayor, who is inevitabl one of the greatest cheerleaders that every community will have.

I, and I cannot believ the treacherous supply store is on Northwood.

Yeah.

We all did that learning today.

That's all we can do.

That's all we can do.

The boundary.

I mean, but this is one of those, like one of the questions that Gretchen asks.

There's a few of them that are consistent with Mayor Monday, but like, what's the geographic boundaries of your community?

And I did not realize, an I've been to Northwood, right.

I mean, I worked out at Stritch.

I was on the Eastern Mommy Bay Chamber of Commerce board, which covers Northwood.

I didn't realize it's only mile wide and eight miles long.

Right I mean, that is a weird shape.

It's an unusual community.

I haven't been on the positive.

And the upsides and downsides were kind of walked through with the mirror.

I thought it was interesting.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I spent I mean, obviously I think my interactions mostly are i like the business part, right.

That there's, you know, hot printing is out there in North Hollywood.

I didn't know that th all of the alcohol distributors and not all of them, but like NWO and true House are all out there in Northwood, Buckeye broadband.

Why are you at the alcoho distributor so much protesting?

You know, I used to own a fire truck that serves beer.

Gretchen.

Yeah, I'll do it.

And then Bob plumb.

He's a gem.

Yeah.

It's again, we've got so many great businesses in northwest Ohio.

We've had the folks in Family Business Center on talking about the challenges of a family business.

And and I can't imagine working full time.

I love my brothers, but I cannot imagine working full time with any of them.

I love the fact that I was doing the free time.

You reluctantly said, I like to go to auction for big big.

Yeah, that' exactly what I want you to say.

You're seven.

You love you, man.

It's great.

Yeah.

Totally.

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