Michael Van Milligen

Over decade, Van Milligen finds his way

by BRIAN COOPER
Ten years ago, on his first day as Dubuque city manager, Michael Van Milligen showed up a little late for work.
He drove past city hall on his first pass. (Eventually, city hall received signage indicating it as such.)
Since his arrival in January 1993, however, Van Milligen has not missed much.
From the start, he focused on restoring public trust in a city government rocked by financial scandal and helping Dubuque distance itself economically from a particularly difficult decade. He is credited for his role in achieving that - as well as other accomplishments.
Last month, as he approached his 10th anniversary as city manager, Van Milligen met with the TH for an extended visit. Following are excerpts.
TH: Early on, you shadowed city employees in several different jobs. I think you were tossing garbage in the back of a truck. You were spreading asphalt with some of the guys. Why did you do that and what did you learn from that experience?
MVM: For about the first five years I worked here, every month I took a day and worked with a different employee. I thought no better way to learn about our job that we have to do here than to work with the front-line people.
Being new to Dubuque, I wanted the employees to get to know me. It was one of the best experiences in my life because I met a lot of good people and I did make a lot of nice connections and some friendships out of that.
TH: Were there things that you learned that directly affected decisions you made or information you had when you had to go back and evaluate budgets or work with department heads?
MVM: Well, I have a management philosophy that's really pretty simple. I think that we need to be three things: We need to be problem solvers. We need to develop partnerships. And we need to be input oriented.
I think the two best places to get that input are from our customers and from our front-line employees. So what that experience helped me with is it reaffirmed that belief in my mind, that there's no better person to help us figure out how to do things better than our customers that are getting the service and our employees who are on the front line delivering it.
We've tried to implement that in the 10 years I've been here through a lot of different processes. We have work teams. We have departmental reviews, which involve departmental employees. I really feel good that we've been able to accomplish that.
TH: How did those guiding principles evolve? How did they become part of Mike Van Milligen's management style?
MVM: Obviously, I didn't make those principles up. People probably used those kinds of things in organizations all across the country. But I have to admit that I selected those three as my core principles and I believe you really keep things simple.
Sure, it would be easy to come up with a two- or three-page list of wonderful euphemisms that are great management things. But I know that it's really all about people. If you've got just some basic principles that you can work with and have good people to implement those principles, you're going to be successful.
TH: In one article, you credited your dad as being a model of management. What line of work was your dad in?
MVM: My dad was a controller, an accountant, for a corporation in Chicago, but he worked himself up from the bottom. He didn't have a college degree. Both he and my mom served in the South Pacific during World War II. That's where they met. Got out, got married, ended up having six kids.
My dad didn't have time to go to college. He did one semester at Northwestern University and got straight A's, so I know he would have done well. He started out as an accountant in a firm and stayed with that firm his entire career. Through buyouts, it ended up being a French company.
He really believed in two things. If you have a good attitude and you work hard, you're going to be successful. I've never forgotten it and I believe it and it worked for him and what limited success I've had in my life from a career perspective, I credit to that, too.
TH: If I were to ask somebody in City Hall - and got them aside and out of ear shot of you - and said, "OK, what's Mike's management style?" what do you think they would say?
MVM: Well, I hope it's exemplified by something I still do.
I told you for the first five years I took one day a month and worked with a different employee. But one of the things I'm still able to do is once a month, we have employee coffee, where you have 10 employees up here for an hour. We just have coffee and doughnuts. It's informal. We usually don't talk business, but if somebody wants to talk business, I will. It's usually getting to know each other, to know that we're all in this together.
I hope that exemplifies my management style - that I believe in people and I care about people. I know that's the only key to our success. I mean, we can have all the buildings or all the equipment or all the ideas or whatever we want to have, but it's all about people.
TH: You've got a reputation for being a pretty calm, level-headed guy. If something is going to set you off, what is it likely to be?
MVM: I really have a need to have a good understanding of how things are working. I don't do very well with just taking things on faith.
If somebody's presenting a concept or an idea to me or working on a project, it's very important to me that I understand all the details of it.
So if somebody were to suggest that I don't really need to know that, obviously they've already gone through that work, that would bother me.
I don't think it makes people feel uncomfortable once they get used to that, knowing that when they come in my office that I'm going to ask a lot of questions and they're going to be very probing. If a person were to be put off by that, that would bother me.
TH: I understand you can maintain a lot of those facts. That you've got good recall on all that.
MVM: I feel like I've got a pretty good memory, but I have to admit there are some days where it just gets overwhelming and you start to lose track. But I've got some great people surrounding me to help me get back on track if that happens.
TH: You mentioned earlier, in talking about your guiding principles, developing partnerships. How would you describe the collaborative relationship between Greater Dubuque Development, the Chamber and the City?
MVM: Well, you know, the council each year sets five-year goals. This year, they placed in their goals the development of partnerships because they realize the importance of it. I feel great about it because then that makes me feel more comfortable as we work on those partnerships.
I actually had a chance to think a lot about that (Greater Dubuque Development) relationship recently because, of course, they went through the River Valley Initiative, their effort to raise $2 million to spend over the next five years in creating jobs in our community and new investment.
As part of that, there was an interview process with community people about the Greater Dubuque Development Corp. That corporation, for me, is the catalyst in a chemical reaction that's happening in this community that's needed. You can have all the right chemicals for something to happen, but if you don't have the catalyst, nothing's going to happen with those chemicals. And Greater Dubuque Development Corp. has served that role. They're unique. They were formed in the 1980s, where 20 to 30 business leaders in town got together and said, :We need to form this organization to diversify our economy because 15 percent unemployment is not what we're willing to accept."
The development corporation has, I think, been very successful in the last 15 plus years being a positive force in that. I'm personally proud to serve on their board.
TH: Now you, personally, in your city manager role, worked with Rick Dickinson and some of his folks on some major projects. My understanding is through that, you and Rick have developed a personal friendship. How important is somebody like Rick Dickinson to a community like Dubuque?
MVM: Well, I told Rick before that I consider him to be one of my best friends, we've developed that close of a relationship. He takes my boys duck hunting. He's just an important part of my personal life. I think a lot of that man.
But Rick is a very positive force in our community. He has a tremendous talent to stay connected with people. Part of that talent is he's tireless at doing it. I always kid him that he has a telephone growing out of his ear. He is constantly on the phone, staying connected with people, just in case they need help or there's something cooking or an idea germinating. He's really been an asset to our community.
TH: Another piece of that collaboration, among several, is the Chamber of Commerce. The chamber is undergoing some leadership changes. What are your hopes and expectations for the chamber's role in the collaboration with the City and GDDC?
MVM: Well, I can tell you I greatly enjoyed working with Steve Horman over the last 10 years. Of course, now they've brought Steward Sandstrom and I'm very impressed with him. The chamber's a good partner. They are very focused on transportation issues for us. That's important. There's actually a chamber employee, Dan Walsh, at every Iowa Department of Transportation Commission meeting, every month. I think that's a big commitment. So, they always have their pulse on exactly what's happening.
But, you look at the part of the partnership they were in the America's River Project. That was huge, to help us develop community support for that project. We've got a good Chamber.
TH: Could or should the city government do more collaboration with county government and the school district?
MVM: I can tell you that statewide, we're held up as a model, our relationships with the county. People can't believe it when they hear about how city and county government get along in Dubuque County.
Let's remember, the county donated over 200 acres of land to one of our industrial parks because they realized the importance of economic development and saw that we were moving ahead and they were willing to be partners in that. They are big partners in the America's River Project. So I think we're the envy of the state as far as our partnership with the county.
The school district, we've been developing better partnerships all along. Even though a lot of those partnerships existed when I came 10 years ago, the mayor and city council have caused that to blossom. For instance, we put play equipment at some of the school buildings so that the neighborhoods will have a park and the school district will have play equipment for the kids in the school.
We sponsor the after-school programming at the low- and moderate-income schools through Gil Spence and our Leisure Services Department.
The mayor and city council voted unanimously to support the local option sales tax vote in December.
We annually have a meeting with all of our state legislators. The mayor and council said, "You know what? It's not going to be just the city meeting with our legislators; let's invite the county board of supervisors and let's invite the school board; not only the public schools, but also the parochial school board attends.
So, we think we're doing good on partnerships, but we're always open to new ideas.
TH: I want to ask you about city priorities, current priorities. After telecommunications, two of the top three priorities that the city identified are America's River and storm water management.
Some, I think, see a dichotomy, where there's a lot going on with America's River, lots of money pouring into that. Meanwhile, certain neighborhoods are most unhappy because they're experiencing floodwater damage. The money and maybe even the energy toward getting that fixed isn't coming as quickly.
How is it happening that you seem to have money for America's River and that investment, but the storm water project and those options are moving at a more deliberate pace?
MVM: Well, I think people understand that it's all part of a puzzle. For instance, the economic development part, where the city is developing the five industrial parks. The downtown development efforts where you see what's happened with the lower Main area and how that's been redeveloped with the city as a partner. The neighborhood reinvestment, in the street program, in the community-oriented policing program.
Riverfront development, like the America's River Project. The state told us, "City of Dubuque, if you're willing to pony up a certain level of money, we're willing to put in $40 million. If you're not willing to, we're not willing to." So we saw that as an opportunity to leverage $40 million of outside dollars for this $188 million project.
TH: And you needed to do that right away?
MVM: It was a timing issue. They were going to be distributing the money. We were either going to be in line for the distribution or we weren't. It's not that you can just wait until some other time. Of course, it was especially important to the museum because if they didn't have that state grant, that project would have gone ahead but at a much, much smaller level.
But that doesn't mean that stormwater management isn't important. The method that I recommended to the city council is a user fee, just like the water fee, just like the sewer fee, just like the refuse fee, where people pay for the service they get. In this case, people pay for the amount they contribute to the problem. So my suggestion was that based on your impermeable surface on your property, which then makes water run off onto somebody else's property, that you pay your fair share. I think it's an equitable way to fund it.
We do have a citizen's action committee right now that's studying how to recommend to the city council implementing that stormwater utility fee.
I guess it has been deliberate, but it's important that it be that because the technical information had to be available first, which was the study of, "Sure we know there's a problem, but how do you solve it?" It took us a couple of years to get that information. We have that now.
Now, how do we fund it? I think a user's fee is equitable.
TH: You're a member of the Dubuque Racing Association board and, I think, the executive committee, too.
MVM: Yes, I am.
TH: According to the financials, the slot machines at the dog track are really what's keeping the dog track open. The pari-mutuel side of the house is in the red, but the slots are offsetting that. Do you see that changing? Do you see pari-mutuel being able to carry its own?
MVM: I think the dog racing loses, if my memory serves me correctly, about $2 million to $3 million a year. I don't see that changing. That would be wonderful if the market changed, where people got more interested in that and wanted to support it more. But I don't see that happening now.
TH: The pari-mutuel would have to continue, though, for the license.
MVM: Yes. The state law requires that we have dog racing, so even though it loses $2 million to $3 million a year, in order to operate the facility, it has to exist.
TH: The DRA also has a relationship with the Diamond Jo Casino operation. There have been times where the Diamond Jo and the city haven't see eye-to-eye. Land acquisitions and leases and some of those issues have come up. Grandstand construction and so on. How would your describe the relationship between the Diamond Jo and the DRA?
MVM: I think they have a good working relationship. State law requires the Diamond Jo to have the Dubuque Racing Association as a not-for-profit partner in order to have their license to operate. Obviously, in many ways, they're competitors. But they also see the mutual interest that they have. I think they have a good relationship.
As a matter of fact, the city's in negotiations now with the Diamond Jo about some leases on some parking down in their facility. Those are going very well. I know that the Diamond Jo and the Dubuque Racing Association have constant discussions and I think they're healthy discussions. But, you know, when you're a competitor, there's also that competitive nature, so it's not perfect, but it's good.
TH: Is the City of Dubuque deriving a fair share of the proceeds from Diamond Jo?
MVM: Well, we have a different relationship with Dubuque Greyhound Park & Casino through the DRA than we do with The Diamond Jo. The city owns the Dubuque Greyhound Park & Casino and the not-for-profit Dubuque Racing Association has a mission of helping the city and helping charities and they fulfill that mission very well. The Diamond Jo is a private business. They pay their taxes and they pay their 50 cents per person head tax.
The kind of disagreement we had was the fact that the city had built all the parking down and had said, "Yes, you can use it to park in," but had never committed to doing that without any remuneration, so now the city has asked for lease payments for that use. Initially, I think the Diamond Jo was very receptive to that, but that's changed and we're have some fruitful discussions now.
TH: So things are moving a little more positively?
MVM: Very much so.
TH: Does that mean that maybe someday we'll have some outdoor concerts on the grandstand?
MVM: Well, I expect them to be building some grandstand facilities (this) year, but they're looking at options. Originally, they had talked about the city-owned land near the Portside, but they also own some land in the Port of Dubuque area, other than the parking lot that they have. I think they're looking to see would that be a better venue for them, so they're looking at all their options.
TH: When you got this job 10 years ago, I think nobody in Dubuque realized that in a way the community was getting a package deal with your wife Nancy. She's had leadership roles for the Iowa Foster Care Review Board and more recently the Iowa Empowerment Board. She also is helping Sister Catherine (Dunn) over there at Clarke. How is that you two can keep such high profiles and active in community and run a pretty busy household?
MVM: Well, I tell you the best day in my life was the day that my wife said yes when I asked her to marry me. It's been nothing but a wild ride and fun since then.
Nancy, since we've come to Iowa, she's been the chairperson of the Iowa Commission on Volunteer Service. She was originally appointed by Gov. Branstad and reappointed by Gov. Vilsack. She now is the chairperson of the statewide empowerment board. She's been involved in the Iowa Citizen's Foster Care Review Board here; as a matter of fact, set up the system in 16 eastern Iowa counties over a five-year period.
She loves working at Clarke College, a great educational institution. She loves Dubuque and she loves Iowa and, of course, that makes my life a lot easier because I do also. It's a great place to raise a family. We have five children. All of our kids have done very well Dubuque.
TH: Nancy has had leadership with the Foster Care Review Board. She goes beyond, or you folks go beyond just talking about it. You have actually been foster parents in the past.
MVM: Yes. Before we came to Iowa, we were foster parents in Illinois. We had numerous foster children that lived with us over the years. Some lived with us for as long as four years. They become important parts of your family.
The nice thing is we've been able to stay connected with some of our foster children.
TH: I understand that you sort of reconnected with one of your foster children more recently.
MVM: Yes. We have one of our former foster daughters. Her name is Miracle. A wonderful person who lived with us for almost four years when we were in Illinois.
She's now married and has two little children, a 15-month old, Angel, and 5-month old, Harmony. They are going to be living with us for several months. Her husband is joining the Air Force and while he's in basic training and then specialized training, she just needed a place to land. Then he's going to get family housing and she'll be moving back with him. But we were thrilled when we got that phone call because it's just exciting to be part of somebody's life like that, when they're just starting out and have the little children running around the house, so we're really enjoying it.
TH: Some husbands wouldn't be all that excited about that scenario.
MVM: Well, I have to admit, a lot of the things I get involved with at home is just kind of riding along with my wife as the driver, but this is so personally rewarding, I'm just thrilled to be a part of it.
TH: Another guest you've had in your home, I believe this last school year, you actually had a descendant of Julien Dubuque living in your home.
MVM: Yes.
TH: How did that come about?
MVM: Well, we got a contact from a counselor, who's our neighbor - Karen Zeckser from Wahlert - who said that a young lady was going to be a senior at Wahlert needed a place to live for a year and her name was Audrey Dubuc, a descendant of Julien Dubuque and she was from Quebec, Canada. So, we jumped at the chance. She lived with us for the whole year and it was everything we could have imagined. Audrey and our daughter, Mary, who are the same age, became best of friends. Of course now she's moved back to Quebec and we went there this summer for a week's visit at her father's invitation.
That created another connection, which was at the urging of Jerry Enzler, with Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, Canada, which was the birthplace of Julien Dubuque. Since then, their mayor and 35 people from their community came and visited us a few weeks ago and are looking at developing a sister city relationship.
TH: Looking back over your first decade as city manager, what would you consider to be your top accomplishments?
MVM: Well, one of the things I'm most proud of is the strong working relationship I have with Mayor Duggan and the city council. We have some just fabulous people in those elected positions and they're a lot of fun to work with and for. I'd say that's the thing I'm most proud of.
I also am glad that as we've implemented the city council priorities that we've been able to work closely with the neighborhoods.
You know, it's easy to talk about some of the glitzy things that happen, like a new company that you're partnered with, for them to locate here and create some jobs, but there are a lot of things in the neighborhoods that you need to be doing, like our community-oriented policing program; like the $7 million the city has invested in the park systems; like the street program, going from spending $2 million a year on the street program to $7 million a year on the street program; like the "Dreams" program through the housing program where we took 30 abandoned homes and redeveloped them into properties that now low and moderate income homeowners have purchased and live in and what that's done for a neighborhood.
Those are the kinds of things I feel best about.
TH: On the flip side, what are things that, "I wish I had it to do over again because it didn't turn out the way I would have liked?" What would be the flip side of that?
MVM: Well, I don't know if I'd say things didn't turn out the way I'd like. I think we've been involved in a lot of exciting projects that have had good results.
My greatest frustration, I think, would be in the transportation area. The dollars are so big, so it's so difficult to put the projects together and it takes so much time. But I feel positive about the partnership we've developed with both the federal government and with the Iowa Department of Transportation to get some of these projects moving.
For instance, Congressman Nussle was able to get us $28 million to help move the bridge project ahead. The Iowa Department of Transportation has budgeted $21 million to get the Southwest Arterial project moving. There's still Highway 20 and that $100 million project. Southwest Arterial is a $55 million project, so we need to find the rest of the money there. The Illinois Bridge is a $100 million project, so we need to find the rest of the money there.
I know how important those projects are, but they take so long to put together, but I think we're getting there.
TH: If you could change one thing about your job, what would it be?
MVM: You know, I don't think there would be a thing I would change about my job. I couldn't be any more honest than that. I feel like I've got the best job in town. I can't believe I have it. I love to come to work every day.
It's a tremendous demand on my time as far as evening work and weekend work. That takes me away from my family a lot and that's discouraging. But I think I have the best job in town, so there's not much I'd change about it.
TH: How do you balance your professional and your personal roles? Do you find yourself bringing work home with you?
MVM: I actually do work almost every night. Either I have meetings or presentations to make, or I have work that I have to get done because with the meetings all day, I just didn't have any time to actually do any work. So I do work almost every night.
But I have some wonderful children. They're very understanding and also very helpful. They're helpful from the viewpoint of they know that they need to be responsible for themselves, the need to help out at home, the need to do chores, they need to do their own homework. Not only do they do all that, but they excel at it. They're doing very well in school and I'm very proud of them.
TH: So you work at night, but I know you're also up pretty early in the morning because I've seen you out running along Asbury Road. Tell me about your workout regimen.
MVM: Well, I get up every morning at 5:30, except Sunday. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, my wife and I go and swim at YMCA. On Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, I run, usually outside unless there's ice. I always take my dog. I have a yellow Labrador Retriever who I love to go pheasant hunting with which, by the way, is my favorite pastime, but I keep her in shape with me by having her run with me in the mornings.
Then during the spring, summer and fall, my wife, on weekends, we love to bike ride, so we try to ride 10 to 15 miles a day on Saturdays and Sundays.
TH: Someone who hadn't seen you for a year or two would notice a big difference in you physically. You've lost quite a bit of weight.
MVM: I lost 45 pounds. People ask me how I did it. I did what my doctor said: low fat and exercise. I've gone on a low-fat diet. I've done exercise, which has really made me feel a lot better, so I appreciate my doctors' advice to say, "You need to get in shape," and I'm doing it.
TH: Put on your long-range vision glasses, if you will. What will Dubuque be like 10 years from now? If you were sitting down again in 2013, what will Dubuque be like then?
MVM: Well, what Dubuque will be like is more what it was like in the past, a growing, thriving community. I think all the pieces of the puzzle are being put in place for that to be accomplished.
Like the industrial parks and the riverfront development and the neighborhood reinvestment and the downtown redevelopment. All that's being put into place.
This is the kind of community in the future that people are going to want to live in. And you know with bandwith and the Internet, people are going to be able to work for the same employer, have the same job and make the same wages, but they're going to have a choice. The choice they're going to have is where do they work, where do they live. I think they're going to choose places like Dubuque. As a matter of fact, I think they're going to choose Dubuque, so I see us in 10 years being a growing, thriving community.

Copyright 2003 Telegraph Herald

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