Mayor Cares For Man 8: Beast Alike

by Louise Dix
II the mayor oi Grinnell is not in

his ottice, he may possibly be iound .

in his clinic fixing a dog’s broken
leg or out in the country giving a
sow a shot.

Dr. Floyd Beaver said that being:
both the mayor and a veterinarian
causes no conflicts for him. ”I try
to work both in,” said the doctor.
“But, I've developed the attitude
that I can't let outside activities
interfere with the practice of vet-
erinary medicine.”

He said that he considers his du-
ties as mayor as being “some-
what” outside ones because his po-
Sitioil of mayor is not 'lull time.
He and the city council are a more
policysmaking body than an adminis-
trative body. A full time city mana-
ger and nllice staff lcarry out the
daystosday business.

Dr. Beaver admitted that being a
veterinarian and a mayor has its
advantages. When he goes out on
call in the country to give veteris
nary aid, he said he gets the opir
nions of the rural people. He also
meets people in the oliice that know
he can help their animals,

This is Mayor Beaver’s filth twos
year term in onice. He first served
on the city council. “I decided to
run for council basically tor two
reasons; first) I was interested in
the rezoning program (or the city
at that time," he said, “This was
in 1960 or thereahouts, And second,
I was interested in a water supply
for my area.’j .

The mayor said he was interested
in the rezoning program because
where his office is now (R D 2)
was then essentially out in the coun-
try and was going to be zoned into
the city as a residential area. “I
would have been classed as a non-
conforming usage and would have
been perfectly legal, But then I
could never have sold or added to
the office,” he explained. The may-
or is now zoned into a commercial
area near the drive-in theater, .

A5 for the water supply, or Bear
ver said that when he and his bros
ther built the clinic, the area was
too far out in the country tor a
water supply. “I didn’t want to
drill a well so I asked [or, city
water," he recalled. He said that
the council thought it would be
years and years before that area
was developed so they decided that
it woudn’t be feasible to run water
that far out,

Dr. Beaver iigured out how much
it would cost to run a pipe out
there and oliered to pay halt the
cost. Still the council refused to'
comply. ,

"Four years later, the city ran
an eight inch Water main out there,
That’s how fast the area developed
he commented. “So I decided that
I’d run for councilman. I didn’t
think that there should be such a
narrow minded group running Grins
hell it the city was ever to grow
and expand.”

His decision to run ior mayor
came by chance. He said that he
ran as councilmansatelarge and res
Ceived the largest number of Votes.
Therefore he was given the title oi
mayor pro tem.

The president oithetelephone come
pany was mayor at the time and
couldn’t carry out his duties bee
cause of freguent heart attacks, Dr.
Beaver ended up doing most of the
work. “I had the experience so I
ran for mayor at the next election
and I’ve been mayor ever since,“
he remarked.

“Grinnell has been good to me
and I telt that it‘was a citizen's
duty to give a little along the line,
whether it be to am, church, or
iraternal groups,” the mayor said.

“Some people say they wouldn’t

want my job‘ for anything because‘

of all the crank phone calls and
complaints,” he continued. “But
I really get very iew crank phone
calls. I found out that if people
have a complaint, they primarily
want someone to listen to them so
I’ve developed the philosophy that it
takes two to argue,”

“I try not to get into anargument,”
the easy going man added. “l've
developed a philosophy of just list-
ening. And the first thing you know
the person has talked himself out oi
his anger.”

An election for mayor is coming
up this tall, and although the mayor
has not announced whether or not

he will run again, hedid say, “There
are a lot at projects yet unfinished
that I suppose one should see thr—
ough." These projects include the
sewer project currently being works
ed on this summer and the mayor
said that it’s “getting pretty well
along."

Dr, Beaver said that he enjoys
being Grinnell's mayor. According
to the book. ”Sale Places"tinavid
and Holly Franke, Grinnell is con-
sidered one of 47 sale places in the
11.3.; tree of crime, pollution, etc.
The mayor attributes this primar
ily to the size oi the town and to

it being such a rural community.-

We’re pretty much a stable comms
unity.” he remarked. ”We don’t
have large numbers of transients."

“As tor the clean air, that just
comes from being a rural community
iar irom any big city," Di. Beaver
explained, “Our industries are clean
in nature and we are very much
environment conscious.” The Powe-
shiek Association for Conservation
and Ecology (PACE) is just one
environmentally conscious group in
the area.

”Our law enlorcement is very well
organized,” the mayor said. “I
think we’ve been down on our crime

. rate this past year.” He attributes

the low crime rate to the type oi
people living in the area. “We
have an above average type oi em—
ployed person,” he explained. "The
type or industry that we have lends
itselt to not being a high crime

area. The college personnel are high
caliber people as arethelargenum-
her of people employed by General
Telephone and Grinneli Mutual Re-
insurance Company."

”But being on the interstate,” he
added. “we do get our share of
so-called bad guys going through,
Fortunately there is good coopera—
tion between the highway patrol and
the county sheriff’s office so that
we can apprehend most of these
people.”

”All these factors put together
tend to keep our crime rate down,”-
the mayor concluded. He said that
there have been “scattered inciv
dents of rustling" butthat this county
hasn’t been as hard hit as other
counties closer to the bigger cities,

One thing that bothers the mayor
is motorcycles on the highway. “in
town this spring, we were averaging
one motorcycle accident a week,”
he said. “I blame this on motorists
who aren’t mentally alert to be look-
ing tor motorcycles, as well as on
the motorcylists themselves.”

He considers community and call-
ege relations to he ”very good at
this time” and said he feels thatthe
physical education complex and oth-
er things opened to the public have
helped relationships. "It’s a tre-
mendous program and has been ac.
cepted real well by the people. we
ve had a real good response to the
college program,” he stated. ”some

Continued on page 6

THE GRINNELL SCARLET AND BLACK AUGUST 31,

1978 PAGE 3

 

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