initiatives
By Scott McAfee, Chief Communications & Marketing Officer
Thank You for Your Service, Colleen! Reflections from a Mayor and City Council member
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Photo courtesy of the city of New Albany
hen newly elected City Council members are sworn into office in January 2022, it will mark the first year since 1996 that Colleen Briscoe will not serve as either Mayor or a City Council member. After 26 years of service, she decided not to run for re-election. Colleen is not only among a select few who have personally witnessed New Albany’s transformation as a community since the early 1990s, she also has great insight as an elected community leader during parts of the last four decades. She sat down with me recently to share some observations. Do you have any stories that you think might surprise people from those early days? I have two. First, back in the early 1990s, the building of the New Albany we know today had just begun. There was no Market Colleen Briscoe Square, no McCoy Center, no library – there wasn’t much out here Nicklaus had signed on to build the golf at all beyond a hardware store, a small course, and my initial reaction was, sure, grocery store, an ice cream shop, a you might be using the Nicklaus name, restaurant, a gas station and a barber but he’s not really going to be that inshop. There wasn’t even a true Village volved. Then, all of a sudden, the door Hall. We were nomads as elected of- opens and in walks Jack Nicklaus to ficials, gathering for meetings at three have a meeting about the golf course in different places, including a glorified another area of the modular unit. double wide, a school building and a church, before Village Hall was built in What drew you to New Albany 2000. originally? Second, I distinctly remember when We had two small children at the I sat down for a personal sales pitch time, and we were living in a home built about New Albany. It occurred in a mod- in the 1920s. My husband wanted a ular unit on the site of what is now the new home and I wanted my children to New Albany Country Club (which hadn’t be a part of a great school district. It was been built yet), and I listened to the vi- a big leap, but the schools had hired sion of what New Albany was going to Ralph Johnson and I had great faith that be like. They talked about how Jack good things were going to happen here.
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What do you think New Albany’s three top accomplishments have been since you began serving? I always talk about the three Ps that New Albany is so good at – planning, prioritizing and partnering – and, for me, it starts with planning. It’s funny, last week I just reviewed our first strategic plan from 1998, and we got so much right, including the creation of the Rocky Fork Blacklick Accord with Columbus and Plain Township and the need for a town center, public open spaces and leisure trails, one school campus, and traffic and transportation planning. That planning, along with setting priorities and creating great partnerships both in and out of the community, made fantastic projects possible, like our library, the McCoy Center, the Heit Center, Market Square, Rose Run Park and the Hinson Amphitheater. It’s rare when the outcome is even greater than the original vision but I think that has happened here in New Albany. Besides those three Ps, two other things have been vital to our success as a community – our New Albany International Business Park and hiring the right city staff to oversee the implementation of our vision. Our business park has been the catalyst for revenue generation for our city and our schools, something that greatly benefits every resident, and our city staff has overseen so many different projects that make New Albany such a special place. You’ve been a part of not only tremendous growth, but tremendous change, during your time as Mayor and City Council member. What has serving New Albany meant to you personally? 17
