The Big Question On Park Maintenance

Marc Culver 0:01

Welcome to the Public Works Nerds Podcast. Welcome to the Public Works Nerds Podcast, a Public Works Podcast of the Nerds, for the nerds, and by the nerds. I'm your host, Mark Culver. Today we're digging into a debate. I won't even call it a debate necessarily, but it's a it's a conversation that occurs. It's a choice that at some point happens. Um, but it does uh come up occasionally at many cities. Does parks maintenance belong under public works, or does it deserve its own parks and recreation department? Uh and there's really no single right answer. Uh there's a lot of factors that go into that, but it really depends on the community, the circumstances, the people that you have there at the time, I guess, the history, but honestly, like I said, really the personalities involved. Uh, but it's a structural question that shapes budgets, staffing, and how residents experience their parks systems. So to help us nerd out on this one, I'm joined by my colleague here at the City of Brooklyn Park, Greg Hoig. He's our parks and building maintenance manager or superintendent, uh, managers and superintendents. Greg has also spent time in the hot seat as our interim public works director uh for about 11 months uh here recently at Brooklyn Park and has served different roles at a couple of other cities, uh including apparently interim city administrators, which I just learned uh leading into the recording of this. So, first of all, welcome, Greg. Thanks, Mark. Great to be here. Yeah, I'm glad you could join us. Um and just as a quick note, this is gonna kick off a series of podcast episodes where I'm gonna interview uh my managers slash superintendents here at Brooklyn Park, those that that work with me, my team of uh managers, um, my leadership team here in Public Works. And I'm gonna nerd out with them about uh issues within their divisions. And we might branch out to things beyond their divisions, which I suspect we might do so with Mr. Hoig here. Um, but just uh, you know, I it's a great opportunity for you to get to know my staff and what I'm working with on a daily basis, and it's also a great opportunity for me to get to know my people uh a little better as well. So I'm kind of using the the podcast uh for other purposes here. But in any event, uh let's dig into this episode with Greg. We're starting out with Greg. Greg um has well, you've been with the city since 2014. 2010. 2010. See, all I have to do is actually like look at his resume, which I have here, and it will tell me that. But uh yeah, 2010. So you've been here for 16 years now. Um, are you the most seasoned manager slash superintendent then?

Greg Hoag 2:51

Currently I am, yes. Yeah, and and that's only been for about the last three years. Prior to that, I was the junior manager. Yeah, things things change quickly. Things changed quickly,

Greg’s Path Into Parks Work

Greg Hoag 3:02

yes.

Marc Culver 3:02

Well, Greg, why don't you take a few minutes, just talk about your origin story, how you, you know, coming out of high school and uh, you know, community college or tech college or wherever you went, and how you got into public works and into this role specifically.

Greg Hoag 3:19

You know, for me, starting as a 16-year-old seasonal employee, I worked for the city of Roseville doing all different types of things within their perks and rack department. Summertime I worked both inside and outside at their part three golf course. Wintertime I'd work at the ice arena in different capacities, and Boney Driver, things along that lines, and also worked both the maintenance end and the building supervision of the outdoor skating ranks. I did that for a lot of years, truthfully, going through high school and through college. Sometimes also worked for some other cities along the way doing similar same things just to get more hours. A lot of us old people didn't know anything better to do. Old people now, but then didn't know anything better to do but uh make as much money as you could when you were only making a whopping $4.25 an hour. Yeah, wow. Type of thing. Yeah. So I did that after high school. I actually took a year off to begin with because I really didn't know what I wanted to do and continued to work 40 plus hours a week in various seasonal jobs, and decided to get a two-year technical degree in some environmental science areas. Came out of that saying, nope, this just isn't what I wanted. Yeah, did complete the full two years, got the certificate, took a little breather again and decided I was going to go back to school. At that point, I went to what was a joint program between Anoka Ramsey Community College and Anoka Hennepin Tech or Anoka Tech. They had a golf facilities management program, which is that and at that point they had both inside and outside, you know, call it disciplines. I chose the inside tract, completed that two-year degree, and right about the same time I completed that, yeah. Still working in the outside maintenance industry. I applied for a job with with the city of Little Canada uh in 1994. I got that job, spent about 10 years there. My title there was Parks Park Maintenance Supervisor. One one of those, here's your first city, both parks and public works, same department. There you go. The only park maintenance person was titled the park maintenance supervisor. So I supervised myself administratively and amongst everything else, but yeah, a handful of seasonals and things like that. Uh from there, after 10 years, you know, over the years I competed for maintenance jobs in different cities, and a person who had who had been the current public works director in Falcon Heights, who had beat me out on a couple of other jobs, called me up and said, Hey, I think it might be your turn. I'm moving out of the state. Or no, I'm I'm moving to a different job within the state. After that, he did move out of the state. Applied for the Parks and Public Works Director in Falcon Heights, got that job, spent a couple of years there. Yeah, Falcon Heights, a very small city in Ramsey County, right near the fairgrounds. Um, shortly after that, in 2006, I applied for the public works kind of slash parks and recreation director in the city of Arden Hills. Spent four years there and both at Falcon Heights and Arden Hills. I did spend a couple of months stint at each one of them as the acting city administrator when the city administrator had taken on a new job. So got to dabble in a lot of different things. You know, I'll say might be one of the things that tipped the scales when I did apply to Brooklyn Park, that I had a pretty well-rounded background, not just in park maintenance, but I had been a part of a full public works department and had some upper administrative and city, you know, direct relations with city council experience. They said 2010 I came here. I'm currently in, if you will, my second role when I was hired. I was hired just as the park superintendent in 2014 due to some restructuring. I inherited the building maintenance division as well. Mark alluded to earlier, I spent the end of 24 and almost all of 2025 as the acting public works director. And here we are today. I'm back into my old role. And yeah, truthfully, and one of the things that brought me to want to apply to Brooklyn Park was I'll be honest with you, the the superintendent manager level or that one peg or a peg and a half down from the top is the the level I truly enjoy. It gives you a it allows you to stay more involved with the day-to-day activities, but yet still be involved at policy level type decisions. It's kind of it's kind of a sweet spot. It is.

Marc Culver 8:29

Yeah. It like you said, it you're you're you're a little more insulated from, and I'm putting some words in your mouth perhaps, but you're a little more insulated from the public, or at least from the the politics of the council and maybe some of the day-to-day things with with the city, with the city manager and the department heads, and some of those more political headaches, um of the larger budget conversation that, but you're still plugged into all of that stuff while still, like you said, uh allowing yourself to be more involved in the the day-to-day operations and and and things like that. And the people, I got I would say one of the things that as much as I love this role of being the director, and I love you know working across all the divisions, I miss some of the project level stuff I got to work with or work on as the city engineer. Um, and sometimes, and this happened to me when I was at Roseville too, it was hard for me to let go of some of those things, um, you know, and trust my staff to, you know, to represent us at the meetings and to make some of the decisions and things like that. And even today, I walked into the conference room and and Mitch, who's our city engineer, was talking to a consultant about something. And I'm like, how come I didn't get invited to the meeting? You know, and I was like, well, that's not my role anymore. And it's kind of hard for me. But I think you probably had some of that. And we'll we'll talk a little bit more about the interim role in the second half of the podcast. Um, but I I think just moving on from maybe that supervisor level even to the superintendent level, or when you were in the interim role, even more so, you probably missed some of that uh hands-on stuff.

Greg Hoag 10:18

I'll be honest, there's still days today that sometimes I just wish I was sitting on a lawnmower.

Marc Culver 10:24

Yeah. Well, we all have those days. Yeah. I mean, I there are days I go stand by uh behind a garbage truck throwing bags into the back of a garbage truck over some of the stuff that we have to deal with. But um, not to say that there's anything wrong with being uh a you know uh uh solid waste uh technician or whatever we want to call those roles. But anyway. Um well let's get into the the meat of the topic here quick. You know, you mentioned you kind of walked through your experience level in that. And uh I will say, you know, Greg has had he's what did you say, 32 years um full-time and 11 years of part-time work. And Greg, uh about a year ago, was it maybe not even a year ago, had a spreadsheet up on his door uh showing his uh Rule 90 eligible day, and he's well beyond his Rule 90 eligible day now, uh, which means that he can retire with uh full benefits uh on his pension. And he only uses that as a threat occasionally. But um you are getting into the sunset of your career, so it's kind of nice to be able to look back and and reflect on a lot of the stuff. And we're gonna

Learning Public Works The Hard Way

Marc Culver 11:40

do that right now. We're gonna reflect a little bit back on some of this. And I want to talk about when you moved from Little Canada and you were the park maintenance supervisor, and little Canada is a small enough, is a small city where you're probably still getting pulled into maybe some other non-parks things. Correct?

Greg Hoag 11:57

Correct.

Marc Culver 11:58

Yeah. Um, and I don't know what the size of their how many maintenance staff they had at the time, but like you said, you were supervising yourself.

Greg Hoag 12:06

Yeah.

Marc Culver 12:07

Um, but moving from that park maintenance role where you're primarily working on the park stuff, and then all of a sudden you become the parks and public works director at Falcon Heights. Like, what was the scariest part of that? Like when you like when you moved in, do you have any memories of like uh a lift station? I you know, I know they've got a couple of lift stations. Um, like what was your first oh crap moment that you remember on that?

Greg Hoag 12:34

Uh I don't my first oh crap moment really was probably dealing with a couple of sewer things because Falcon Heights being as small as they are, a lot of it was contracted work. So our you know, our street snow plowing at that time was done by Ramsey County. So some of those things you did you work with with your other entities that you know did have a a great learning experience to that point is we do we did a reconstruction project to Hamlin Avenue in conjunction with the city of St. Paul. Oh. So you know, working directly with the city of St. Paul, the Capitol Region Watershed District, a lot of that. That to me, that was that was one of the first real good learning experiences of of the realm of public works. But if you want to call it about that oh crap moment, yep, but sewer backups and and lift stations that shut down, type of thing, and and ongoing maintenance and kind of literally an old crap moment, right? Yes. Yeah, but that you know that's where I started to really have to to pay attention and learn, you know, it goes downhill. Yeah, and if it doesn't go downhill, it needs a mechanical device to make it go downhill. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So a lot of it was there, and I think that you know, as as the story will go, you'll you'll find that I've I've become very good at networking, using resources and and people that I've learned from other cities to gain knowledge, as well as all of the great contractors and vendors that are out there in our industry all across the board.

Marc Culver 14:18

Yeah, and Falcon Heights would teach you that pretty quickly because, you know, for those that don't know, you know, those of you in Australia that are listening, um Falcon Heights is a small community of just over 5,000 people, I think. Um they've got the state fairgrounds, so their population swells to like 200,000 people during the summer, but um they are small enough where they don't have a lot of staff, they don't have a lot of equipment resources than that. And Roseville is their neighbor to the north. And so they would often call Roseville asking, oh, can we borrow this? Can we borrow that? We need some help with this. And you know, we were we were good neighbors, and um it a lot of times it it helps our interests as well. But you get to realize how quick you re you get to realize quickly how important those um those networking, those relationships um are uh with your peers and your colleagues at different cities with different contractors and things like that. So you can pick up the phone and say, hey, I I need I need help now. I need help with this, that, or the other. But uh, so that's uh that's a really important element. And I know I've watched you in practice long enough to know that you you really do value those those relationships, and I know why now, because you know how important they are uh long term.

When Leadership Stops Talking

Marc Culver 15:37

Um but again, getting back into the topic, um so it looks sounds like at Falcon Heights, Arden Hills, and at Little Canada, Parks was underneath the public works umbrella.

Greg Hoag 15:51

Yeah, we had a in my time, we did have a divorce in Little Canada where I was actually under the Parks and Rec director. Okay, was hired under Public Works, went to Parks and Rec. I do believe today their structure is back to public works. Okay, and a lot of that, and that uh as we continue on here in our discussion, a lot of that has to do with who is in the leadership roles in both spots. And at that time I had two directors who were not getting along well with each other, and one who insisted that everything, well, at that point I was working under the public works directory, insisted that the rec director pass everything through him rather than going directly to me. And I can tell you there were numerous times that ball fields weren't dragged, things like that, because he the public works director wanted me to do something else that day rather than get ready for the programmed activities. And I let the two of them fight it out with the city administrator at the time, and you know, story goes, I became an employee of the park and rec director. Wow.

Marc Culver 17:09

For a short period of time. I mean, you were only yet little Canada for 10 years. Well, okay, well, yeah, that could have been for a little bit then. For how long did that last?

Greg Hoag 17:17

It was probably six to eight years. It happened early on. Okay. It happened early on.

Marc Culver 17:26

So talk about with that with that difference then, you know, your time at Little Canada where you had time where you were working under Public Works, and then when you were working under the Wreck and Park Director, um, what were the advantages and disadvantages then of those those two structures?

Greg Hoag 17:44

The the biggest difference then for me was not missing communications like that. Truthfully, I still worked. Well, we had split shops year-round anyway. So I still worked on my own, but I was still part of the the overall snow plowing crew. Um through some negotiation, I didn't have to be on calls, so I didn't have to deal with sewer blocks and things like that at night because I had my own stuff going on nights and weekends and things like that that nobody else wanted to do anyway. So they kind of took me out of the on call rotation. But I still, yeah, the the things that most cities have, you know, call out the all hands on deck, every division, no matter where you are, typically is involved in a snow operation or a windstorm operation or anything like that. None of that changed. It's all about the truthfully, the communications back and forth, because that's all face the facts. Park maintenance is cut probably has more customers who have events, activities, everything else that you have to prepare for. Yes, all of Public Works has customers of their population with delivering the the needed services, but parks is a little different with the the scheduled, scheduled events, scheduled all the other things that go along with it. So you really have to have directors that talk to each other and staff that talk to each other.

Marc Culver 19:25

You know, I was just thinking about this just this has popped into my head, and and we we people can get annoyed with me later, maybe. But you know, if if you've listened to the podcast before, you've heard me say public works, we make normal happen. And I as you're talking through that, it kind of hit me that like you know, the the traditional public works um staff and divisions and and such, we we we are dealing with normal. We're we're dealing with the everyday normal things um and making sure that that persists. Whereas parks and recreation and parks, uh, and we kind of choke, the the wreck and parks director and I, we go back and forth on this of uh the quality of life department. Um, who is the quality of life department? But like parks is like the special events. Um you know, we make special happen. Parks does. Um, the the uh graduation parties and the birthday parties and uh weddings and uh uh anniversary events and things, you know, the events that people, the family reunions, the events that people are are booking the um park facilities for, but also the the baseball and softball tournaments and soccer tournaments and games and and things like that, which which are special in their own right. But uh so we'll have to come up with a phrase. I guess maybe it is we make special happen, but maybe there's something else uh for the park side um that we can kind of coin that phrase on. But I that is a big difference, and and your responsibilities are much more outside of the normal business day than two, you know, and that's one thing that I've noticed here, and that is that's part of the challenge of staffing a parks maintenance staff um or schedule is having people here on the weekends to you know clean up the the um you know the the park buildings and and structures in that and parks and um but get them ready as well. Uh obviously line and drag the the ballparks and the soccer fields and the football fields and and all of that as well, but a lot of your those responsibilities are occurring outside of the the normal business day. So that that is that is different and that that can be uh challenging for the for the maintenance staff as well. But so here at Brooklyn Park, we are if you haven't figured it out, parks is under the public works umbrella, the parks maintenance side of these, but we do have a very Good, strong, um, sizable rec and recreation and parks department as well. Who is um the director there is Brad uh Talberg, and maybe I'll get him on a podcast someday as well. Um and when I came in here as the director of public works and Greg brought me into the the morning meetings every two weeks, every Thursday morning. Uh well every two weeks on Thursday morning, they have their um your your maintenance meetings. I don't know what do you what do you what do you call those?

Greg Hoag 22:35

We just we we call them the currently now the public works and wreck and park meetings, and it's the it's the upper level managers from recreation and and and my upper level team in park maintenance and the direct both the directors have have been there. So yeah, that's right. I said it takes it takes good leadership on both ends. And the these meetings were took place before I started, but it was only on a monthly basis. And as we've as the city has grown, the operation has changed, we've kind of come up with the every two weeks is really a good time to have all the heads come together, and we can be on all kinds of different topics. Yeah, but it's to kind of really make sure that both sides understand what's going on or knowing if there's any stressing challenges coming up elsewhere, and I think you know, I think it it really does work. The the spin on all of this is the person who's in my position probably has a could be perceived as having the it the toughest. Because technically I have two bosses, but only one does my review, right? And sometimes it's balancing that or communicating with my true boss and Mark that you know what Brad's got me doing this, and we need to do it for the betterment of the organization. But the flip side of that, Brad and Mark are usually well aware together what's going on because a lot of times when it comes, it's coming from higher than the directors on top of it. So, but that you know, to me, that is what was had a great foundation when I got here in 2010, and today still continues. It is about having the right faces and the commitment to agree to meet, talk, however you want to do it. We just you know, and I I talk with somebody in recreation in some fashion every day, but as a group, we talk every two weeks.

Marc Culver 24:44

Yeah, and and I think that's the key in this in this setup. And you know, you talked about this when you were at Little Canada and how that lack of communication um between the Wreck and Park director and you on the maintenance side led to, well, we're gonna put you back underneath uh Wreck and Park or put you there. Um and I think I've been really impressed with the setup that you guys have, the relationship that you have, and the ability for you to um, you know, communicate up the ladder, down the ladder, things like that to make sure things are getting done and people are getting taken care of. I you know, I've I've thought about this a lot, you know, just outside of it, or even when we're sitting in these meetings, and then it's like like who owns these parks? Like whose whose parks are the parks themselves, like who really owns them? Because we we take care of them. We're the caretakers, the residents of the city own the park. That is the 100% right answer, Mr. Hoyd. Thank you. You're right. But you know, from uh from a uh infrastructure perspective, you know, and you could say the same thing for the sewer pipes, but clearly the you know the utilities division owns, quote unquote, using air quotes, um, the sewer pipes. But it's a little more difficult. It's a it's a little more of a gray area when it comes to parks because our reckon parks department, when we're building a new park, they take the lead on that. What are we building? You know, they they lead the engagement efforts of what does the public want? What do we need here? What is the what are the needs of the neighborhood? Um, what does this park need to serve? What what uh amenities do we need here? Things like that. But then once it's built, then we're the ones that that have to take care of it. You know, we need to make sure that uh the buildings are maintained appropriately, that we have good replacement cycles for for HVAC equipment or what have you, that the the pavement uh in the parking lots and the trails and sidewalks and that are maintained and replaced when they need to be. And those are all things that we're responsible for. But obviously, our Rack and Parks director has some input into that and some insight into, you know, well, this this whole play, the playground equipment needs to be replaced, you know, but then what do we replace it with and stuff

Budget Stories Revenue Versus Costs

Marc Culver 27:07

like that? So it's an it's an interesting relationship that also gets into like whose budget is this really, you know, and and Greg and I have had some conversations about well, who's getting the revenue for the events and who's actually spending the money on the toilets and and things like that, you know. So so let's talk about, I think that's a great segue or lead into what are the some of some of the disadvantages of having public works or parks under public works, do you think?

Greg Hoag 27:34

I think one of the biggest disadvantages is it's it is hard to tell the story because as Mark just alluded to, recreation is the revenue source for permits, for all of that, but we are the expense. Yep. And it it's very hard sometimes to tie both of them together, but it also then is as staff change in at different levels within the city, primarily like finance and administration, it's making sure that you know if you're having tough budget discussions and oh we're you know the the finger gets pointed at you to cut so many dollars, you know, tell me what you want to hear, what level of service is going down, because I'm not seeing the revenue for the expenses that I have. But yet people are paying for a service and they expect a level of service. I think that is probably the toughest thing, but that's where you know it goes along with making sure that you have good communication up and down the ladder and beyond just public works and parks and recreation, that there can be different impacts. Yeah. A great plus is there's typically no squabbling over, yeah. We need to borrow a street sweeper, we need to do something else. And conversely, back to other divisions. If we have pieces of equipment that they need, you know, it it makes for smarter purchasing. There's less replication because it's not the mind versus yours mindset. Yeah. What works real well here, even is we we share in primarily park maintenance equipment because we're similar, but we share equipment with the golf courses.

Marc Culver 29:25

Yeah. Yeah. And and that's that's another complicated relationship because the the golf course uh personnel are under wreck in parks, but they're also not union. Correct. So that that's a whole nother level of complexity on that. And to that point, that was one thing that when I came to Brooklyn Park um from Roseville with a little hiatus in between. Um I and at Roseville, uh public works and parks were separate. So the parks maintenance um was reported to the parks and recreation director, um, and and I had my own staff. But they were in the same union. The the park staff, maintenance staff, and the public works maintenance staff were all in the 49ers union. And that got a little interesting when when I, as a public works director, would say, hey, these jackets aren't part of your uniform, they're part of our safety equipment. But the parks and rec director didn't feel the same way. And so when a parks maintenance staff member got a uh you know, a high visibility winter jacket that went against his uniform allowance, that got a little dicey from the union perspective. And so there is some, there are some advantages to having one director set a uh a vision and some directives and some policies that all of the union members then um follow, you know, and obviously we set those in correlation. We'll we'll have to have a different podcast episode about the union, perhaps, but we got to be careful on that one. But I I've I I we have a really good relationship with our unions. We have a labor management committee um where we meet regularly and hash out some issues in that before they become contract issues a lot of times. And that I've been really impressed with that. I've been impressed with how Greg has managed that over the time that I've been here and seen that. Um but getting back to the topic, having all of those members of the union under the same director makes that go much smoother than having two different directors and maybe two different um philosophies and thoughts on things. Um, equipment sharing is I think a huge benefit. Uh, and I ran into that when I was at Maple Grove. Again, Maple Grove parks and public works were separate, Roseville parks and public works were separate. We did, and it's it can get a little petty sometimes. It can, it really can. And life is petty, all right? Sometimes life is petty. Um but yeah, sometimes you just have some of these petty little arguments over, even like, oh, we've got an issue at a pond in a park. Well, it's a pond, so it's a stormwater issue, not a park issue. And it's like, well, where's the line? You know, where where is the fountain that's in the pond, which is partly an amenity, is that really a stormwater thing or is that a park thing? And trust me, I had many conversations at Roseville about that very thing. Um, and again, when you have one director that's hearing some of the arguments for and against, it helps that all of that is kind of under one umbrella versus the thiefdoms, you know, that are kind of watching their budgets, watching their own um uh impacts and and such. I don't know. Greg, do you have any other any any other input on that or or examples of that or stories?

Greg Hoag 33:02

It even happens here. Yeah, that no matter where you're at, no matter what system you're under, you know, the call it the the divisional battles, whether they be for fun or for real, exist. But yeah. We we still play that game too, and it I'll be honest with you, it it it sucks that when parks are developed through the different mechanisms of how you get the land, you usually end up with the lousiest piece of land that's on a parcel, which then becomes the stormwater part of it. And yeah, so I'll even challenge people sometimes. Is it a park or is it stormwater? I don't know.

Marc Culver 33:41

Yeah, and and those don't get me wrong, those are there are some valid conversations about that, certainly. I mean, but uh it just I felt sometimes that was yeah, I pushed a little further than it should be.

Greg Hoag 33:53

But here I'll say they're more for fun, but when you're dealing with two separate directors and two separate departments, uh yes, I have seen those discussions go sideways quickly.

Marc Culver 34:04

Yeah. Now I we keep talking about Roseville, and Greg was a seasonal at Roseville, Greg lives in Roseville, you were a volunteer firefighter in Roseville, you didn't talk too much about that, um, or paid on call, whatever you call it. You were a firefighter. Correct. Um and and uh that's that's uh that's something that lives in your in your bones, in your blood too, uh, as being a firefighter. And I know I've seen firefighter Greg come out sometimes, not in a bad way, in a good way. Um but one thing that we haven't mentioned is that you were on the uh Parks and Recreation Commission uh for Roseville for how many years?

Greg Hoag 34:48

Seven years. I did two terms, but I started on somebody else's term. So I was there for a total of I think seven years.

Marc Culver 34:58

And you were the chair?

Greg Hoag 34:59

I was the chair. I was the chair through COVID. Talk about a great challenge trying and we were doing a very hot topic about renaming a park at the time through the Pocahontas Park, right? Yes, yeah, through the through through the virtual platform, and and I know afterwards at that time the director told me I'm I'm happy you were the chair because you understood Robert's rules of order and how to run a meeting from your your years of experience as a as a government employee, you'd trying to do all that virtually.

Marc Culver 35:38

Yeah. Yeah, that could that I could see where that was would be challenging.

Greg Hoag 35:42

So but I do I I applied to be on the park commission shortly after I had retired from the fire department solely because uh if those of you have never been a volunteer or a paid on call firefighter, that is your hobby. And that's part of the reason, probably, as Mark alluded to earlier, I haven't retired yet, is I need to figure out what I'm gonna do in retirement because you know that my my hobby was work and it still is kind of work. So yeah, but yeah, you know being on that or taking it from the lens of a of a park commissioner, bringing my everyday work experience was you know, it it was fun, it was different. It it allowed me actually to see a little bit more of the inside of the Roseville operation currently as it sits today. You know, I worked there as a seasonal many moons ago, but and still know a lot of staff there. But I yeah, that was a great experience for me to to do that once again. You're the political body then, dude. Right, yeah, tongue-in-cheek. Right. But yeah, making presentations to the city council and all that.

Marc Culver 36:57

Yeah. Yeah.

Does City Size Change The Answer

Marc Culver 36:59

Well, and and and to that point, you you you also had a lens or a view of you know how Roseville ran their uh park maintenance program and staff and and things like that. So with that, with your experience at Falcon Heights, with your experience at Little Canada, which are both much smaller communities, your experience at Roseville, which was you know a middle-sized community of about 35,000 people, and now at Brooklyn Park, which is the sixth largest city in the state of Minnesota, which sounds a lot more impressive than it is, mind you, people. I mean, it we're still only 87,000 people. You say sixth largest city in California, and it's a whole different uh magnitude over there. But um, but we are a much larger city than the other communities you've worked for. So how does that, the size of the city, change the calculus of kind of that departmental structure, do you think?

Greg Hoag 37:56

The work is still the same. Yeah. It's just magnified. It it truthfully, the work is still the same. It's just magnified. Let me refinitely the everyday maintenance is still the same, it's just magnified. So that escalates the number of employees you need to get get a job done. Yeah. The other cities I work for, don't get me wrong, or don't be mad at me if I miss the number of parks, but I don't think any one of them had more than 20 parks. We have over 60 parks and other areas that we maintain at Brooklyn Park. It takes a large staff to do that.

Marc Culver 38:36

Do you think it changes the have you I I I'm trying to figure out how to phrase this so I'm not being biased, but do you think we will get to the size where it makes more sense for parks maintenance to be underneath parks and recreation again?

Greg Hoag 38:56

I I don't believe it will. Yeah. Because I you know it comes back to the the efficiency of the operation being under one roof. Could that happen in the future? Maybe. I think it all comes back to can the directors get along and can and can can the communication stay as good as it is.

Marc Culver 39:18

Right. I I think that's pretty important. That's a pretty important factor. And you would hope that you know any directors that are in that position as a part of their jobs would have the skills and and even the direction from their city managerslash city administrator to make sure that they maintain that, you know, that good level of communication and collaboration and and such. But that isn't always the case, we know. Um, I don't know. I'm trying to think if there's anything else we want to say on this topic before we do a quick shift over. Because I do want to spend a little bit of time talking about your time as the interim director. Um I I think we already, I think, I think we're good. I think we're good there. And if you have any comments about that, you know, with your own experiences, if you're listening to this and you have some thoughts or um experience in that where you've seen some issues one way or the other, we'll love for you to drop a comment on LinkedIn about it. It's probably the best place to do that. Um, and yeah, let us know what some of your experiences are. I think it would be great if we could build that PublicWorks Nerds LinkedIn as another one of those um repository for people's experiences and knowledge and things like that, and also maybe an area for people to build a network uh of people with with those experiences.

Life As Interim Public Works Director

Marc Culver 40:44

So with that, uh I wanted I did want to talk to you a little bit about well, your leadership experience. And like I said, like leading into our start of recording this podcast episode, I learned that you also had short stints as um interim city administrators at both Falcon Heights and Little Canada. And now, you know, you had a longer stint as the interim public works director here for Brooklyn Park. But how how was that for you? You know, and I think particularly the longer stint as a public works director, because you went through a budget process, you went through a challenging budget process, you didn't get to finish that one. I don't know if that's good or bad for you, but um how how was that? And and I also having watched some of it, I know that part of your challenge was letting go of that day-to-day stuff that we that we were talking about earlier. But talk about that experience, like you know, maybe vent a little bit. Maybe, you know, this is your therapy session, Greg. Um, how how was that experience for you?

Greg Hoag 41:56

Uh I think the toughest part was not knowing what the duration of it at the beginning was going to be. And you know, not tough for me to walk into a an opera leadership role. As Mark alluded to, I've been a director before, I've been an acting city administrator before. But the acting part of it, interim acting, however you want to title it, it changed over time as it went out as well, was not backfilling any of my current job as well. So literally, I took on a second full-time job for nine months, did what I could to offload where I could, but I also couldn't let go of the day-to-day because it was always an interim role. So it you know, it's hard to step away from the day-to-day from my normal job, but also do the day-to-day required for the other job. Um, I can say right off the bat, one of the first things I did was pick up the phone and call Mark Culver and said, My weakness will be engineering. I'm gonna rely heavily on you to just keep engineering moving so I don't have to even worry about it and deal with the you know the some of the more upper level things that were going on, knowing that Mark had also been a public works director in the past.

Marc Culver 43:32

And you and you and you did do that, and and I I really uh appreciate and respect the fact that you didn't try to get into the details, and partly because you couldn't, you know, you just didn't have the time to do it. But yes, but I appreciate and I reason and I I do uh like I said, I appreciate the the fact that you um respected me and and trusted me to Just to take that on. And we were dealing with, you know, the Blue Line project. We were dealing with 252. We're dealing with trying to get uh this big growth area up in the northwest area going and some things like that. So we had some some big meaty things, things to deal with. But um, but yeah, yeah, you did, and and thank you for that.

Greg Hoag 44:18

And and and then I did similar things with with the street manager and the and the utilities manager, because you know for utilities, we're heavily involved right now with trying to find a solution for PFOS, amongst some other things. And and our street manager at the time was also getting ready to retire. So that that made it even a little bit more challenging because he kind of had one foot out the door. So I was I was working with that. See, so I I truth truthfully relied heavily on all of my managers, and I think I've told them all how much I appreciated the help that they did give me. But you know, in the end, I'm still the manager of my own division on top of doing it, and it was hard to step away. Through that time, we decided at the city council level that we were going to build a very large fire station. Um for those of you who remember my title at the beginning of the introduction here, I'm the park and building maintenance manager. So that project through the design phase took a lot of my time last year as my normal job, but I was also trying to be the director at the same time. So it yes, yeah, like I said, it it became challenging just because of the unknown of when it was going to end and the fact that it did go on for nine months, eight months, nine months. Um but truly I enjoyed it because it did get me back into at least some working knowledge of what was you know what's going on in other areas. Spent quite a few meetings talking about PFOS. Yep. I know what PFOS is, but hearing a little bit deeper from some consultants and things, that was all good. Spending time closer with Mark talking about different things with Light Rail and that. It it enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. And I you know today it's probably made me a better employee at where I'm at still currently. Yeah. It does.

Marc Culver 46:34

I mean, that that experience gives you an appreciation of of all, and not to say that you didn't have that, because you did have some more general public works experience, but not at the magnitude of of Brooklyn Park, uh, a city of this size and a lot of the complex issues that uh Brooklyn Park is dealing with right now. So um it is I mean, it would be a tough rotation to put people through, you know, to uh try to give them that perspective. Uh, you know, I guess you know you have your principal for a day, maybe we had your public works director for a day type of thing or something. I don't know. But um it it being in that role and just listening to some things and having to listen and having to make some of those decisions uh does give you an appreciation for for the complexity of that.

Greg Hoag 47:20

But um I'm gonna give I'm gonna give a shout out to one other person. I won't use them by name, but I can say that the day that it became public that I was the the interim director, the our street divisions union steward came in and sat down in my office. He said, I'm here to support you any way I can.

Marc Culver 47:41

Oh, I hadn't heard that before. But good for him. I know who you're talking about, obviously. Uh that gentleman just retired himself um after many, many years of service to the to the city. So he was a good he is a good guy.

Greg Hoag 47:57

Yeah. And there were a lot of others that you know over the course of the eight months did did step up. Too many, too many to name them all. But that one rang, you know, rings back to me because literally it was day one he walked in and said, I'm here to support you anyway I can.

Marc Culver 48:12

Right. What was there a particular well hell, it was a pretty big moment. There were two big moments. There were two big moments when you were the director. Um where I I would say where firefighter Greg uh came out in those moments. Um it gave you an appreciation of the emergency management. But why don't you go ahead and talk about those those two moments?

Emergencies That Pull In Everyone

Greg Hoag 48:37

Yeah, um early in the year, I can't remember exactly if it was February or March uh of 2025. Of 2025, a plane crashed into a house, which which you know is a relatively big incident. Yeah, it's a fire incident to begin with, but when a plane crashes into a house, it it involves all divisions and all departments of the city to the point that you know public work services were needed. And you know, I was part of the incident management team for that. And then last June, the unfortunate tragedies of the Mark and Melissa Hartman homicides in Brooklyn Park. I was notified and part of the emergency response team within the first hour of that incident, all the way through the full 72-hour manhunt.

Marc Culver 49:36

Yeah, yeah, those are two big roles. And that's one of those things where you know, we've had Mark Ray on here talking about emergency management and public works as first responders, and we're definitely those things. Um, but those are some really challenging things. And and like I said, your time as a firefighter certainly served the city well in knowing, anticipating some of the needs of our police department and our fire department. Because I remember hearing some people talk about how you, you know, were getting uh porta potties out there and and um and just some other things that that you were able to anticipate, knowing that that these events were weren't just gonna be a couple hours long, you know, that um even us bringing equipment into uh the plane crash site and and things like that. So thank you for that. But I think we were lucky to have you there um in that role. And I know that if if something like that happened now with you in your parks management role, maybe maybe it doesn't fit cleanly into the parks division or the parks building maintenance division, but I know you would be the first one to raise your hand and say, what do you need? I can be there. Uh I can take care of that. Oh, we should think about this, we should think about that. You would want to be in the in the uh mobile uh command center trailer. Um and that's just the person you are, and and there's a there's a lot of good about that, and and we're lucky to to have you. So so thank you. Um yeah, I know there's there's more stuff that we can talk about that, and maybe we'll talk more about that time later in a different uh episode. But um Yeah, I just want anything else you wanted to say before we we wrap up the episode here?

Greg Hoag 51:29

No, you know, I think I think I'll go on. Yeah, we're we're we're sitting here today, Mark as my boss, and one of the prompting things we were here to talk about, you know, Mark and I competed for the director's position. But as I said earlier, you know, after doing it for a year, you know, I I proved myself I could do it. So there's no reason why I wasn't going to apply for it. But am I disappointed I didn't get the job? Sure. But I'm really sitting at the the role I like the most. And and I think that you know, through that interim time with Mark supporting me, we developed a good working relationship. That still to this day I'm supporting our department in ways as as we just alluded to that don't fit truly into my job description. Yep. But that's kind of always been me. And I think a lot of that came from working in small cities. For those of you who never worked in a small city, you may have a title, but you wear a lot more hats than what your title or your job description says. And I think those three small cities that I work for is what got me to where I'm at today and what makes me understand the whole of public works and beyond.

Marc Culver 52:52

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, much more. Yeah. Well, you were you were a city administrator, you ran it all for a little period of time. So so yeah, I think that's that's pretty valuable. And and I'll second everything you said. And you know, even during the we we knew leading into the interviews, even before they officially posted the position in that last year, you know, Greg and I knew we were going to be quote unquote competing um for that position. But I don't, I don't, I use that word and I said quote unquote competing for a reason because I don't feel like we we we were obviously competing for the the position, but we I didn't really feel like we were competing against each other. Like we were very, we were both very supportive of each other, and we had talked about the scenarios of well, if you get it or I get it, you know, and this, that, and the other, and we had we had some shared visions on on how things were go would go. So um, yeah, I think we've got a really great relationship. And it's it's interesting that you know, I think that relationship is a little battle-hardened because of that time, you know, and and we had to kind of form uh uh you know a much more collaborative uh relationship uh with each other. So hopefully that pays dividends in the uh couple, three, four more years that I got you here. So anyway, well, thank you for your time today,

Competing For The Job Then Moving Forward

Marc Culver 54:20

Mr. Hoig. Very much appreciated. Appreciate your perspective on this. Um, and like I said, if anybody's got any comments on any of this, feel free to drop that in our uh in the Public Works Nerds LinkedIn page. And of course, as we always do, one last thing before we go, we're on our fourth season of the podcast. We'd love to grow our audience, so please help us spread the word by liking, reposting, and or commenting on LinkedIn or any other social media platforms you see us on. Um and let us know what you think of this episode and the podcast as uh a whole. Uh and also we love uh episode ideas. So if you get, and I've actually had a couple people reach out to me about episode ideas, and I have to actually have to um uh call myself out on that because I haven't necessarily always followed up, but I will. And I still want people to bring those episode ideas to me. So keep bringing them. Um thank you very much. We will see you next time. Nerds out.