Four decades worth of leadership — and thousands of miles  worth of county road paving experience — sat down at one table recently, where county commission chairmen past and present came together to reminisce about their terms in office and share their thoughts on what they learned from tackling one of Cullman County’s most scrutinized jobs.

The intimate event, which turned out to produce some remarkable conversation between the men who’ve held the county’s top spot, drew all but two of the commission’s current and former chairmen to the dining room of the Victoria Manor assisted living facility in Hanceville, where former chairman Roy Gamble resides.

The luncheon welcomed Robert Harbison, who was elected chairman in 1973, Randall Shedd, Gamble, Pete Tucker, George Spear and sitting chairman James Graves. The two-hour talk saw personal and political differences give way to amiable reflection on the difficulties of running county government, as well as the lessons each leader learned on the job.

Only J.W. Hicks, who served as chairman from 1985 to 1989, and Wiley Kitchens, who served from 2004 to 2008, didn’t make the event.

Chairman-elect Kenneth Walker won’t take office until November and wasn’t at the luncheon. But Shedd canvassed his peers for the advice they’d offer Walker as he prepares to take his place among their number.

“The thing about this job — and it’s really kind of a shame that so many folks only get elected to one term, and then they can’t hang on — is, for me, that you learn so much more by the end of your first four years than you knew going in on the first day,” said Tucker. “When you first go into office, don’t just jump into action. Sit back and watch how things are done for a while, and listen — listen to others.”

“I think he’s right,” said Gamble. “When I ran for my second term, my heart wasn’t in it, because of all the flak I had taken in my first term. It’s hard for people to take it. You want to have that knowledge if you’re going to have a second term.”

Harbison said it’s important for elected leaders to be true to what they believe; to stay committed to the ideals and hopes they had when they first sought office. “If you have a project you want to do, and you’ve told people that’s what you’re gonna do, don’t let anybody steer you away from it,” said Harbison. “Just push ahead.”

Party politics shouldn’t drive the decisions of elected leaders, added Spear. “Leave your party at the metal detector, and serve everybody — that would be my advice,” he said.

Graves said the job has gotten more complex as the county’s annual budget has swelled over the decades. Establishing a consensus among the three-member commission on how to spend the discretionary portion of those funds, he said, is one of the office’s toughest jobs.

“When you get into office, be patient, and take a careful survey of what’s going on before you start to do anything,” said Graves. “But know — that whatever you do want to accomplish, you’ve got to have the agreement of those other two guys, and you’ve got to find a way to work together.”

“If a new chairman asks me, I’d say that, politically — and in doing the job itself — the most important thing is to make sure that the county government functions,” Shedd surmised.

“Even politically, the smoother our government functions, the better off the chairman will be. And, when I look back, I would advise a new chairman to spend a good bit of time outside that courthouse — not on vacation, but among the people. Hear what people say; get out and talk to folks as part of your job. I think if I’d done that, especially during my second term, I’d have stayed around for a third term.”

Shedd, who organized the meeting, was so pleased with its outcome that he pledged to try to turn the commission chairmen’s luncheon into an annual affair.

“This is really something I’ve been wanting to get together for a long time,” said Shedd near the meeting’s end. “Now that we’ve taken that first step, and with the good conversation that’s come out of it here today, I really think it’s something we should keep doing. You learn a lot from the gentlemen who have sat in that office and taken their turn serving the county, and they all have a real wealth of understanding. I’m looking forward to doing this again — hopefully every year.”



* Benjamin Bullard can be reached by e-mail at bbullard@cullmantimes.com or by telephone at 734-2131 ext. 270.