If there’s a runner-up (by a hair’s breadth) for 2014 Advertiser Person of the Year, it’s got to be Town Council Chairman Bill Walbert. When an avowed Republican can maintain balance and a respectable level of decorum with that body, the arguably most dramatic town governance forum and the one where Republican-Democrat dynamics are most easily observed, we notice.
It was William Warren Walbert Jr.’s first year as council chairman and as a councilman at all, actually, having been newly elected and sworn-in late in 2013. Those who’ve spent late nights with the council this past year may have noticed as he managed not only to comport himself with the role and its expectations quickly, but did so while guiding the council and those who spoke before it through a gamut of contentious issues.
To be effective as council chairman in any year, especially as a freshman, one has to. The council’s primary task as the year wraps up and rounds the corner to January — right about this time now — is its role weeding through New Canaan’s annual budget, most recently clocking in at $138.4 million for 2014-15 total expenditures.
Town Council Secretary Kathleen Corbet, Chairman Bill Walbert and Vice-Chairman Steve Karl at a council meeting in 2014. (Aaron Marsh photo)
Last year, though, also included this trifling detail: the town’s first property revaluation for tax purposes since one completed just before the ground-shifting of the Great Recession had set in. Walbert demonstrated a knack for maintaining civility and constructiveness in matters often surrounded by discord, helping guide the council in a balanced, considered approach to proposals such as, very recently, listing Waveny House on historic registries, which took from July through December to reach a vote.
When the members of the council unanimously voted him chairman Nov. 19, 2013, Walbert said his goal was “to provide an environment where the best ideas can percolate to the top . . . where we can do our best work.” It can be fairly said he did just that, and not simply by agreeing or nodding assent.
In one particular example, Walbert warned against too much expansion of New Canaan’s much-acclaimed Tele-Health Wellness Program for seniors. Eventually, it might be suggested to get residents of all ages involved in that program, Walbert said — and the result would be “government in the business of health care,” he quibbled, à la criticisms of Obamacare. Despite those misgivings, that tele-health program is now nearly doubling in size to more than 100 participants in its latest iteration.
You might think it was Walbert and the council’s interactions with colleagues and town officials in 2014 that sparked an Advertiser nomination for Person of the Year. Maybe it was those cordial, professional New Canaan relationships you’d expect a businessman like the owner of Walbert Capital Management, a financial advisory firm with an office over on Main Street, would be able to foster.
But that’s not it, at least not entirely. What tipped the scales was the tone — respectful and sometimes humorously disarming — that Walbert has helped set consistently in reaching out to the people of New Canaan, those who put him on the council in the first place.
“We absolutely welcome and enjoy having the public come and speak to us,” Walbert said at the council’s meeting Wednesday evening, Dec. 17. “We are your representatives with government and absolutely encourage all to step forward and speak. We ask that you try to limit it to 2-3 minutes because of time, and also remember that the things you’re saying are televised.
“So try to keep your comments to something your grandchildren would want to see repeated,” he said.
In that last comment is further insight into what makes Walbert tick, and it goes beyond business to something more meaningful: family and the connection to community. No surprise — along with that office on Main Street, Walbert has lived in town for decades with wife Laura, also no stranger to community service and leadership, and children Joan, Carolyn and David, all three of whom attended New Canaan Public Schools.
Many are aware, and perhaps many are not, of New Canaan’s vibrant history of volunteerism and community participation. According to Walbert’s fellow council member Tucker Murphy, Walbert’s service — as is true for many who’ve given of their time to the town — is another case of such a volunteer who was encouraged by peers involved in New Canaan governance and leadership. To Walbert and the many who’ve thus stepped up and led by example and from whose efforts the town has benefitted, we at the Advertiser say, “Well done.”