Life on the Mississippi in Iowa with Mayor of Dubuque Brad Cavanagh (S4E10)
The coolest gig I’ll ever have, that’s how Dubuque Iowa Mayor Brad Cavanagh explains his job. He says as mayor he is plugged into government at all levels, but also still lives a regular life in the town where he grew up. He talks about partnerships and how Robert F Kennedy made him think about how government can work. Listen as he explains how he gets things done in this city on the Mississippi.
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Transcription
David Martin: This is the good government show.
Brad Cavanagh: You know, one of the things that people say here at these conferences all the time is how great it is to be mayor and how much of an honor it is. And it’s absolutely true. I mean, it is probably the coolest gig I’ll ever have in my life.
We talk a lot about people planning and partnerships. It sounds cliche, but that’s really what it is. It’s it’s trying to create these partnerships to be able to get things done, because we recognize you can’t do it on our own. We are the largest metropolitan statistical area in the United States. That has to drive as far as we need to to get on a planet.
80 miles is the closest place.
We need to treat each other as real people. I think it’s easy to look at any level of government and just treat somebody like a caricature.
I just want to be a good person and do good stuff, and we need more people who just want to be good people and do good things. Running for office.
David Martin: And welcome to the Good Government Show. I’m your host, Dave Martin. On this episode, we’re meeting the mayor of Dubuque, Iowa, Brad Cavanaugh. If you live in Dubuque, you’ve probably met him by now. Mayor Cavanaugh says being a mayor is probably the best job in government. He explains that as mayor, he goes to Washington and meets with national leaders, but he also meets citizens every day, like at his son’s Little League games.
I’m plugged in at different levels that most people are not, he explains. And by the way, for you baseball fans, the field of dreams, baseball field is just about a half an hour down the road. You know, in the Iowa cornfields. Anyway. Dubuque contributed to the building in the field. So they’re sister cities, I guess. Anyway, we talk about the city of almost 60,000 people, and that’s where Mayor Cavanaugh has been the mayor for almost three years.
The city is a regional center on the Mississippi River. The masterpiece on the Mississippi. Dubuque is known as. And I’ll let the mayor explain that. A former social worker, Mayor Cavanaugh, explains why his solutions oriented background translates to delivering good government to his city. You’re going to hear about people, partnerships and planning. This is the mayor’s essential guide for moving the city forward.
And I learned something new. Well, I learned a lot new about Dubuque and about Iowa, but I learned the city’s unofficial official sandwich. Unofficial official sandwich is. Write this down. It’s a turkey and dressing sandwich. I’ll let the mayor explain this. It sounds interesting. Anyway, I’ll have my conversation with Mayor Brad Cavanaugh of Dubuque, Iowa, coming up right after this.
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Welcome to the Good Government show. I’m happy to have Brad Cavanaugh, the, mayor, new mayor, actually, of Dubuque, Iowa. Yeah, you’re new enough.
Brad Cavanagh: Actually, I’m. This is my third year. So this is your third year? Two and.
David Martin: A half? Yeah, two and a half. How’s it going?
Brad Cavanagh: It’s great. Yeah. It is. you know, one of the things that people say here at these conferences all the time is how great it is to be mayor. And how much of an honor it is. And it’s absolutely true. I mean, it is probably the coolest gig I’ll ever have in my life.
David Martin: You think?
Brad Cavanagh: I really do? Actually. No matter what I decide to do next, president.
David Martin: Senator doesn’t tell.
Brad Cavanagh: You know.
David Martin: You’re in Iowa. I don’t know how come.
Brad Cavanagh: I don’t know about any of those titles.
David Martin: You get you get a leg up on the rest of.
Brad Cavanagh: America, right? Right. But, you know, I do think it is it one of the things that’s great about, working as the mayor and serving in this role is that you you actually serve on all the levels, really? I mean, you work with the federal government on a regular basis. You work with the state government on a regular basis.
You shop at the same grocery store that all your constituents shop at. Everybody is. So you’re you’re plugged in on all levels in a way that I don’t think anybody else gets the opportunity to do. So I really do appreciate that about the role.
David Martin: Tell me about Dubuque. Yeah. Give me, give me. Yeah, yeah. So the the travel version of.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. You know, one of the first things I always, I always tell people is, you know, when you think of Iowa, what do you think of? And most people are going to say corn and they’re going to say flat, you know, that’s what they’re thinking of. And, I usually I usually joke, no, that’s Nebraska. It’s not.
But it is parts of Iowa. But where we are is a really interesting place geographically. So we’re right where Illinois and Wisconsin come together on the map with Iowa. We’ve got a bridge going to both states. Okay. And, we are in what they call the Driftless Region. So it’s where the glaciers didn’t reach. And we actually have these towering bluffs all along the Mississippi River.
And our downtown is built down below a bluff. So we’ve got this big bluff on top. There’s houses built up there. It’s the oldest city in Iowa. So it’s actually a, you know, it’s just a beautiful, historic place, and it has beautiful natural resources. And, you know, natural scenery and, some of the best views, the Mississippi River you’re ever going to see in the United States.
So it really is a very cool place. You know, it’s a town of about 60,000 people, about 100,000 in the surrounding area. We went through a major population drop back in the 1980s. We had two major employers, John Deere, their construction and forestry division is headquartered in Dubuque. And then we also had a Dubuque Packing Company. So meatpacking plants, okay, those two were the main employers for so many people.
And when they saw tough times at the same time, it they had to do major layoffs. And our population just left people a whole generation of people just left Dubuque. And we have.
David Martin: Stayed.
Brad Cavanagh: And well, no.
David Martin: One and raised.
Brad Cavanagh: No, I left, I actually did oh no, I am born and raised. So I was born in Dubuque. my mom worked for John Deere at the time that this all happened, and we did have to move. We moved to a small town south of Dubuque for a number of years. Came back. I graduated from high school in Dubuque, but when I graduated, it was 1996.
I just didn’t see any opportunity for myself. There, and I left, I took off, I was gone for a good 12 years. My wife and I spent some time in Saint Louis while I was gone. Dubuque became cool. And, you know, we kept seeing looking back, we had visionary leaders who did some really important things. One of the most important things that people did was they turned around and looked at the river and said, oh, there’s a river here.
We should we should highlight it. We should spend more time near it.
David Martin: We should build a river. I hate to interrupt you, but I look at your business card. It says the City of Dubuque masterpiece on the Mississippi.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, yeah, they came up with that.
David Martin: During that time. Okay.
Brad Cavanagh: And and I believe it. I think it’s true.
David Martin: Good PR.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, it’s great PR and we have great PR people.
David Martin: In it. Is it the masterpiece of the Mississippi?
Brad Cavanagh: It really is. It’s a beautiful spot. we have we have seen incredible growth. You know, one of the things we say a lot is that, we’ve we’ve been punching above our weight for a long time. Okay. And for the last, you know, 20 years, really, we have seen this incredible growth in, economic development and recognizing things like the assets that we have, the historic nature of who we are, the Mississippi, all this is great for tourism, but it’s really great for the people who live there and want to call it home.
So it’s, it’s an exciting tourist destination.
David Martin: We are.
Brad Cavanagh: We are. Yeah. So one of the things that has happened recently is we’ve had, a whole lot more riverboats that are coming up and down the Mississippi Viking was kind of a Kickstarter for a lot of this. A Viking built a cruise ship on the Mississippi River, and they now go from New Orleans all the way up to near Saint Paul in, and then other companies have jumped in to American cruise lines is another great example.
And we’ve we have regular stops of major riverboats that we haven’t seen in my entire lifetime. All of a sudden stopping there.
David Martin: Have you either have you taken a riverboat?
Brad Cavanagh: I have not, not not a good one like this. These are these are, these are really good riverboat cruises.
David Martin: I understand that there have been problems in past summers with, water levels on the Mississippi. Has that affected.
Brad Cavanagh: You? Yeah, in fact, it’s affecting us right now. I think, I think the floods did.
David Martin: Something where the ships couldn’t get through.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, we’re. I think we’re at 20ft right now and flood stage, I think around 14. so we’re not 17 I think so we’re we’re up there and we, and it’s happening right now. So, you know, last year was the third highest flood in our history since we built a flood wall. And our flood wall helped really well.
So we’re doing okay on that end of it. But the Mississippi is, temperamental waterway. It’s going to do what it wants to do, and we have to live with it. So it does affect that industry a little bit.
David Martin: So as mayor of the, masterpiece of the Mississippi, where shipping and and, you know, that kind of, cruise and, travel industry is important. What can you do to help? Well, with the.
Brad Cavanagh: You know, from the tour standpoint and that industry, I think some of the things that we’re, we’re doing is we make sure that that’s a part of who we are and make sure it’s a part of our identity. So we’ve created, real partnerships with our convention and visitors bureau. We call it travel Dubuque and they, are really doing incredible work to be able to bring people to the region.
I didn’t even mention this part yet, but my The Field of Dreams is about 25 minutes from my house. So Dyersville is one of the places that’s really close to Dubuque. We share that project in a lot of ways. In fact, the city of Dubuque, actually gave money to the city of Dyersville, which you don’t see very often to be able to build a permanent stadium at the spot.
David Martin: Been there and play baseball or watch.
Brad Cavanagh: it’s incredible to go.
David Martin: They had the all star game there a few years ago, right?
Brad Cavanagh: No, they had we’ve we’ve had two Major League Baseball teams there. Yeah. And they’re, they’re they’re like, they bring tears to people’s eyes. That’s what this experience is like. I’m not even kidding.
David Martin: Place. They’re regulars.
Brad Cavanagh: so right now we have this summer, 450 youth baseball teams coming in and playing an exhibition game at the Field of Dreams, and then also playing tournaments all over the region. Oh, that’s. So it is another big draw for sure for, you know, from a tourism standpoint. But, you know, really this kind of gets to the key, your question gets to the key of pretty much everything that we’re doing in Dubuque.
It’s all about we talk a lot about people planning and partnerships. It sounds cliche, but that’s really what it is. It’s it’s trying to create these partnerships to be able to get things done, because we recognize we can’t do it on our own. We can’t do it as one city of 60,000. we have a lot of things that people might look at as deficits.
we don’t have an interstate running through. you know, we’re not a major channel for for that. we have we’ve had challenges with airline and keeping an airline at the regional airport that we have for a city our size.
David Martin: I read about that a little bit because I did a little bit of Dubuque research and, yeah, you had, regular schedules, like, now you have none, right?
Brad Cavanagh: Well, we have we have, an ultra low cost carrier in a fellow that gets us to Orlando. They’re wonderful to work with, but that’s it doesn’t fix the problem of commuter traffic. Right. This is an interesting problem to have because we are we are the largest, metropolitan statistical area in the United States that has to drive as far as we need to to get on a plane.
It’s 80 miles is the closest place. So what that’s our argument has been. Yeah, it really is. And if you think about what that means for, you know, we have multiple colleges in town, you think about what that means for higher education in college. You think about what it means for recruiting and workforce, the ability to have headquarters there if you’re going to be, you know, for instance, John Deere and all these different places, it’s a real challenge.
And, we are going to fix it.
David Martin: How we.
Brad Cavanagh: Well, we we have,
David Martin: Okay, we have a city council meeting here. Let me show how to get you.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. No, it’s actually. Yeah. No, trust me, I’ve had this conversation many times. It’s one of the most things we talk about the most, actually. Yeah. we so again, back to partnerships. We have a great partnership with the federal Department of Transportation. We have a small community air service development grants called scarcity. It’s a program. It is for towns like us.
We don’t we don’t fits into a program called Essential Air Service. So we don’t, which basically, for lack of a better term, forces the airlines hand to make sure that they provide service to the particular community. Okay, we don’t have that. We were left out of that program years ago, so we have to have these other issues, these other programs.
So we have to come up with minimum revenue guarantees to be able to do it. The CAC program gives us a grant to be able to have a minimum revenue guarantee. So we have, that coming.
David Martin: And is the traffic there that you believe is the absolute need? Absolutely.
Brad Cavanagh: The need is absolutely there. We will we will definitely have, the need and it will remain there. So it is something that is, requirement for a city our size. It’s unacceptable that a city of our size is not receiving air service in this way. And we’ve made that known to both our federal government partners and our partners in the airline industry.
And we’ve been very, a very squeaky wheel about this particular issue.
David Martin: Do you think you’ll have it in your term?
Brad Cavanagh: Yes, I think we’ll have it this year, actually. You do, I do, yeah. I’m very, very confident that we have pushed the boulder up the hill and we are at the top and ready to be able to do this very, very soon.
David Martin: That’s not
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, it’s it has not been what it’s required though, is, you know, we got everybody around the table.
David Martin: Did you know anything about the airline industry before? I know.
Brad Cavanagh: A whole lot more than I do.
David Martin: Than I did before, but that’s got to be part of the fun. Part of the job is, you know.
Brad Cavanagh: Is it is.
David Martin: Okay to today. I’m an expert at airlines.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, it really is. Yeah. You put your you put different hats on every single day to be able to do that. And you know your show I love the name The Good Government show. You know when I think of good government, I think of what we actually did to solve this issue. We brought everybody together at the table who who didn’t always get along in our community and hasn’t always seen the airline industry in the same way, doesn’t work with the federal government in the same way.
And we put everybody on the same at the same table weekly, every single week. We sit down and have a meeting, and we hired a great consultant to be able to help us through this process and, you know, communicate with the airlines. We’ve got our airport director, the travel folks, the chamber folks are another economic development organization. Everybody’s there and we we fight like a family.
We make up like a family, and we get things, get things done. And we are going to solve this problem together because we we’ve decided that’s what it takes. And that’s how stuff gets done in the city our size.
David Martin: Okay. One of the things I wanted to talk to you about was, youth climate action. Apparently you’ve you’ve got a new grant for this. Tell me about it.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. This has been a really interesting year for that. you know, I have to thank Bloomberg Philanthropies, first and foremost for a lot of this because, you know, they they’ve been paying attention to what we’ve done in Dubuque. The mayor before me was, a gentleman named Roy Buell. He was there for 16 years when he first ran for mayor.
One of the things he ran on was a sustainability platform, and that was before sustainability was a thing everywhere. Right. So, it was it was really important to him that we, we create a sort of a brand in Dubuque because because he wanted this to be something that we really stood for and put in everything that we do.
So our sustainability office has been around for quite a while. And, Bloomberg Philanthropies has taken notice, and they invited us to go to Cop 28 last year in Dubai. And I had the honor to be able to go there, with my sustainability director. Her name is Gina Bell. She’s fantastic.
David Martin: And I’d like to buy in a little over the top. Is it?
Brad Cavanagh: Dubai was like nowhere else on Earth. It felt like, it was. They treated us wonderfully, but it felt like a science fiction movie to me. Most of the time when we were there. And. But I have to say, you know, the most the biggest impact that this had on me was being in the place where everybody that was there, where it was the most important discussions.
The on the globe, you know, and the whole world happening while we were there about how are we going to save ourselves from the things that we have wrought over time. Right. And so this gets back to the the youth climate action. So from a sustainability standpoint, you know, we’ve been able to to access some grant funding. One of them most recently was from Bloomberg Philanthropies to be able to help us identify ways in which they want to take action in our community.
So we are in the middle of that process right now, is gathering, grant applications to be able to have some really youth stories.
David Martin: Is that that surprised you?
Brad Cavanagh: you know, I have. So this is one of those places where I haven’t been quite as involved, you know, in the process because the process is going on as we speak. So, but what I am hearing from youth is, you know, there are they’re they’re looking in all directions. They’re looking at the places that are closest to them, for instance, like, what are we going to do with food in the cafeteria?
That’s all wasted, you know, because that actually is a really that’s that’s a major contributor to methane gas in a landfill, for example. And to see you identified.
David Martin: As half a sandwich.
Brad Cavanagh: Sort of like, what can we do with that? And how can we do it on a larger scale? So every single school in the community, every single college in the community, you know, making really work together. It was one of the ideas that a young woman floated when we had our initial kickoff. You know, the grant kickoff for that.
Okay. and then also, you know, youth organizations getting together and being able to do these things together, that it’s I didn’t realize how many different organizations were actually existing that we could harness to do something about this particular issue. And that’s the exciting thing about having a grant like this.
David Martin: Okay, I understand. Well, your your background, you’re a professor, social work professor.
Brad Cavanagh: Yes, I was, I, I know I no longer teach, but it was, it is the most full time, part time job that I’ve ever had in my life.
David Martin: As a city.
Brad Cavanagh: Manager. Yeah, we have a city manager. He’s been there for 30 years. he’s he’s fantastic. You know, for the last two years, my wife and I decided that I was going to treat this more as a full time position and really try to help shepherd along this, this change that we’ve had after having a mayor for 16 years.
My wife works full time in the health care industry. works in administration now for a federally qualified health center. And, it’s been, a challenging time for health care. So we really we focused on her job and had me do this. we also own a small business on the side, too, to kind of help with some things, too.
But we don’t.
David Martin: Have to do it.
Brad Cavanagh: Because I don’t have enough to do. Right. And, and, you know, like when I say full time, part time job, it’s a full time time, part time pay. So, yes, it does require a mayor to be able to do something else, you know, in my role.
David Martin: Okay.
Brad Cavanagh: But yeah, I going back though, I, I’m a social worker. That’s my background.
David Martin: So how does a how does being a social worker help you be a better parent?
Brad Cavanagh: I think, those skills that I have learned in a 20 year career in social work has been the the most useful as I go through this process. You know, I spent a lot of time, doing counseling in various different forms when I was in, practicing in social work before I started teaching full time. And, you know, the skills you use when you are listening to someone very well and then summarizing what they’ve said and being able to really, you know, bring a conversation to a point and, and move people in a direction that would be more solution focused.
Those are skills that social workers have that I, you know, thankfully, have learned that I find very, very useful as we try to solve bigger problems on a larger scale. I think, you know, social workers learn how to do this kind of thing in a way that I think is, is, is very useful for, for government roles in elected roles like this one.
David Martin: So I read about you, you had when you ran for office, you talked about a couple some things you wanted to get done. You were talking about, creating jobs in Dubuque. more housing in Dubuque, in child care. How are you doing on your goals?
Brad Cavanagh: Actually? Really? Well, I’m glad you reminded me about these things. Yeah. No, actually. Really?
David Martin: Well, if I do say so myself.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. Well, again, though, with partnerships, I mean, this is one of those things because one of the things that was important when I ran, it was important to me is that I wasn’t I wasn’t going to pretend that I’m going to show up and bring things to the table that are now going to be the issue that everybody cares about, right?
Right. I actually I ran on things that were already things that were very important to people and people were already talking about. And I recognized that what we needed in Dubuque, in terms of leadership in that moment, was a leader who was going to stand up and take the take the torch and start to keep running with it and the things that they’re already working on.
I’ll start with housing. we have had incredible success in housing in Dubuque. It surprised me, even in what we’ve been able to pull off. And it was really through encouragement from the economic development agency that we have in our community called the Greater Deep Development Corporation, and then also from developers themselves coming to the city and saying, hey, we really want to do this work.
How can we work with you to be able to create more housing? So we created more incentives. We actually, you know, to get into the weeds for a second. we use things like tax increment financing and tax abatement and looked at them creatively in a way that we could then, create housing in the places where we really wanted it.
And the types of housing that we really, we really wanted. So we asked developers specifically, you know, we said we need housing of all sorts, but we especially need it downtown. We need it to be workforce housing that people can afford. We need low income housing that people can afford. So come and build that stuff here and they’re doing it.
We we had a study that said this 100 unit.
David Martin: Many cities across America. It is how were we able to pull it off. So that is in many.
Brad Cavanagh: It was really with those partnerships. Again, I mean, it was really sitting down with people at the table and saying, what’s going to work for you, what’s going to work for you and work for us at the same time and work for this entire community. And then pulling it off. And we had good data to work with. We knew we needed 1100 units.
At least that’s how short we were. So we we created these incentives. We rolled out the red carpet and said, come on, let’s go. And we had a city council that that really didn’t sort of we didn’t give in when the arguments weren’t there that, that really said that we really shouldn’t do housing. So, you know, the idea of not in my backyard is kind of a pejorative term, and I don’t like using it because I think people have legitimate concerns in their neighborhood.
Sure. When you’re going to.
David Martin: Build something, nobody likes change. Nobody likes.
Brad Cavanagh: Well, and it’s hard and.
David Martin: Nobody likes their their cheese moves.
Brad Cavanagh: And we haven’t built anything substantially in Dubuque for 20 years, you know. So, when people showed up at the meeting, every single time we tried to rezone something or do a development agreement for housing, every single time there were neighbors who were concerned and showed up and spoke about it. But every single time we listened to those concerns, respectfully discuss them fully, and then move to the project forward.
So we now have over 2300 units in the pipeline in some way, being built in Dubuque to be able to to move housing forward. So the housing piece is doing very, very well. It is good government. And it was it’s been it’s been a, I think a really healthy discussion for our community to have child care is another great one.
We’ve had some great success. And this was again huge partnerships. there’s some a nonprofit organization called Dubuque Initiatives that, got together and pulled a bunch of different people together and accessed funds, had funds already from the sale of a building that they had so had funds already, and then access more funds both federally and state. And we actually, bought a an old building in an industrial park of all places, but a place where there were a lot of workers who needed childcare and bought this building.
And then, worked with several different partners within the building to basically have, different tenants in there, but mainly childcare. It’s a huge new childcare center. And then on top of that, we’ve created a program with funding that comes from employers to be able to pay childcare workers more and recruit more childcare workers into the industry, because we didn’t want to just build a new childcare center and then have, you know, take you just basically take kids from another child care center, put them there, and then what happens to this other childcare center?
Right. So we we’ve kind of come at the problem from both directions. And it really appears to be working. We’re in the middle of that process right now. Opening the new childcare center. It’s open and it’s being accessed. And then this new program with funding is actually starting to work.
David Martin: Okay, we’re going to take a break and we’re going to come back and we’re going to talk about your philosophy of government. Okay.
After you get done with this episode, hear more good government stories with our friends at How to Really Run a City for Mayors Kasim Reed of Atlanta and Michael Nutter of Philadelphia, and their co-host, journalist and author Larry Platt talk with guests and other mayors about how to really get stuff done in cities around the nation. Check them out where you’re listening now or through their nonprofit news site, The Philadelphia Citizen. Org slash podcasts.
All right. So this is our Good Government show questionnaire. This gets to the heart of how you really think and feel about government. Are you ready? Okay. I’m ready. I understand you are a longtime city councilman.
Brad Cavanagh: I was a city council member for two years, actually.
David Martin: Oh, two years. And now you’ve been mayor for three years.
Brad Cavanagh: For for two and a half.
David Martin: Two and a half? Yeah, I got all my numbers wrong. There we go. For a reason. All right. From being, city councilman and now mayor to find good government.
Brad Cavanagh: I think good government is based on relationships. It’s old school of politics. It’s the way that I think things used to get done when people genuinely respected each other and cared about one another, and really did want to try and should create good old politics. Yeah, yeah. Because there’s a part there’s a lot of good stuff from old politics.
If you look back in history, you know, I always like to think about the, the, the Ronald Reagan tip O’Neill days, right? When you had these, these two people who were on different sides, but they got along right. And I was I was pretty young when that all happened, but I’ve read about it, so I kind of know what that was like.
And you know, what I, what I fear is that people haven’t seen good government like that for a long time. But what I’ve learned is that it’s all about those relationships. It really is about, building relationships with with people that maybe you don’t totally agree with all the time, but you can agree on some things. You can at least respect each other as human beings, and when you sit down at the table, you’re going to get some stuff done.
David Martin: How do you know if you’re doing a good job?
Brad Cavanagh: Because you start to see results, and you win when you see those people that you have those relationships with, you continue to have positive interactions with one another. when I go to Washington, D.C., and I sit down with our, our congressional delegation, for example, and their staff, we’re genuinely happy to see one another. We we’re glad to be there having this conversation about whatever we’re talking about.
And then we start to see results from those things. We have federal money that comes our way to be able to build the things we need to build and do the things we need to do. those results are the things that matter to people most.
David Martin: If people don’t like what they see, what would you like them to do if they don’t think they’re getting good government? But what should they do?
Brad Cavanagh: That’s where communication really comes in. And I think that what, what I’ve tried to do as mayor and I think I’m being pretty successful with this and my council is to is inviting that discussion. If there is a challenge that people have that they don’t see what they want to see, I want to hear about it. And I want to actually listen and actually listen.
Yeah, actually listen. Not just pretend to listen or not just make somebody feel like they’re listened to, but actually listen, actually think about it and then have a real discussion about the pros and cons of whatever argument is being made, and move things forward through a real human interaction. You know, I think that that’s what it really takes.
David Martin: You’re out in town. You mentioned you have a young son. So are you at the Little League football games and baseball games do it. Everything good people stop you. You going?
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. Going back to the beginning of the conversation. That’s one of things I love the most, is that I get to do the same stuff that everybody else does, and they see me everywhere that that they go. I’m obviously I’m not going to be everywhere all the time. Right. But I, you know, there are certain things that I.
David Martin: Do extra like sometimes to go to the hardware.
Brad Cavanagh: Store. Yeah. My, my kids, you know, there are certain events that my children don’t love going to with me because they know that I’m going to get stops along the way. especially, you know, outdoor festivals in the summertime. Sure. They can’t go in there and hang out with me. And because I’m going to get stopped to have to have conversations, which I love, but I can understand that I can be free.
David Martin: Yeah. Can we just go? Can we please move forward?
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, but it’s, Yeah, it really is. That’s one of the things I like. I like going and, you know, to the grocery store and having somebody stop you and talk about a few things.
David Martin: It’s love that I.
Brad Cavanagh: Actually.
David Martin: Do. Yeah. So if you’re, if you’re listening in Dubuque, you could, you could stuff the mayor any.
Brad Cavanagh: Time it’s, you know, whether they’re listening or not, it’s going to happen.
David Martin: So it’s fair enough now that you’ve been mayor for a little while, what would you like people to know about the job and what would you like? People know about government and how it works.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. Give you you know, first thing I want people to recognize is that, we I think we need to treat each other as real people. I think it’s easy to look at any level of government and just treat somebody like a caricature. you know, a, some sort of mythological figure who exists there when really I’m, I’m just a person like anybody else.
And any elected person is the same. They’re they’re a person like anybody else. So we should talk to each other that way. That’s how we should treat each other. We shouldn’t tweet at each other. We shouldn’t, you know, yell at each other through the news media or in any other way. We shouldn’t treat each other disrespectfully when we see each other, you know, that’s we should we should work together and just have a real conversation.
and then, you know, it’s hard to do now. I, I, at times it can be. Yeah. I don’t know, for me personally, it’s kind of just my Mo and I try to keep it that way, but I have to consciously think about it. You know, I have to wake up in the morning and recognize that this is what I’m trying to be as an elected person.
And I want people to continue to have faith in government. It’s really important to me that we rebuild the trust in government in general in the United States.
David Martin: That’d be nice.
Brad Cavanagh: I, I did not anticipate, when I ran for mayor that I would be talking about our democracy so much, but I do and I it’s it’s very real. Democracy is going to be saved and, sort of refreshed through local government. That’s where it’s going to happen in the United States.
David Martin: Well, that was the message at one of the, you know.
Brad Cavanagh: Symposiums where it’s been the message for a while. And it’s absolutely true. when, you know, when you do when you when you actually look at the polling, I mean, you can see that the level of trust is eroded at so many levels. And, and it comes through in the action. You know, Congress has not been very functional of late.
They have not been able to get a whole lot done. And they’ll tell you that themselves. But on the local level, we get something done every time we meet every two weeks and we have a regularly scheduled meeting. We do real things for real people. And that’s where I think we can rebuild that trust. And I think it we need to pay attention to that and pay attention to each other and rebuild that trust.
David Martin: But there’s a challenge that you have, at the local level because national election, you know, you get more people to come out and vote, local election, you get half the voters.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah.
David Martin: But those are the people who are voting for the people who actually directly affect them more. How do you bridge that? You know.
Brad Cavanagh: So much of this is on the candidates themselves. And I say that as somebody who is run, what I recognized is that when, when I ran and when other people have run and they have done the work, they show up at the community meetings, they literally knock on people’s doors and go and talk to them one on one.
When that work is done, the the numbers go up. There’s still not going to be the the 50% that we see for a presidential election, which is still its own problem. but they are they’re better than they were for the previous election when people weren’t working very hard. You know, I think that candidates need to be they need to be real.
They need to get themselves out there. They need to talk to people about what people really want to talk about, even if they disagree with each other. You know, I, I’ve stood on.
David Martin: Like mall.
Brad Cavanagh: Doors. I actually love knocking on doors, I really do. I it’s it’s kind of a weird thing I like I mean, it’s good exercise, you know, running around the neighborhood. But I do love the conversations. And I’ve had some long conversations, you know, that the campaign managers are going to tell you don’t spend any more than, you know, three minutes on anybody’s front step.
25 minutes later, you’re still listening to this person who really wants to give you a piece of their mind about the things they’re upset about. And after that conversation, if you can at least look at each other and say, thank you for having a conversation today, you’ve done something. I mean, that’s that I think that that’s where that trust is rebuilt.
But I think the candidates have to do the work and that really gets people to show up. outside of that, it is a real challenge. I mean, we don’t we don’t gather in the same way as we used to. It’s not the same that it was before. We’re more isolated than we’ve ever been. And I think that we have to we have to work on that as a society together, too.
David Martin: So two part question first, what’s the best part of the job?
Brad Cavanagh: The best part of the job is, is actually being able to help people in a very real way. I’m really satisfied when, I feel like I’ve done something real for someone that is actually very helpful. I that’s the whole reason I ran. I wanted to do more for my community. I wanted to do more in the world.
Brad Cavanagh: And when you do that, it’s it’s incredibly gratifying.
David Martin: What’s the hardest part of the job?
Brad Cavanagh: the hardest part of the job is what I was just describing a minute ago about our our lack of trust in our lack of interaction with one another. it’s it’s seeing it’s seeing the reality of, how unhealthy our democracy really is. That’s it’s frightening at times. It’s really challenging. it’s difficult when we are. It makes it difficult to be able to talk to each other and, keep that respect there.
So I think that’s the hardest part of the job for sure.
David Martin: So you are a guy who makes news in Dubuque. Where do you get your news? What do you read? What do you look at?
Brad Cavanagh: I try, I, I try to read, from both ends of the political spectrum and then stay in the middle most of the time. So I work really hard to, get my news from Fox News, because that’s where most Republicans get their news, right? That’s that’s, it’s pretty, I think gets it pretty well established. when you look at the, the where Democrats get their news, it’s a little more mixed, but it’s something a little bit further on the left.
So, I generally read the. So I, and I like to read I don’t like watching news very much. And, I do listen sometimes, but I don’t I like to read mostly. So I read Fox News, I read the New York Times and the editorial board from the New York Times, and then I try to go to the AP a lot of times right in the middle, sometimes CNN right in the middle, and try to keep it there.
So I, I look for both ends of the spectrum to see where the ends are and then try to figure out the news. That’s a factually based news from the middle. but I’m not.
David Martin: An easy job sometimes.
Brad Cavanagh: No it’s not.
David Martin: And I still a daily newspaper interview.
Brad Cavanagh: There is. There’s a daily, locally owned local newspaper in Dubuque. It is a it it is.
David Martin: You get home delivery.
Brad Cavanagh: Part. I don’t get it in print any longer. I get it on my phone and I appreciate that. I so I every day I read it on my phone read it this morning.
David Martin: So yeah just get get home delivery. It helps.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, yeah.
David Martin: Please get home delivery. Yeah. The next newspaper. Yeah. who’s your political hero? Who inspired you to get into politics?
Brad Cavanagh: You know, I, I, I really appreciated the life story of Robert Kennedy. Robert Kennedy, I think, you know, he was a complicated figure. He started off, you know, working with Joe McCarthy, for example, and, you know, the during the whole Red scare and things that were going on in the 1950s. And then by the time he was running for president, he actually was a champion of civil rights and in a way that he hadn’t been before.
Right. he was. And you know what? What really inspired me most about Robert Kennedy was that he was, he’s so very human. He was just he for somebody who could easily be very removed from society. He gave a lot of he demonstrated a lot of examples for us about ways to treat people in a very human way and meet people where they are.
And I that’s, you know, going back to the social work piece of it. That’s something that I learned that I try to take very seriously. You have to you have to go to people where they are in their life and in their experience. You can’t expect them to always come to where you’re sitting. You got to go to them.
And so that he has inspired me, I think, quite a bit. And then there’s some local ones, too. There’s a woman named Terry Goodman who has been, involved with city government at in Dubuque for a very long time. I have learned more from Terry Goodman in two years as mayor than anybody else. She knows how to get things done.
She knows how relationships work.
David Martin: Did she call you up? Everybody said, go now. Listen, Brad, we have to talk.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And I listen closely. There is one of those people you have to have those mentors.
David Martin: Yes you do.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah.
David Martin: So you have to you have to keep you have to keep hearing it. Yeah. you know, I know you said you started in social work and studied at college. Did you ever think about going into office? Were you school? Yeah.
Brad Cavanagh: No, no, no, I actually that’s one of the things I said a lot. You know, people were like, oh, are you always trying to be mayor? You know, is that something you’re always thinking about? And I’ll tell you that the 18 year old version of Brad.
David Martin: Yes.
Brad Cavanagh: Would laugh at you if you told him he was going to be the mayor of the town that he was in at that moment. Yeah, yeah, it was not something I thought about it. I started thinking about it seriously in graduate school. you know, I actually it was it was here in the state of Missouri. I actually, went to Jefferson City for a day and did some advocacy for, you know, a political science class that I was taking for graduate school.
We had to do a policy course in social work school, and, I remember that day because, you know, I, I walked into the office, Russ Carnahan was actually my, representative in the city of Saint Louis. I walked into the office and there were lobbyists all there, you know, that had been sitting in waiting. And I came in and said, I’m a constituent, and I’d like to speak to Representative Carney.
He comes running out of his office to come and see me and pulls my wife and I back to the office to have a conversation. And it just clicked in that moment that, oh my gosh, we can. That’s the type of access that you can have to your elected representative. Like that’s somebody. That’s how that’s supposed to work.
And it sort of began a little light, a fire in that moment. And then really the moment that I decided to run for something was election night 2016. And, what I tell people is the absolute truth of this. It wasn’t necessarily which candidate won in which candidate lost in the presidential election of 2016. It was the way it all went down.
It felt like I was watching the whole system break right in front of me because it was just there was just nothing but anger and vitriol for that entire election. And I just want to be a good person and do good stuff. And we need more people who just want to be good people and do good things. Running for office.
David Martin: That that is a great philosophy, by the way. okay, so Dubuque, the, masterpiece of the Mississippi, a tourist Mecca, is for the greater, Iowa area. if I’m coming to town, where are you taking me? What are we having? What’s what’s the what’s the dish of Dubuque?
Brad Cavanagh: Oh, the dish of Dubuque. Yeah.
David Martin: We’ve got such.
Brad Cavanagh: A great restaurant. Actually, there is such a thing. It’s called a turkey and dressing sandwich. It’s bread on bread, basically, is what it is. So you, you know, you take turkey and dressing and put it together, but then you put it on a standard white bun, you know, just a regular, regular old bun. And you put it there and you have it.
Everybody’s got at their graduation party. It’s what people eat at weddings. It’s like the thing in Dubuque. It’s so interesting.
David Martin: I never heard of this before.
Brad Cavanagh: I know. Yeah, it’s very, very Dubuque.
David Martin: Yeah. It is a turkey dressing.
Brad Cavanagh: Turkey and dressing sandwich.
David Martin: Yeah. Is there a little pieces of turkey in there somewhere? Well, there’s turkey.
Brad Cavanagh: In there too. Yeah, there’s actual turkey. Yeah. But that mix it with the dressing. But you know, the funny thing is a lot of times you eat it and you don’t even put anything on it. So it’s very bready.
David Martin: You know how it is.
Brad Cavanagh: I love it. I grew up on it. It’s good stuff along with that. But we have like how.
David Martin: How often do you have it?
Brad Cavanagh: Oh, I don’t have it that often. As you get older, you realize you shouldn’t really eat that much bread all at once, you know, so it doesn’t make you feel very good.
David Martin: All right. Go ahead. Yeah.
Brad Cavanagh: So there’s that. There’s all kinds of great restaurants in Dubuque. I mean, we have some really good food there. He’s got great chefs. so we, we, we know our cuisine as well. So we actually do a lot of those things. I’m going to take you to a place called the Fenelon Place Elevator. It is the shortest, steepest railway in the United States.
And it was built, to go right up the bluff. So you start at the bottom and you just go straight up the bluff, and then you get off at the top. It’s a little rail car and it’s all. It’s just sort of a dumbwaiter system where the two cars pass one another right. it is it’s probably the most popular tourist tourist attraction that we have, outside of the river itself and all the great parks we have and things like that.
the story with it is it’s real short version. A guy built it for himself. He worked at a bank and, back a long, long time ago, early 1900s. Built this for himself as he wanted to go home and take a nap in the afternoon after lunch. And he couldn’t do it because he had to get the horse and carriage up the hill, and it took too long.
So he built this thing for himself, and they kept it around. actually had another one in town for, for a period of time, but it’s a great tourist attraction. Beautiful view of the city, too, when you get to the top.
David Martin: Okay. I the the this the breading sandwich, though, I.
Brad Cavanagh: Yeah, I really got you stuck on that.
David Martin: Now I try that, all right. This is the good government. Shall we always bring it back to good government? Tell me about a good government project that you’ve created, that you’re excited about.
Brad Cavanagh: So, you know, I’m really excited to get those airlines back because we’re going to do it. I think that’s been really good government. but we, you know, we are probably, looking at being able to access a major federal grant very soon. and we’re very, very excited because it is a major infrastructure project to be able to separate the road from the rail line that is running through our town.
You know, we’re an old river town, so we’ve got a rail line coming right through. and we’re going to be needing to build an overpass there so we can continue to build the workforce that we need, get people where they need to go. It’s right in the middle of a neighborhood that is actually, one of our more economically disadvantaged neighborhoods.
So we’re really excited about projects like that one. but to be honest, you know, for us right now, it isn’t just one project in Dubuque. I keep telling everybody, even just half the things that we’re thinking about doing and, you know, and thinking about happening this summer actually happen. It’s going to be a really exciting summer in the city, Dubuque, and I’m pretty confident that we’re going to be able to do most of what we’re trying to do.
David Martin: Well, I have to say, you have won me over. I never thought about going to Dubuque, Iowa, and now I’m now I’m intrigued.
Brad Cavanagh: I cannot wait to welcome you. I’ll have the turkey dressing waiting for you. All right, all right.
David Martin: We will do that. Mayor Brett Kavanaugh, mayor of Dubuque, Iowa, the, masterpiece of the Mississippi. Can’t wait to check it out. Thanks for doing this.
Brad Cavanagh: Thanks for having me.
David Martin: Thank you. Where do you get your news from? Where do you get your state and local government news from? Because that’s getting harder and harder. And it’s essential to stay updated with your community. And it’s becoming increasingly important to know what’s going on in other cities and states, because they’re likely facing challenges that you’re grappling with, too, are you’re going to face eventually.
That’s why we’d like to welcome our new partner, route 50, to the show. Route 50 is a leading online publication covering state and local governments across the country. They’ve written about states protecting themselves against the rise in cyber attacks, counties using AI to better support citizens services, local responses to crumbling infrastructure and extreme weather, and much, much more.
There’s a lot there. It’s a one stop shop for issues affecting state and local governments and their residents. That’s you. That’s all of us. Do yourself a favor and go to route 50.com to see the topics and solutions they cover, and learn what other people in government are doing. They also deliver a daily newsletter called route 50. Today.
I see it in my inbox every morning. I check it out and you should too. Thanks again. Route 50. We’re excited to have you on board and being a partner here at the Good Government Show.
What is it the county government does? That’s the question county commissioners get asked the most. And the simple answer is everything on the Good Government show. We’re so lucky to have talked with so many county commissioners and other county officials that have shown us how effective county government is. County government dates back to get this 1634, making it one of the oldest forms of government in the United States.
Think about it. Roads. Highways. Hospitals. Schools. Recycling. Law enforcement. Water. Sewers, and most of the county. Those services are maintained by the county that’s county government. The National Association of Counties represents all 3069 counties across the USA. Naco helps county government work better together through things like sharing best practices. When county government works well, well, that’s just good government.
The coolest gig I’ll ever have in my whole life. That’s what we want to hear from the mayor or from any elected leader. We always want to hear good government stories and putting everyone together to create an efficient and necessary air service. Well, that sounds like good government in action. Oh, and it saves me a two hour drive when I visit Dubuque for that turkey and dressing sandwich.
Anyway, housing, childcare and saving the environment and bringing people together to do it. That’s good government. And that’s what Dubuque Mayor Brad Cavanaugh is working on. Good to hear. Well, that’s our show. Thanks for listening. Please like us and share this with your friends, or review us right here where you’re listening and check out our website. Good government show.com for extras.
Join us again for another episode of Right Here where you’re listening. I’m Dave Martin and this is the Good Government show.
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**This transcription was created using digital tools and has not been edited by a live person. We apologize for any discrepancies or errors.