For a long time, geography and political boundaries have defined the limits of cooperation in Warren County. Factors like what city someone represents, or whether they’re from the top or bottom of Hopewell Hill, have acted like roadblocks on the path to cooperation.

Local leaders have described the situation as everyone competing for their own team. Recently, however, Warren County’s heads of state and community leaders have been removing those blocks and replacing competition with collaboration.

The county presiding commissioner, mayors, superintendents, community board presidents and chamber of commerce executives have been meeting every two months for what they’ve dubbed the “Warren County Municipal Team.” At each gathering, representatives discuss a topic of common interest, talk about what’s going on in their area and share helpful information or experiences with one another.

Recently they’ve discussed possible improvements to the emergency sirens throughout the county, and how the whole region can benefit from economic development initiatives.

It’s a level of cooperation several leaders said they haven’t seen during their time in public office.

“We just didn’t talk about issues that we could help each other out with,” said Warrenton Mayor Eric Schleuter. “Now we can share information ... that is for the betterment of our cities to be able to pull together.”

He said that the group discusses topics like equipment purchases, what has worked well or not for different projects, and in general what different cities and agencies are doing. Each city can then use that information to inform its decision making.

“It’s beneficial for everybody to talk together, work together, and not be so separate,” Schleuter said. “The egos are set aside when we go in there, and that’s a breath of fresh air. ... Even I can be an ego and prideful about our town sometimes. But the amount of people who set that aside to be able to share that information, I applaud each one of them.”

Marthasville Mayor David Lange said he also is enthusiastic about the gatherings.

“I think it’s a very good positive for the Warren County region to have these municipal meetings,” Lange commented.

He said staying informed about neighboring communities has been helpful, especially when it comes to difficult topics. For example, when the issue of medical marijuana became prevalent, Lange said the mayors discussed how their cities were each approaching regulations.

Lange said emergency sirens are a topic he has hoped to work with area leaders on for several years. He explained that right now, local governments control their own independent sirens.

Lange is hoping discussions can lead to a county-wide siren network that can be controlled entirely from the Warren County 911 Dispatch Center.

Team origins

Early efforts toward cooperation began in 2017 during a joint effort to oppose state tolling on Interstate 70.

But a focused push for collaboration didn’t gain momentum until now-Presiding Commissioner Joe Gildehaus started campaigning for the Warren County Commission in 2018.

One of Gildehaus’ campaign issues was active communication and working together with local governments, which he said was missing when he ran for office. After starting with just himself and the mayors, Gildehaus said they decided to formalize their gatherings and expand to include school districts, economic development groups and representatives of smaller communities that don’t have mayors.

“When we had that first meeting, everybody showed up and you could hear the excitement. They said, ‘Wow, this is something we’ve never done,” Gildehaus said. “In order for us to be successful as a county, we need to work together as one. ... When we all work together, we’re going to get a lot of things done.”

Besides talking about issues of concern in each area, Gildehaus said the group forum can address anything that affects the entire county. That could be the siren topic, state issues, roads or anything else.

Chad Eggen, executive director of Boonslick Regional Planning Commission, said he’s happy to see all the local town leaders coming together. Boonslick is a community planning service that works with towns in three counties, but Eggen said local districts often stayed isolated from each other.

“What one does affects another one. When all the mayors can be there and talk through things, it helps exponentially,” Eggen commented.

Boonslick hosts the Municipal Team gatherings every other month. Eggen said regularly meeting is a good way for representatives to understand how local issues fit together on a larger scale. Building relationships helps each group understand the others and how they can help each other.

Eggen added that he is glad to see the inclusion of school districts, business groups and smaller communities such as Lake Sherwood.

“That inclusion is going to be important to the future,” he commented.

The Municipal Team’s upcoming meeting Dec. 9 will focus on the recent expansion of the Warren County Jail that is slated for completion within a month.