An exchange of ideas

Two river towns 70 miles apart think they just may have something to teach one another.

Cape Girardeau and Paducah, Ky., are about to embark on something unusual in the world of city government: an exchange program. On May 22, Cape Girardeau Mayor Jay Knudtson and city council members will travel to Paducah to meet their counterparts and attend municipal meetings. Additionally, Cape Girardeau department heads will spend the day in Paducah shadowing their counterparts in public works, engineering and other fields.

Later, Paducah will return the favor by sending a delegation north. The exchange was decided several weeks ago during an informal meeting in Paducah between the two mayors and city managers. Everyone liked the idea of an exchange and only needed to agree on one thing: which city would go first?

"We flipped a coin right there in Mayor Paxton's office," Knudtson said.

It seemed, both mayors said, a natural connection for two cities with notable similarities. Both are medium-sized compared to other municipalities in their states. Cape Girardeau, at 36,240 people, is the 18th most populous municipality in Missouri. Paducah, with 25,575 people, is the 12th most populous in Kentucky.

Artist Mark Palmer bought this condemned building (INSET) about five years ago for $1 and converted it into a fine arts gallery and his home in lowertown Paducah, Ky. (DIANE L. WILSON ~ semissourian.com)

Probably most importantly, both serve as the medical and commercial hubs for their regions.

But for Cape Girardeau, the first to send its city staff, it's the differences that are most interesting.

Knudtson likes, in particular, a regular meeting Paducah holds with area leaders. Once monthly, many of the city's business leaders, city and county government officials, hospital and university officials meet to update one another on what is happening in their respective fields.

"I just think communication in a community is so important, to let everybody know what's going on and so they stay enthusiastic and can answer questions when stuff comes up," said Mayor Bill Paxton, 61, a retired banker in his second term as Paducah mayor.

Paducah city manager James Zumwalt agrees it's a valuable tool. "It basically allows all the folks playing a role in economic development to stay on the same page. To make sure we don't miss an opportunity because someone doesn't know about it," he said.

Artist Mark Palmer bought this condemned building for a dollar and converted it into a fine arts gallery and his home in lowertown Paducah, Ky. (DIANE L. WILSON ~ semissourian.com)

The meetings, which are closed to the press and public, are described as free-flows of information. Each representative is expected to give updates on developments in his or her field.

Cape Girardeau has a similar monthly meeting of the leading lights in the business world, First Friday Coffee, held at the Show Me Center, but its reputation is more as a place to see and be seen than one to make deals.

"While I believe we do a good job of working in a cooperative manner with Jackson as well as the county commission and the university, we don't have necessarily a formal process that fosters that cooperation. We do that through various lunches and spontaneous meetings, so I'm real curious to see what goes into this," Knudtson said.

Another difference between the cities is revenue sources. Cape Girardeau relies on a general 1 percent sales tax for 44 percent of its total revenue. Paducah, on the other hand, relies on a payroll tax for 43 percent of its $28.3 million total revenue.

The payroll tax is little more than a 2 percent tax on all wages and salaries earned inside Paducah city limits. City commissioners may vote to increase or decrease it without a vote from the residents. It was last raised to 2 percent in October of 2005.

Payroll tax revenue tends to fluctuate less than sales tax, which rises and falls more dramatically in reaction to the economic climate, Paducah officials say.

"Obviously the key to a payroll tax is to get new jobs all the time. Whether it's in retail or medical or river-related or industry, if you keep growing your jobs, the payroll is going to come up," said Paxton.

"It fluctuates if you suffer a major job loss and it blossoms if you have a major employment boom, but it normally does not change dramatically," said Zumwalt.

Cape Girardeau has begun to look for more consistent sources of revenue.

"My focus has always been on bringing retail here because the retail sales is the revenue stream that drives our budget; well, Paducah doesn't have any sales tax, so I'll be interested to drill down a little deeper to understand their budget," Knudtson said.

Cape Girardeau is also interested to see how its southern neighbors have tackled controversial issues. Beginning April 1, the entire city of Paducah went smoke-free. The ordinance approved by commissioners in a 3 to 2 vote means smoking is no longer permitted in any of Paducah's restaurants, bars, hotel lobbies as well as most other public places.

"Like with anything worthwhile, it's not going to be easy," Paxton said. "And while I have been getting steady complaints from bars that count on smokers, never in the six years I've been mayor have I had more positive comments about an issue."

Paxton said the city decided not to put the smoking issue up for a referendum, but instead chose to tackle it as a commission.

"I'm a conservative and I usually believe less government is better, so this was a tough one to endorse. But you look at how nonsmoking is sweeping the country and it only made sense this was something for us to do," he said.

Knudtson agreed cities fighting against the smoke-free trend are in a losing battle.

"I will tell you there will be a time when Cape Girardeau is smoke free. Whether that happens under my watch or not remains to be seen. To this point I have believed it is something best addressed on the state level because that brings some consistency issues into play," said Knudtson, adding that the city has begun looking at no-smoking ordinances in other cities.

Regardless of what issues are discussed, some of the most valuable information is likely to come from the simple act of interacting with city staff who do the same job in different places.

"I think all professions, journalists and everybody else have professional associations, meetings and national conferences, but it's very unusual for folks to actually go and watch how they do things in their environment. And I think that's extremely valuable," Zumwalt said.

tgreaney@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 245