Mayor Susan Whelchel
Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star
By Steve Plunkett
If you want to schedule time with Mayor Susan Whelchel, call quick.
This month she will be at the Allianz Championship Golf Tournament, which she wooed to the city to become one of Boca Raton’s signature events. In March comes the Festival of the Arts Boca. In between are the usual City Council meetings and workshops, meetings with neighborhood groups, brown-bag lunches with small businesses.
And on March 31 comes the real calendar-crunching event, the council’s yearly organizational meeting in which she will pass the mayor’s gavel to her successor. Term limits are bringing Whelchel’s six years as mayor to an end.
“I’ll probably take a few months off and maybe go on a vacation,” she said. “I have no immediate plans other than to catch up with my nine grandchildren.”
The jewels in her crown include the Allianz Golf Championship, which she connected with the Broken Sound Club in 2007, the Don Estridge High Tech Middle School on the old IBM campus and the successful luring of Office Depot, ADT, Lord & Taylor and other businesses, which added more than 5,000 jobs to the city.
“That was definitely one of her achievements as mayor, attracting businesses to Boca,” County Commissioner Steven Abrams, her predecessor, said. “She really led the city out of the recession.”
Whelchel was born in Waycross, Ga., but moved at barely a month old to northeast Florida. She got a bachelor’s degree at Jacksonville University and started out teaching social studies in high school. She married John Whelchel and lived in Lake Mary before coming to Boca Raton in 1977. The Whelchels’ business, Florida Aquastore, needed access to Miami’s airport, which at the time was the only one in South Florida providing international flights.
She busied herself working at the business, which builds water tanks and wastewater treatment plants, raising their four children and volunteering at their schools and the Boca Raton Junior League.
“I lived here 20 years uninvolved in city politics,” she said.
But in 1994 her youngest was starting college and the Junior League wanted one of their own on the City Council. League leaders went around the room asking who could serve.
“I had the time — I think that’s important,” Whelchel said. “You just can’t do this half-heartedly.”
Also factoring into her decision to enter politics was the fact that her two oldest children, who had finished college, did not return to Boca Raton. Their friends didn’t either.
“That really got me thinking. Why? The answer was always the same. Always. It’s that there was nothing for them to come back to except for their own family,” Whelchel said.
No culture, no top-notch recreation programs. The educational system needed improvements.
“But most importantly, there was not a lot of jobs,” Whelchel said.
She was elected to the council in 1995 and re-elected in 1997 and 1999. She was term-limited in 2000 and appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to the Palm Beach County School Board for a two-year term. She again won elections to the council in 2003 and 2005.
From the start, her goal was to create a business environment with corporations that would bring young people with college degrees back to the community.
“I think we have accomplished that, with the ability to retain a small-town feel,” Whelchel said. “The community is so giving to others that I believe it provides a sense of place for anyone that is interested in being engaged and involved.”
She ran unopposed for mayor in 2008. Almost simultaneously the city faced the nationwide recession.
“So I have spent my six years in office in a difficult economic environment,” Whelchel said.
Boca Raton survived by making layoffs and cutbacks, closing parks and postponing projects. But the city also kept its taxes “reliable and reasonable,” she said. “We created a sustainable city and a triple-A bond rating,” the mayor said. “That is a huge statement.”
Whelchel notes she is only the third female mayor in the city’s 89-year history, following Dorothy Wilken in 1976 and Carol Hanson in 1995, compared with 29 men. Mayoral portraits adorn a wall in council chambers.
“There’s a bunch of gentlemen up there but only three sweet faces,” she said.
Whelchel takes pride in having created the city’s Green Living Task Force, its business development program and its education liaison. She was instrumental in bringing Urban Design Associates, which developed the downtown design guidelines, to the community.
She’s also pleased with the city’s new Planned Mobility zoning areas, which were developed under her watch to encourage less driving to work and stores. One of the PM areas is the Arvida Park of Commerce, which before was zoned “light industrial” even though the city has no desire to court manufacturers.
“Unless you make changes that are necessary then you are not doing the best that you can,” Whelchel said.
Unfinished is resolution of the Wildflower property, which the city bought in 2009 for $7.5 million. In January the council decided to negotiate with Hillstone Restaurant Group to bring a waterfront eatery open to the public.
“I’m not the least bit sorry that we bought that property as long as we use it properly,” said Whelchel, who was the driving force behind the purchase.
Other highlights of her mayoral tenure include the 2012 presidential debates at Lynn University and trimming the sea grapes along State Road A1A to provide “view windows” of the ocean.
“I had a good time being on Morning Joe the day after the debates,” she said of her appearance on Joe Scarborough’s MSNBC show.
One of her prized mementos is a golden box containing eight wooden disks, a recent gift from the Beach Condo Association of Boca Raton and Highland Beach. “Coasters made from Overgrown Sea Grape Tree Trunks on Boca Raton Beach,” the engraving inside reads.
“Most people will remember me as the mayor — promises made, promises kept. I’ve never deviated,” she said. “I’ll probably be remembered as being forthright and telling it like it is.”
Scott Singer, who will take a council seat in March after drawing no opposition, said he received valuable advice from Whelchel before deciding to run.
“Mayor Whelchel, through her years of service to the city, has provided a perfect example of commitment,” Singer said.
Whelchel counts Abrams as a close friend and mentor, calling him a “consummate politician” and herself a “server of the community.”
Abrams said the relationship is one of mutual mentoring: “I probably learned just as much from her as she did from me.”
Abrams appointed Whelchel as his representative on the county’s Business Development Board and said Boca Raton residents will continue to see her on the scene.
Three of Whelchel’s children and their families now live — and work —in Boca Raton. Whelchel says the city is “immeasurably” better off than it was when she took office.
“We have a world-class community and our hard work bringing new businesses has set the tone for the next generation,” the mayor said.
“I think we have a real livable city and a great place to raise your children.”
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