April was a great month for national recognition of Greeley’s recent successes!
First, we were notified that Mayor Norton’s support for local educational initiatives is being recognized by The National Academy Foundation (NAF). The mayor’s extraordinary leadership in ensuring that students have the opportunity to participate in a series of work-based learning activities preparing them for college and career success earned him the prestigious NAF Advisory Board Champions Award.
It was the mayor’s efforts to bring the Northridge High School STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) Academy to maturity and more that earned him this designation. His passion for STEM comes from his engineering business where he learned the value of young talent. This inspired him to recruit engineers from the City of Greeley, CDOT and privately owned companies for the Northridge Academy of Engineering advisory board. He also supported a city-wide measure to provide free transportation to students on Greeley-Evans Transit, thus eliminating a significant barrier to learning. The Mayor has wrapped the STEM Academy into his Work Force Initiative that enlists local businesses for student internships. The award will be officially presented at NAF’s 2015 conference this summer.
The second award came from another national association, Transforming Local Government (TLG), an Alliance for Innovation organization. They recognized Greeley for its innovative year-round image initiative and the Greeley Unexpected advertising campaign that have stirred community resiliency. Greeley’s successful approach to overcoming old community misperceptions and negative stereotypes earned the highest award offered by TLG, the Thomas H. Muehlenbeck Award for Excellence in Local Government. A City staff member accepted the award at TLG’s annual conference held April 13-15 in Phoenix where over 500 attended the awards luncheon. We also presented a case study on the image initiative. Watch our awards luncheon video: Community Image Initiative - Greeley Unexpected
We’re putting Greeley “on the map” in a very positive way!
Roy H. Otto
City Manager