Dear Fellow Piedmont Residents | Sara Lillevand, City Administrator

Dear Fellow Piedmont Residents,

I am both thrilled and honored to be serving as Piedmont’s City Administrator. As I assume this position, I want to acknowledge the tremendous contributions and dedication of my predecessor, Paul Benoit, and thank him for his leadership and guidance. I look forward to working with city officials, staff, and the community to make sure Piedmont provides quality services (ranging from public safety to recreation) that our community requires.

I believe I am the first city administrator who actually grew up in Piedmont. This gives me a unique and deep understanding of the needs of residents and the challenges of providing quality services and maintaining aging facilities with limited resources. As the former Recreation Directory, I gained a first-hand appreciation of Piedmont residents contributing their time, expertise, and financial support to make our city a wonderful place to live, play, and raise a family.

While our footprint is small (less than 2 square miles), we have big challenges.

Piedmont residents rely upon our own police and fire departments. Recruiting, training, and retaining quality public safety personnel is expensive.

Costs continually rise for city services and repairs. Recently we asked for proposals to re-pave Magnolia Avenue and received only ONE bid, which exceeded the engineer’s estimate by $352,000 (25%).

As Paul Benoit noted many times, our city facilities, from the Recreation Center to City Hall to the Veterans’ Hall, are old and in need of extensive renovations. Ignoring these problems will not make them go away.

Finding solutions to these challenges will demand creativity and compromise, as well as community input and participation. I am humbled by the opportunity to make a difference in the community where I was raised. I know our success in maintaining excellent core services while tackling significant issues associated with aging facilities will be based on the willingness of the Piedmont community to continue what we have always done — getting involved, sharing ideas and opinions, banding together, and rolling up our sleeves.

I look forward to keeping you informed and working with you as we restore and renovate Piedmont’s infrastructure and facilities in the days and years ahead.

Sincerely,

Sara Lillevand
City Administrator
CITY OF PIEDMONT

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The above is the text from a letter, dated August 2019, mailed to all Piedmont residents.