A mayor’s job with a growing city is daunting, challenging.
Just ask Pete Lewis, Auburn’s three-term mayor from 2002-14.
“Being the mayor of a city is something you either love or you hate,” Lewis told the audience at the Auburn Area Chamber of Commerce’s Spotlight Awards program at the Muckleshoot Casino on Wednesday night. “There is no in between because you have no other real life. You’re 24/7, the mayor. …
“It’s an amazing job, it’s a hard job.”
A job that Lewis’ successor, Nancy Backus, has done well since being elected in 2014 as Auburn’s first female mayor in the city’s 125-year history.
Backus has accomplished many great things in her time in office, Lewis and others observed.
For her efforts, the chamber honored Backus with the Bill Kyle Service Award at the recognition dinner.
“It means more than you probably will ever know,” Backus said of the award. “I am so proud to be your mayor every day … There’s never been a single day that I had ever thought of hating this job. I love my job. It is my dream job, and it is one that I will be forever grateful to all of you to be able to have.”
Lewis added: “This award is well earned.”
The award is named after Kyle, who was known for his service to others, especially caring for the less fortunate. The award is given each year to an elected official whose hard work and dedication positively impacts the greater Auburn community.
Kyle, who made his home in Auburn with his wife Dolores, owned a medical insurance agency. Among his many contributions, Kyle helped save the Auburn Food Bank from closing in 1994. He also created in 2006 the Food to Go program that fed hungry students at the food bank on weekends.
He volunteered with the food bank, Auburn Rotary, South King County United Way and the Association of Washington Business among other organizations
Kyle passed away in 2009, but his legacy in the Auburn area lives on through the award.
Lewis, who presented the award to Backus, described some of her accomplishments as mayor:
• Working in partnership with the food bank and Valley Cities in opening the Ray of Hope Resource Center and Sundown Shelter to serve the homeless.
• Earning an appointment to the Sound Transit Board of Directors, the first mayor from a South King County city to do so since Jim White, a Kent mayor who filled a seat during his first term of office in the 1990s. Under her watch, Auburn has since opened a second parking garage in the transit station downtown.
• Convened committees to tackle and improve the health of Auburn residents, and addressed the drug and homeless crises in the city and King County.
• Oversaw the completion of the Auburn Community & Event Center at Les Gove Park, a $9 million project that took more than two decades in the making.
• Helped to add 14 officers to the Auburn Police force.
• Promoted job growth and encouraged the continued downtown redevelopment.
In accepting the award, Backus took time to acknowledged the many members of her support staff, a team responsible for making all things possible, she said.
“I am really, really good at one thing,” she said, “and that is surrounding myself with good people.”
Also
Carolyn Tolliver received the Ambassador of the Year Award, recognizing the woman for her outstanding volunteer service to the chamber.
