ST. CLAIRSVILLE — City Service and Safety Director Dennis Bigler is reflecting on a long and involved career as he prepares for retirement.

Since taking the position in 1980, Bigler has left his mark on the city, having played a leading role in numerous projects and helping guide the growth of St. Clairsville into the city it is today and may be in the years to come.

Ive worked for three great mayors, he said, noting that he began his job under Mayor J. Edger White. He then served under Robert Vincenzo and the current mayor, Terry Pugh.

Id been out of college for two years and just wanted to go into some kind of public sector work, he said, adding that his activities with the restoration of Captina Creek first brought him to the attention of the city. He was the head of a citizens group that created the Captina Creek Watershed. Bigler noted this was the first project in the state to use orphan mine land funds for the reclamation of inactive mine sites.

Bigler said his focus was on long-range planning and laying the groundwork for future development.

That was back when the (Environmental Protection Agency) was giving grants for water and wastewater projects, so we started out by doing a tremendous amount of water and wastewater work, he said, noting his first three years on the job saw a $6.5 million wastewater project and a $2.5 million water project. The city also completed construction of a $1 million electrical substation during that time. So thats how I started out when I first came into the job — doing a lot of utility work, a lot of utility upgrades.

His work also included downtown restoration and expansion. These projects involved establishing a National Historic District, rebuilding sidewalk infrastructure and lighting.

After I did the utility projects, that kind of set the stage in the early part of my career to go into more of the livability projects like the downtown restoration project, he said. We caught the eye of a lot of people in downtown restoration across Ohio because we renovated such a large number of our buildings in the downtown area within just a few years. People were calling us from around the state about how we did that.

Bigler noted the post allowed him to see that these lengthy projects were completed properly.

All of my larger projects it seems have always taken about a five-year period. One of the nice things about the time that Ive been able to have consistently with St. Clairsville is to let me work on projects over a period of time and its made it easier for things to be developed.

Another project was the restoration of two water supply reservoirs.

We were one of the first in the country to use a concept called armoring that we helped to popularize, he said. We saved about a third of the cost of the traditional method of restoring water supply. Thats now the norm. We won a national award for our work in doing that project.

In 1986, work also began on the Plaza Drive area on the west end of St. Clairsville.

We got three developers to work together and led the way by getting a grant for some infrastructure, he said, adding that this allowed the plaza and its businesses to be built.

Theres a lot of parallel between the west area project and what were doing now on the opposite side of the city with the St. Clair Commons project. That project also took us about five years from our start to when we had some considerable building to be done, he said. All of that was because we got utilities and infrastructure into that area and we allowed those areas to grow and we helped those developers to work together.

All of these things took a plan years ago that we were able to bring to fruition. Weve never done plans that we just let sit on the shelf. Every plan weve done has been implemented. Its all been very strategic planning.

Bigler reflected on other issues he has worked on that impacted the area. He pointed out measures taken during the 1988 drought that saw water curtailed.

We came up with the idea of making a connection between the Belmont County system and Bellaire, and we were able to supplement Belmont Countys water with the city of Bellaire through a connection that we came up with the idea to do, he said.

He noted that planning was particularly vital to do more with less.

St. Clairsville did not have a lot of funds to work with. I think thats been the successful thing that a lot of people look at, he said. Weve done a lot without a lot of money, because weve been able to leverage different pools of funds all the time to make things happen.

He pointed to the citys $2 million bikeway, which called for 14 separate contracts.

The city won a statewide planning award for the bikeway, he said, citing an award from the Ohio Planning Association. Thats one of the hallmarks of the city right now — the bikeway.

Bigler also assisted in creating the subdivision regulations and standards and construction standards to guide development in the area. He noted that the citys status as a historic district also brings more funding opportunities.

We redid the zoning and created corridor protection for the National Road. Thats very important for the future of the city as it faces development pressure from other areas. Those things that we did protect the city going forward. Those are institutional changes.

Other policies include the cross-training of employees to allow for more efficient operation with minimal staff.

More recent projects are the U.S. 40 and Ohio 9 reconstruction, which saw streets widened and curbs and sidewalks rebuilt.

Theres just been a host of infrastructure projects, he said. I think weve brought in between $30 million and $40 million in grants over my career.

Bigler noted that the most recent large-scale projects he has been involved with were also among the most difficult. These were the renovation of the Clarendon Hotel and the incoming businesses at St. Clair Commons.

I think that project is going to take off just like the west area project did. Just give it a few years, he said.

Bigler intends to enjoy his retirement by remaining involved with his church and community projects.