The mayor knows Fort Collins is best 'home, sweet home' -- even if Money mag drops it to 2nd

July 14, 4:29 PMDenver People ExaminerErnie Tucker

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Old Town Fort Collins

    Fort Collins mayor Doug Hutchinson isn’t worried about his hometown’s slip from first in 2006 to second on the annual Money Magazine list of “Best Small Cities” in America.   
    “I prefer to think of it as a re-competition, which we almost won again,” says Hutchinson, adding that it seems like publications don’t want the same winner repeating yearly. And Hutchinson, in his second two-year-term after getting elected in 2005, is upbeat despite the silver medal-finish.
    “I’ve lived in Europe, Asia, both coasts and the South, and moving back here underscores what a great place this is,” says the man who retired in 1999 from a career in the Air Force.
    Hutchinson first arrived in "The Fort" with his family as a four-year-old in 1946, when the community had 12,000 residents and two stoplights. It has now grown to more than ten times that figure, according to 2007 estimates.
    But the qualities cited by the magazine editors -- who tapped Plymouth, Minn. first and Naperville, Ill, third – seem to grow from the small town feel. The widespread use of bike lanes, for example, is something that appeals to residents – and helps employers, including high tech firms, attract talent. As the editors note, "Even the wheelless can get in on the action now that Fort Collins has a bike library: Residents and visitors can check out a bicycle for up to seven days, free." (Not surpising. Indeed, at one point in the 1970s, the city issued legal hitchhiking permits for trusting people to thumb a ride within city limits).
    There’s something in the fabric of The Fort that feels timeless.“Did you know that when Walt Disney was researching the first Disneyland, he sent architects to Fort Collins to study Old Town, because it had preserved some of the best Prairie Style buildings?” Hutchinson asks.
    That appearance – along with CSU and the nearby Poudre River – are reason enough to settle. Indeed, Hutchinson says that his entire family -- three offspring and their kids -- lives in the area, including a son across the street from him.
    Of course, it’s not all about cotton candy. Residents of Fort Collins like their brew, and the editors of Money tipped their glasses to the four brewpubs in Old Town. Anyone with tastebuds knows about New Belgium brewery, whose website talks about being a “small but mighty” community of beer-loving, bike-loving and earth-loving folks. With a nod to the city's old sugar beet factory in its Beet Street cultural initiative as well as the planned 5.3-mile Mason Street Corridor which is intended to bring transit-oriented development to the town, things are rolling.
    Hutchinson, in his “State of the City" address on Jan. 29, spoke about “the Fort Collins way of life” which the mayor explained comes about “through careful planning and deliberate action.” He's been part of that deliberation, helping woo top companies such as computer chip-makers Intel and AMD.   
    His term is up next April, and under city ordinance, he can try for one more stint. Hutchinson is coy about that declaration, but he conveys the impression that he might want to do it: not only to see the next phase of the trainsit project – but to see if he can help pull Ft. Collins up by the bootstraps, from number 2 on Money’s list to its rightful perch back on top. And that's something people in Fort Collins would drink to.