Q&A: Meet Scott Willis, the Republican in line to be Westfield's second mayor
One-term councilman Scott Willis will be the most-experienced elected official in Westfield government when he takes office as the city’s second mayor at the start of 2024.
Willis won a three-way primary race in May for the Republican nomination for mayor of Westfield and is unopposed in November.
He is already preparing for the role, which is fast-approaching with four months left in 2023. He announced in late July that Westfield Washington Township Trustee Danielle Carey Tolan will lead his transition team.
IndyStar sat down with Willis at his office in northern Indianapolis in mid-August to learn more about his plans as mayor and how he hopes to lead the city government at the start of the year.
This interview has been edited for content, brevity and clarity.
From Purdue to the Marines
Question: Tell me about your family.
Answer: I was born raised in Kokomo, just about 20 minutes north of Westfield and was one of five kids. I've got three brothers and a sister and went to Purdue upon graduating from high school. I went to a little tiny county school. So I'm kind of a small town kid. Even though Kokomo is a larger city, we kind of lived out at the edges of the city.
After I graduated from Purdue, I joined the Marine Corps, left Indiana, came back eventually settled roots here and met my wife Stacey. We've been married now 23 years. And we have three amazing kids. My oldest is Sophia. We just took her down to Cincinnati. She's at Xavier University. She's a junior, studying biomedical sciences. My middle daughter, we just dropped her off at Purdue on Monday and so she'll be studying communications and public relations at Purdue and then my youngest son is a freshman at Westfield.
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Moved to Westfield for the schools
Q: Why did your family end up in Westfield?
A: We settled back in Hamilton County when I came off active duty and was working for General Motors at the time. I met my wife Stacey, at the time she lived in Fishers. I lived in Noblesville. Once we got married we bought our first house in Noblesville together. We were there for a few years until we had our first daughter Sophia. And then we started thinking more bigger picture around schools and communities and where we wanted to be. We just settled on Westfield, ironically, because at the time, it was the smallest school district in Hamilton County amongst the four cities, which was important to us. We did not at the time want our kids to go to a Carmel-sized school. And we just liked the community feel you know, Westfield was still a small town and had that small town feel to it, which is why we settled in Westfield.
Strife in Westfield government
Q: Government in Westfield has seen its challenges while you’ve been on city council. How do you approach relationship building in this community and in the government when you take office?
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A: I tried to stay above it even over the last four years when you know the mayor was fighting with the clerk-treasurer or the mayor was fighting with the council or vice versa. I mean, it was a lot of dysfunctional relationships. I always tried to stay out of that. My grandmother told me, and my grandparents were very instrumental in my upbringing, my mom's parents, and my grandmother used to say it's OK to disagree. It's not OK to be disagreeable. And so I just tried to live my my life that way. So even in council, when we were disagreeing on a particular initiative or an ordinance, I tried not to make it personal. I try not to take it personal, and just voice why I believe that was the right decision and then, you know, whatever the decision was made you move on. So I've tried to stay above that. In terms of the residents, I've just tried to always live my life with transparency. I try to communicate with residents about what's going on. I've made myself very accessible as you know, through my town hall meetings, I've done it every quarter since I took office. And I find that when you do that, even when people disagree with you they at least respect where your opinions are at. And I think it tends to defuse the confrontation that can often come with government.
Grand Park and Grand Junction
A: A big part of Mayor Andy Cook’s legacy has been major projects in the city: Grand Park, Grand Junction, various trail systems. You haven’t taken office yet, but do you have any goals or big projects you’d like to take on?
A: First off Grand Park. Obviously, it appears my administration is going to have to make the decision on the route we go with Grand Park. So we're going to come right out of the gate and be forced with maybe one of the biggest decisions that we're going to have to make in my career. And that is what do we do with Grand Park? But regardless how that decision plays out, one thing is for certain we have to create more of a destination around the park. People are coming in to Westfield they're coming to the park with over 5 million visitors. They're not spending their dollars in the park and so it's a big priority for me to find ways to create a destination in Westfield so that people come in they stay in our hotels, they eat at our restaurants, they're shopping in our shops, not going to Carmel, Fishers and even Kokomo to have those experiences. That is a big priority for my administration.
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Second is revitalizing our downtown. We talked about this ad nauseam on the campaign trail. I've already actually developed a plan ready to roll out to the public. And in January we're going to bring the vision to the community and let them weigh in on it. And my hopes are that we can hit the ground running in the first or second quarter of next year with some exciting projects around revitalizing downtown Westfield because it's needed. I've lived here 20 years and although we have a new park and some really cool restaurants on Park Street, there's really nothing else that's happened. We need desperately for that identity to have a downtown.
Then lastly, as you and I've been talking about NorthPoint Two. That's going to come back in the first quarter of my administration. And I believe we have the votes to get that passed. And that will create an industrial, light industrial development project that’s shovel ready to go. So when industry is looking to come to Central Indiana, and they're looking for 50 acres for a light industrial or high-tech development, we will be positioned and ready to strike. Because right now we don't have any land really to offer those types of businesses. So those are my big ones. But we've got many, many more we can talk about but I don't want to give away too much at this point.
Westfield's growth explosion
Q: What excites you about this moment and for the community going forward?
A: I think Westfield is ready to explode. And we've seen a lot of growth over the last 20 years. We are the sixth fastest growing city in America. And what's exciting we're the only one in the Midwest that even pops on the top 100 list. And that's really eye-opening at least for me it is and but I think we're ready. The best is yet to come. We have a lot of businesses and a lot of developers that want to come into Westfield and help us create something really, really special. And with all these new elected officials with new and fresh ideas, it's really exciting. I'm not gonna lie I'm super excited about coming in, and really transforming our downtown and other pockets of our city to just continue to create what I believe is one of the greatest cities in America to live in. So I'm excited to get to hit the ground running.
Contact IndyStar's Carmel and Westfield reporter Brittany Carloni at brittany.carloni@indystar.com or 317-779-4468. Follow her on Twitter@CarloniBrittany.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Q&A with Scott Willis: Here's his vision as mayor for Westfield
