SNOQUALMIE – Bob Larson’s upcoming schedule may not sound like a lot of fun, but he is looking forward to it.

“Fiscal analysis,” said Larson, when describing what was in store in the coming weeks before the city of Snoqualmie’s budget season.

Larson has spent the last 20 years in fiscal analysis and other practices where the devil is in the details. As Snoqualmie’s city administrator, Larson will be taking his time.

Larson was born in the small farming community of Worthington, Minn., and, until he moved to Washington, had spent his whole life in Minnesota.

Growing up, he wanted to be a police officer, but was drawn to city administration while finishing up community college. A professor told Larson about studying urban planning, which would equip him to look over all parts of a city, not just police. Larson liked the idea and eventually got his master’s degree from Mankato State (now Minnesota State University at Mankato).

“I have a real strong aptitude to serve,” he said.

His first foray into city administration was in 1984 as an intern at St. Louis Park, a suburb of Minneapolis. Larson spent 12 years working everywhere from the police department to the public works department, learning about the idiosyncrasies and cultures of every part of the city. He eventually became an assistant to the city manager and worked on major economic and development projects in the city.

“It was a great experience,” Larson said. “I’ll never forget about it.”

He then went to another Minneapolis suburb called Deephaven, which hired Larson as its first, full-time city administrator. In 2001, he was recruited to be the city manager of West St. Paul, where Larson said he was asked to make some suggestions on how to handle a pending budget crunch due to a drop in state funding.

Some of his suggestions, however, didn’t go over well. Larson wrote a memo last summer that outlined some expenditures in the city’s public safety departments that seemed as though they could be trimmed. Larson estimated that his proposed changes, which included whether or not the city kept its own fire department and had its own emergency dispatch service, could have saved the city more than $250,000.

Larson insisted the cuts would not result in any currently-held jobs in the city being lost, and that labor budget savings would be made with attrition. During the outcry that followed, Larson, who had a background with police services, said he repeated often his commitment to the public safety departments.

“If we are going to have those services [public safety] we have to make sure we support them,” Larson said. “There are others ways of supplying police service and other ways of supplying fire service.”

A majority of the West St. Paul City Council didn’t see it that way and Larson was asked to leave just before Christmas following a 4-3 vote.

Larson said he harbors no ill feelings about the event or toward the city he left.

“West St. Paul is a great community,” he said. “I have absolutely no animosity toward those folks.”

When the opportunity for the Snoqualmie position came up, Larson seized the chance to be a candidate. He had been looking at moving his family west for some time and Washington was one of his destinations. When Larson and his wife researched Snoqualmie, they fell in love with the area and Larson let the city know that when he was interviewed for the city administrator position.

“It is a hidden gem,” Larson said. “And I hope it will stay that way for awhile.”

Keeping Snoqualmie a hidden gem will be hard, Larson said, but it can continue to look like one. Snoqualmie growth was an aspect of the city that also excited the new city administrator. Larson said a trend he has seen in all communities that are experiencing a lot of new growth has been a controlled growth approach that seeks to retain a community’s historical feel. Snoqualmie is following that trend, he said.

Larson’s philosophy toward budgets and growth made him a good candidate, according to Snoqualmie Councilman Matt Larson. Matt Larson, who sat on the board of city and community leaders that interviewed candidates for the job, said an experienced, fiscally-sound leader with an eye for how the city wants to grow is what the city needs. In Snoqualmie, all departments in the city answer to the city administrator, and Larson’s history working through budgets with all different aspects of a city will only be an asset, Matt Larson added.

“Their [West St. Paul] loss, our gain,” Matt Larson said.

Larson was one of two top candidates picked by the search committee earlier this year to replace interim City Administrator Don Isley, who retired. When a contract offer by the city with the other candidate wasn’t accepted, Larson was offered the job.

Now that he is helping Snoqualmie look ahead, Larson said his experiences from the past two decades will pay dividends. When looking at the city of Snoqualmie’s own department of public safety, Larson said he likes what he sees. Snoqualmie is still very much a “stand alone” city that, unlike a suburb, does not meld with any of its neighboring communities, he said. Therefore, having its own public safety department is an asset.

The city’s development standards also appealed to Larson. With huge retail cores within a short driving distance of Snoqualmie, Larson said he does not see the kind of growth that is predominant in a city like Issaquah ever coming to Snoqualmie.

“I don’t see a ‘big box’ store going in up at the Ridge,” Larson said.

In addition to shaping the future of Snoqualmie, Larson also wants to become involved in the community. He and his wife Jane have two children, Benjamin and Emma, who have become early fans of the area and like their schools. Larson himself wants to be a part of the local groups that make up the service community in the Valley. While in Minnesota, Larson participated in many organizations such as Rotary Club, Big Brothers programs and chambers of commerce.

Preparing for the upcoming budget season may not be a walk in the park, but with a new city he is eager to work for and a community his family is eager to live in, Larson said Snoqualmie is the place to be.

“I have always found that things work out in the end,” he said.

Ben Cape can be reached at (425) 888-2311 or by e-mail at ben.cape@valleyrecord.com.