After a break in civic involvement to raise her children, newly appointed Royal Palm Beach Councilwoman Jan Rodusky said she is prepared and eager to take on her new role.
On April 7, the four existing members of the Royal Palm Beach Village Council selected Rodusky in their third round of balloting to fill Seat 4, vacated by Fred Pinto upon his election as mayor.
“I really love the Village of Royal Palm Beach,” Rodusky told the Town-Crier on Wednesday. “I have been in the community for 20 years, and sat on the Recreation Advisory Board for four years, and got off when my kids were really little in the early days of living in the village, and that kind of took front seat. Now, they’re old enough that they don’t need me as much, so it was good timing.”
Rodusky believes that the village is on the right track. She noted that she has done her homework, including researching the village’s strategic plan, which she mentioned in her application.
“I think we’re financially strong, the government is run efficiently, and I think the next 10, 15 or 30 years is really marching to the beat of the strategic plan,” she said. “I think that smart growth is important to the residents, and that’s what encouraged me to get involved.”
Rodusky took part in the strategic plan meeting held a few weeks ago led by consultant Lyle Sumek.
“It was a public meeting, and the village has been doing the strategic plan for several years now with the same consultant,” she said. “It’s a very methodical, well-thought-out plan in which we go through, ‘Here’s what we did last year. What are the priorities? What are the opportunities? What are the strengths and weaknesses?’ We go through each section of the strategic plan and really refine what’s going to happen over the next year. As a result, we now have the feedback, which we will take to the residents’ summit next week.”
That meeting is set for Tuesday, May 3 at 7 p.m. at the Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center.
“That is the second part, taking the strategic plan to the residents and letting everyone have a say in what happens,” she said. “That’s exciting to me. I like to see the village grow in thoughtful ways.”
Rodusky said she is also excited about big projects that the village is working on, including the construction of an amphitheater at Royal Palm Beach Commons Park and plans for a facility serving seniors.
As chief grants writer for the Cultural Council of Palm Beach County, she is also interested in the expansion of cultural events and activities in the village.
“Another piece of my interest is adding arts and culture to our strategic plan,” she said. “We have a lot of leisure activities, which makes the village rich. We have a lot of recreational activities, which also gets the people engaged. The trend is for the population to be more active and interactive in doing things, not just going to a museum and looking at art, or not just passively sitting on a lawn and listening to music. The trend is more personal involvement in all kinds of art, whether it be painting and sipping wine, and sculpting or crafting classes.”
Rodusky said there are many artists in the village who could play a big role in the development of “maker spaces” where people get involved in creating art themselves.
“It doesn’t mean that everyone has to be a professional artist, but everyone wants to have their hand in actively doing things, whether it’s painting or basket weaving or sculpting or playing music — that’s the growing trend across the country,” she said. “I think there’s a real need to bring some of that to Royal Palm Beach.”
She explained that she has a personal interest in art and considered an art major at Kent State University in Ohio before she focused on sociology for her bachelor’s degree and eventually a master’s degree in public administration.
“I have a sister who is an artist,” Rodusky said. “I don’t have an education in art, but I have a passion and interest for art.”
Rodusky grew up in Akron, Ohio, and when she was finishing her master’s degree, she worked for the recreation department in University Heights, Ohio.
“I started as an intern and was hired, and started working in the recreation department, so I really had my first experience in municipal government as a young college graduate,” she said.
After working there for a few years, she married, and her husband took a job in Pennsylvania. They eventually moved to Florida, where her husband, a biologist, took a job with the South Florida Water Management District. “He has worked at the water management district for 22 years,” Rodusky said.
Her first jobs in Florida revolved around nonprofits.
“Finding a municipal government job was very hard, so I worked for a few nonprofits, and I gained a really good development background,” Rodusky said. “I started in special events, and I moved on to grant writing and annual gifts, and I was hired by Intracoastal Health Systems doing annual gifts.”
Intracoastal Health Systems became the Intracoastal Health Foundation after Good Samaritan and St. Mary’s medical centers were sold, and she started the grant-making program, where she worked for nine years before joining the cultural council.
Rodusky noted that Royal Palm Beach has developed a successful grant-writing program.
“They are very experienced in doing that, and that was the case when I was on the Recreation Advisory Board, and that was many years ago,” she said. “It has paid off well, and they now have a system that is fully operational.”
With her two children now in middle school and high school, Rodusky said she is ready to do her part for the village.
“I’ve tried to stay up on the information that’s going on and the trends in local government,” she said. “We have things in the strategic plan that we want to get done, but I don’t see any outstanding problems. Our village manager and his team, based on last year’s goals and this year’s accomplishments, it’s pretty impressive how much they get done in the short period of time of a year.”
Rodusky added that she hopes her 11 months finishing Pinto’s term will turn into a longer tenure on the council.
ABOVE: Councilwoman Jan Rodusky
