Outgoing Mayor Richard J. Kos made building ‘better Chicopee’ his goal

For Richard J. Kos, it’s never been about the number of years he served as mayor, the number of times he made the headlines nor the number of events he’s attended.

Rather, it’s been about making his hometown a better place to live, work and do business.

(For the record, he is the only person in the city’s history to be elected mayor of Chicopee seven times. That includes the special election in 1997 in which he was among eight candidates who competed to serve out the term of Mayor Joseph Chessey. When John L. Vieau took office this morning, Kos wrapped up his second stint as the city’s chief executive, serving more than 12 years.)

“My bottom line was always to make a better Chicopee, to try to make improvements every year I’ve been in office,” says Kos.

He grew up the only child of first-generation Polish-Americans. From his parents -- his father, Joseph, was a carpenter by trade, and his mother, Wanda, was a factory worker at American Bosch -- came a strong work ethic and devotion to family and faith.

Kos attended St. Stanislaus School and went on to graduate in 1971 from Chicopee High School, where he excelled in football and hockey. College took him to Amherst, and law school landed him at Suffolk University in Boston.

It’s one of the giants of Western Massachusetts high-school athletic coaching, Bill Moge, who Kos credits with instilling in him a drive to excel on the field and off. “He was a person who always wanted you to be your best, to do your best,” Kos remembers of his football coach. “He was my biggest mentor when it came to leadership.”

“I was fortunate. Coach Moge was unbelievable to me,” Kos says, remembering how the coach, who spent five decades guiding young people on playing fields and off, encouraged him to apply to college at the “potted ivies,” referring to the Ivy League schools like Amherst, Dartmouth and Harvard, all of which wound up accepting him. Kos chose Amherst, he confides, because it was where he could play both football and hockey. “At the time, that was so important to me.”

It was during law school that Kos came to civic service as an intern to Chicopee Mayor Howard Redfern. Later, as an attorney, he served as city solicitor to Mayors Robert Kumor and Richard Lak in the 1980s.

His first stint as mayor, Kos says, was at a time when Chicopee was doing well. “We built things,” he says, remembering how his administration worked to put in place many of the steps needed to build two new high schools, a new library, a new fire station for Fairview and the regional women’s jail. He also took on the thorny issue of whether Chicopee should be in the business of running a nursing home and led what was an uncomfortable effort to close the Chicopee Municipal Home.

As he left office in 2004, he remembers saying he might be back in 10 years to see how things had gone and perhaps take another stab being mayor. Joking at the time, it wound up coming true.

When Kos did, in fact, return in 2013 to challenge Mayor Michael Bissonnette, he found municipal mosaic that had changed dramatically. “This time, the city was different,” he recalls. “There was more animosity, mistrust and things needed to be done.”

Kos remembers all too well arriving when the city was in the midst of state civil service officials described to him as “the most egregious case of political and personal bias” involving the leadership of the Police Department. As he had done during his first mayoral tenure, Kos didn’t shy from tackling potentially contentious situations.

“Working together, we had a lot of issues to confront,” Kos says of the tact he took this time around. “One of the solutions was to repair our public safety complex to serve us for now and for generations to come. We made a $10 million investment and (recently) celebrated the start of first regional dispatch center in Western Massachusetts. We now have more firefighters and police officers on street than we’ve had in years.”

The key to his successes, Kos says, has been the willingness of municipal departments to band together as a team with a joint goal of improving the community. (Not unlike what is done on an athletic field.) “It’s amazing how when you do one thing, more good things follow,” he says. “How one positive thing can lead to another.”

He points to last month’s reopening of the Aldenville fire station that had been shuttered since 2006 as another example of how things played out thanks in large part to creation of the civilian dispatch center. He predicts more communities across the region will follow the lead of Chicopee and Longmeadow.

Pointing to a similar evolution of positive steps during his first go-round as mayor, Kos recalls the opposition he faced when he proposed closing the municipal home back in the 1990s. As things unfolded, Chicopee wound up with a 17-acre site that proved a perfect location for a new high school. “It was a matter of doing what’s right for the community and taking sequential steps so that things turn out well,” he explains.

The things he’s accomplished over the past six years, Kos hopes, have set the groundwork for continuing improvements and efficiencies in municipal government (combining IT and maintenance functions for all municipal departments), attracting new economic development and ensuring the public schools are in the best shape possible.

“We’ve got one of the lowest average tax bills in the region, and we’ve accomplished lots of stuff,” he says. Some of those things might appear insignificant but still can have a major impact, like one suggested by his wife, Gina, to have all high-school freshmen become certified in CPR. “It does a wonderful thing, exposes students to health-care professions, gets them to be concerned about each other and be cognizant of others’ well-being instead of looking at their phones,” the mayor says. “It also puts them ahead in building their resumes for the future.”

Kos’s personal resume will see him return to the practice of law with the Springfield firm of Egan, Flanagan & Cohen, where his partners have kept his desk waiting for his return.

“It’s time for me to come off the ice,” Kos says, using a sports analogy to describe how life is unfolding for him. “I go from having 55,000 clients (the people of Chicopee) to having just several. As my wife says, 40 hours a week as a lawyer will seem like a part-time job.”

When he left office the first time in 2004, one of his goals was to spend more time with his family. It’s among his hopes this time, too. Already, there is a family trip to Poland for the spring that will include both his son and daughter, now in their late 20s.

Could there be another return to politics in his future?

“Jokingly, you never say never, but if I said that now, my wife, Gina, would just shake her head,” Kos says. “You never know. It’s been a real honor to come back to your hometown, where you grew up, get involved in government and make a difference.”

His advice to Vieau, meanwhile, is simple: “Always do what’s right for the city. It seems clichu00e9, but you have to focus on that. The biggest challenge for any leader is to get all the information and, with all the facts, you find the answer. It may not please everything, but it’s the right answer.”

He likens the job of mayor to being the person sitting on the top of the mountain and dealing with people who live on every part of the mountainside. “They all come to you, some from where it’s sunny and hot, some from here it’s treed, and others from where it’s rocky. They come to you, and you, as mayor, then have the complete perspective. Each person coming to you (has a) view (that) is perfectly accurate. You have to decide what’s best for entire mountain.”

Cynthia G. Simison is executive editor of The Republican. She may be reached by email to [email protected].

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