By Robert Barkin
January 17, 2011

Buddy Dyer

When Orlando, Fla., Mayor Buddy Dyer was still at the University of Florida law school, he was chosen as head of the law review and immediately faced a problem: it was years behind schedule. Yet, by the time he completed his term as editor, the publication was back on track.

Later, when the student association was locked in a bitter dispute and the opposing sides barely spoke to each other, “the only thing anyone could agree on was that Buddy Dyer was the right person to mediate the dispute,” recalls Mayanne Downs, Dyer’s law school classmate and current Orlando city attorney.

Since 2003, Orlando voters have considered Dyer the right person to lead the Central Florida city, and he has delivered with impressive results, from the building of major arenas and development clusters to the groundbreaking of long'sought commuter and high'speed railways. And, the same ability to focus on results and bring opposing sides together is cited as the signature of his success. “He’s the real deal,” says Jacob Stuart, president of the Central Florida Partnership, a local business-civic advocacy group. “He’s praised because he deserves it.”

As recognition of his performance since his election in 2003 and his significant achievements in the past year, American City & County has chosen John Hugh “Buddy” Dyer Jr. as the 2010 Municipal Leader of the Year.

The list of Orlando’s recent accomplishments under Dyer’s leadership is impressive and encompassing: from launching SunRail, Orlando’s first commuter rail system, and high'speed rail, from Orlando to Tampa; to expanding the emerging 7,000-acre Medical City research campus, with the opening of Sanford Burnham Medical Research Institute; to overseeing the steepest decline in crime in city history by maintaining investment in police and fire protection amid budget cuts.

“He’s a great champion of economic development in Orlando,” adds Alex Martins, president of the Orlando Magic. “The mayor’s vision is to improve the quality of life of our citizens.”

In reflecting on the qualities that have led to Dyer’s success, civic leaders and friends point to “the Dyer method,” which is his ability to bring together diverse groups representing a variety of interests to forge coalitions that can produce results and build a team approach that points to the accomplishment of others. “He’s a consensus builder by nature,” says Noranne Downs, regional secretary for the Florida Department of Transportation, who has worked closely with Dyer. “He’s fair to everybody.”

In a fortuitous turn of events, the federal government was pushing high'speed rail as part of its economic stimulus program and saw the Orlando-Tampa corridor as a “jumping off point” for an eventual nationwide high'speed rail network. The impetus from the federal project helped push SunRail though the state legislature during a special session. High Speed Rail is scheduled to open in 2015.

“What he says will get done, will get done.”

Many attribute Dyer’s success to his unusual combination of skills. Born in Central Florida, he graduated from Brown University with a degree in civil engineering before earning his law degree from the University of Florida.

Now 52, Dyer believes that both professional degrees trained him to structure a project and develop a logical path to completing it. He also attributes his management style to lessons learned during his years in the state Senate. “You get things done by building consensus,” he says, noting that politics has since become more partisan. “I was the Democratic leader, but very few things are passed on a partisan basis. I think that experience has been really helpful on a personal level.”

He came into the mayor’s office without any local government experience and learned on the job. He found that the same philosophy that worked in the highly political statehouse in Tallahassee could be applied in Orlando City Hall, which is nonpartisan. “You set a vision and follow a path,” he says. “There are always obstacles to overcome that you don’t foresee. You try to plan for impediments and take care of them and resolve them as they come along.”

The primary goal from the first day of his administration has been convincing the Central Florida region that it needed a “great downtown” in Orlando. “I was building off the foundation that the former administration laid here,” he recalls. “It was talked about and wished for for a long time. I tried to build a consensus to make it happen.”

Though he is a Democrat, and the political environment today has shifted very strongly to the right, Dyer says that he has been able to gain the support of Republicans and the business community behind his major capital initiatives by couching his program in terms of economic development. “We want to continue to think big,” he says. “Orlando isn’t competing with Tampa, but it’s Central Florida against Amsterdam and Stockholm.”

As for his future, Dyer notes that there is no term limit for mayor in Orlando, and he intends to run for re-election in 2012. “I don’t want to leave work undone,” he says. “I want to see these projects from beginning to end.”

Dyer’s friend, Mayanne Downs, sees a bright future for Dyer if he decides to pursue higher office, perhaps after his sons are a few years older. “Wherever he goes, I can absolutely promise that he will put the ‘Dyer method’ in place,” she says. “He’ll sit everybody down, set the project goals, and what he says will get done, will get done. You can bet on it, absolutely bet on it.”

Reprinted with permission from American City & County magazine. Copyright 2010 Penton Media, New York.