Most students use Facebook to keep in touch with their friends, but Penn graduate student Josh Maxwell uses it to keep in touch with his constituents.
Maxwell — who is in his first year of the Masters in Public Administration program at Penn’s Fels Institute of Government — is also the mayor of Downingtown, Pa., a 9,000-person borough in Chester County located 33 miles from Philadelphia.
Maxwell got his start in politics when he was appointed to the Planning Commission of Downingtown as an undergraduate at West Chester University.
On the Planning Commission, he helped write various city ordinances and “people liked what I had to do and asked me to run,” Maxwell said.
After a campaign against a Republican opponent who was also his age, Maxwell, who is a Democrat, won the election and became the youngest mayor in Downingtown history.
He was 26 years old at his swearing-in ceremony in January 2010.
Being mayor is a lot of fun, “especially when you’re younger,” Maxwell said.
“It’s probably one of the coolest things I’ll do for quite a while,” he added.
Even though he engineered his schedule so that he only has to come to campus on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, unpredictable happenings can throw a wrench into his plans.
“When there [are] emergencies in the town, [such as] a snow emergency — we had a murder last semester for the first time in a decade — things come up and you refocus … so you have to stay ahead of your study stuff,” Maxwell said.
His job and his education “work together very well,” he said.
“I understand the concepts a little bit easier because I can see how they’re applied, whether it’s economic development, economics, statistics or fiscal impact analysis,” he explained.
Through Facebook, Twitter and e-mail, Maxwell gets event invitations, questions, friend requests and feedback on his performance from Downingtown residents.
“Make yourself available and people will find you … they like having an available mayor,” Maxwell said.
The most rewarding aspect of his time as mayor was also the most challenging — the creation of a 2011 budget that included cuts to various departments but that didn’t include any tax increases. Other boroughs in Chester County raised taxes by as much as 20 percent.
“On a tangible basis, every single day, you can affect people’s lives,” Maxwell said.
Being a local politician, “you get to see how your policies affect people, because they’re your neighbors — they’re right down the street,” he continued.
In spite of his position as mayor, Maxwell doesn’t receive any special treatment from his peers at Fels.
“They like to rib me 'cause I have a cool title,” he laughed.
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