By Andy Bell-Baltaci | Daily Journal
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EDINBURGH — The Edinburgh Town Council hired a new town manager Monday night, more than three months after it fired its previous one.
Dan Cartwright, who until now was chairman of the Johnson County Plan Commission, will take over the job. As town manager, he will lead the town of about 4,600, work in conjunction with the town council and administer and enforce ordinances, orders and town resolutions, among other duties, according to town documents.
Cartwright replaces J.T. Doane as town manager. Doane was fired in October after the town council learned he was paying a town employee from his personal bank account. A Johnson County Sheriff’s Office investigation concluded Doane’s action of paying an employee of the town’s electric department under the table since March may have been unethical, but was not illegal.
Doane had apparently done so to close the wage gap between the non-journeyman and journeyman’s salary, as the employee was working toward journeyman certification.
After Doane’s termination, town council members, Jeff Simpson and Ryan Piercefield, acted as interim co-town managers, before Simpson stepped down in January and Piercefield assumed sole responsibility.
Before assuming his role as Edinburgh’s town manager, Cartwright was the co-owner of D and F investments, a commercial and real estate development business in Whiteland, for 30 years. After he closed the business in 2015, Cartwright headed the Johnson County Plan Commission, where he oversaw the restoration of the Johnson County Courthouse and minor projects involving the prosecutor’s office and juvenile detention center, Cartwright said.
Cartwright is also a member of county’s board of zoning appeals. He hasn’t decided if he will leave either the Plan Commission or the Board of Zoning Appeals, but Edinburgh will be his first priority, he said.
Edinburgh’s parks department, as well as the town’s ownership of its water and electric utilities, drew his interest, Cartwright said.
Cartwright’s goals as town manager include rerouting State Road 252 so truck drivers don’t have to go through downtown Edinburgh, expanding the industrial park on the south side of town and increasing residential development to prepare for potential population growth, he said.
“My goals are to continue to maintain good service to all the residents of the town — that’s priority one,” Cartwright said. “I think there’s an opportunity to expand some residential development, which I’m excited about and I’ll be looking into. That’s the kind of thing I’ve been doing my whole life. I have a lot of connections with commercial, industrial and residential developers and real estate brokers.”
