GOVERNING magazine named Ulster County Executive Mike Hein one of the nation’s top state and local public officials of the year. The list of nine included a governor, mayor and state legislator. Hein was the lone county executive. The magazine cited Hein’s work on homeless veterans’ housing, bringing higher education opportunities to “inner city” youth by repurposing the vacant Sophie Finn elementary school in Kingston for use by the community college, the county’s suicide prevention smartphone app, and coordinating a statewide database of municipal innovations.
“We are deeply committed to fulfilling both our social responsibility and fiscal responsibility; and so, we have worked to reinvent government, embrace reform and innovation, in order to ensure more services than ever before, while protecting property taxpayers in the process,” said Hein.
Of the honorees, GOVERNING executive editor Zach Patton said, “These nine men and women are outstanding examples of the tremendous achievement that’s happening in state and local government right now… these dedicated individuals have shown that real change is possible. We’re honored to recognize their contributions to public service.”
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