It’s been almost three decades since the city of Malad has had a city council without Larry Thomas on it.  Over that time, Thomas has seen a lot of things change in the town around him, though at the typical Malad pace.  

Right now, that pace is on “post-holiday” setting as far as his store, Thomas Electric and Furniture goes.  “After Christmas, everything is pretty slow,” he says, which makes it a great time to sit down with her for a conversation—an “exit interview” if you will.

Larry is a storyteller par excellence, and I would have been shocked if his entrance into city politics didn’t have it’s own great inciting incident, like all good stories. “So what happened is,” he says, “Mayor Horsley called me up and wanted me to meet him at the funeral home.  And I thought, ‘…okay, is he trying to measure me for a coffin?’”  

“He said that one of the councilmen was going to resign—I think it was August of 97—it was late summer and that councilman’s term wasn’t up yet, but almost.  So I was appointed, but had to run right after, pretty much.  I had two months under my belt.”

At the time, Thomas described Malad as “pretty slow.  “There wasn’t a lot of growth going on in the area.  For example, a ‘long’ city council meeting would be two hours, maybe two and a half.  That was a long meeting.  And now we’ve had some that go to almost eleven thirty at night.  It’s hard for me to go home and unwind.  It takes me about an hour, and then at 5:15 my alarm goes off for the schoolbus!”

Thomas is nothing if not in for the long haul, and to that end, he has also been driving bus for the school district since January of 1981, and was the same year he graduated from college and basically took up work at Thomas Electric.  “I like to be involved!”  he laughs.

While the media landscape in Malad is largely in the realm of cyberspace now, in the late 90s Thomas took an even more lowkey approach.  “I think I ran a few ads in the paper, and I probably told a few people about it,” he says, of his campaigning during the first election.  

He has run and won in every election since then, until he decided to push his chair out from the table this year.

“Almost every year I’ve run for re-election there have been a few who have run.  Of course, a while ago Idaho changed the rules so that if there is no one running opposed, you don’t have to have an election.  When I first started, cities handled the elections, and they did it right at city hall.  Probably half of my term was done there.  And then it was changed to where all the elections were done by the state.”

 Over that time, he has experienced a lot of feedback as a public figure.  “I’ve had mixed comments from people, of course.  Some say ‘well, I’m glad you were on there for that vote’ and then others say ‘what were you thinking?’ I get that quite often.  I’ve had some say, ‘are you looking to have more enemies?”

Thomas isn’t the first in his family to work in government.  “My grandfather [D. (Daniel) LeRoy Thomas ]was the fourth mayor of Malad, so every meeting I’ve looked across and it’s been neat to see him there.  I look over several times during each meeting.  he served from 1951-1955.”

He wasn’t born during the time of his grandfather’s term, but the stories he told stuck with him.  In his opinion, the job of mayor is a lot different now than it used to be.  “The mayor’s job is so much busier than it used to be.  Mayor Hawkins puts a lot of time in over there.”

He acknowledges that he did consider running for mayor when Spence and Debbie Horsely left to serve a mission, but says that “What is boils down to is that I didn’t think it was fair to the city to run if I wasn’t going to have the right amount of time to put into it.  The time just wasn’t there.” 

Unlike a lot of people, Thomas has a very specific memory of what initiated his interest in local government.  And like a lot of people, that inspiration was a school teacher.  “It was Joe Davis—he was from Samaria and he was a U.S. Government teacher and one of my favorite teachers in high school.  I look back now, and I’ve heard people say it, but he taught like a college teacher.  He expected a lot.  He didn’t baby anybody.  And one of the interesting things about Mr. Davis was that if anybody was struggling in his class, he’d try not to ever fail anybody.  If kids couldn’t get their grade, he’d have them help on the farm or do whatever he could.  He wanted us to know about current events.  He had us read the newspaper, and we had pop quizzes every morning.”

That legacy is still a part of Thomas’ outlook.  “To this day, I still love reading about current events.  I’ll randomly pick up papers and keep up on news, and I’ve always loved politics.  I’ll sit down and watch things happening and Wendy just rolls her eyes and goes into the other room,” he laughs.  “She does not get into politics.”

Politics are often a dirty word for people, but as Larry explains, the fact is that in any society they are part of keeping a community together.  “It’s always bothered me when we have to raise utility rates, especially because we have so many people on fixed incomes.  But on the other hand the city can’t supplement water, sewer, and trash.  It’s not good sense—the city will go broke eventually.  The increase we had a few years ago, I had a number of people tell me they couldn’t believe we would do that, but at some point you have to.”

One thing that makes Malad relatively unique among cities is that because of its small size, coupled with the fact that many residents tend to come from families that have been in the area for generations, the distance between the city council and the citizens is very small.  “It’s tough,” Thomas says.  “In 2002, I got made a bishop.  I actually wondered if I should stay on the council, since I knew I might offend some people in my ward with decisions I would have to make.  There are some people in the area who are probably still mad about decisions I’ve been a part of on the city council.  But, they do say you’re not doing your job if someone isn’t upset about something you’ve done!”

“There are often situations where people are in a situation that puts them in a bad way, but it’s not the city’s responsibility to get them out of it.  They want us to understand their situation, and we do, but it doesn’t just affect them.  You’ve got this whole community that is expecting the city council to have this tough love, I guess you might call it.  It can be tough, but we have to enforce it the same for everybody as much as possible.”

“There are two issues here—there’s your good name, which is one thing, and there’s the good name of the city of Malad.  And that’s going to trump what you want sometimes.”

Over his time, the City Park has been one of the major changes to the city’s appearance.  The beginnings of work on the walking path, the ball fields, and the other improvements to the park started in the 90s.  As far as Larry remembers, the walking path itself was dedicated sometime in the early 2000s.  From then, improvements have continued apace, including the Splash Pad, and the on-the-way new playground.

Other highlights include specific events over the years, including one once in a century and a half event.  “One of my highlights was when we had Malad’s sesquicentennial in 2014 (150 years from 1864).  What we did was, mayor Horsley and the council wanted to feed everyone in the city, and we did it at the park!  It was really neat—we had current and past city councilmembers and mayors and their spouses all serve the meal.”  

As far as the issues that Thomas sees as the most emotionally charged in the community, he points to Planning and Zoning, and utility billing, which are of course always issues for a reason.

In the immediate future, Thomas sees the Bannock street project as the next big topic of concern.  “Somebody asked me if that’s why I got off the council,” he laughs.  “Growth, trying to manage that.  Sewer and water—our infrastructure is getting older.”  Looking forward, the two issues are related.  As the population increases (which Thomas predicts will be measured, but real) with increasing numbers of workers from the surrounding region looking at the advantages of living in a small, rural Idaho county and hoping to make it their home, the infrastructure will need to keep pace.  “Balancing that growth with what we always want to try to keep is the real trick,” he says.  Water, affordable housing, utilities, and privacy concerns will likely dominate planning and zoning discussions for the next twenty-seven years at the very least.

As he prepares to leave the city council table, he sums up the experience in this way.  “I have enjoyed it,” Thomas says.  “I’ve got to rub shoulders with some really great people.”  Asked what advice he would give to incoming city councilman John Williams, Thomas says, “Remember the people—it’s about them, not us.  Be willing to listen to people, and be willing to make smart, but good decisions.  I’ve tried to be a good listener and think about what the other person is going through with their concerns.”

“You hear about some of these long time senators and legislators, and people call them career politicians.” If that phrase meant to treat the job like Larry Thomas, it wouldn’t be a bad thing.