By Karen Blackledge
DANVILLE — There’s no question he’s Danville’s mayor. The license plate on his red SUV says “the mayor.” It’s also evident Ed Coleman is Irish. A couple of leprechaun figures stand on his front porch.
In his 13th year as mayor and having been re-elected to a fourth four-year term in November, he was instrumental in starting the Neighborhood Watch program in the borough. Montour County District Judge Marvin Shrawder will speak at the next meeting at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in the middle school.
Coleman, 73, is continuing a holiday project he spearheaded last year, where North Central Secure Treatment Unit teenage boys and girls made and decorated more than 90 wooden boxes to cover meters in the downtown. They are planning to make more boxes to cover all the meters on Mill Street and hopefully some along West Mahoning Street, he said.
As head of the police department, Coleman works closely with Chief Eric Gill. “Danville has one of the finest police departments in the area, thanks to the chief and his officers,” he said. Police officers, on their own time, are refurbishing the police department. “The chief has exceeded all my expectations and the expectations of council,” he said.
As part of the renovation project, the mayor gave up his office, so the officers could have more space. Coleman now has an office on the second floor of the municipal building.
Seeing himself as an ambassador and a promoter of Danville, Coleman serves on many organizations, including the advisory board of the North Central Secure Treatment Unit, a maximum-security juvenile detention center in Mahoning Township.
Saying he has great rapport with local, county and state officials, he worked with local residents to add soccer fields near the water treatment plant. He also served on a committee to beautify Memorial Park.
He attends two council meetings a month along with committee meetings and stays in touch with the police chief.
When Coleman was first elected, he was paid $2,000 a year, but the U.S. Census count for the borough dropped below 5,000, so his pay dropped to $1,875.
Coleman has an annual budget of about $3,000 he uses for membership dues in such organizations as the mayors’ association, office supplies and plaques he presents. Each year, he recognizes a Citizen of the Year.
The mayor has only been away from Danville, where he was born and raised, for the four years he served in the Navy. “I graduated in May 1955 and was in the Navy in June,” he said of his stint, which took him to Cuba and Italy.
After returning home, he held a number of jobs, including working on the highway and driving an oil truck and a beer truck.
He owned Coleman’s Inn, which is now Buster’s, for 20 years. At the same time, he worked as a rural carrier for the Danville post office, retiring after 31 1/2 years. “I drove every route we had at one time or another,” he said.
He also works as a Realtor with Prudential Hodrick, of Danville. He received his license two weeks before being elected mayor.
He said his real estate work doesn’t interfere with his job as mayor.
Coleman has four sons and a daughter with the sons living in Danville and the surrounding area and his daughter in Pittsburgh. He also has six grandchildren.
Someone whose phone rings quite often, he used to love to play golf, “but I can’t now. My health won’t allow it.”
