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Mike Webb’s journey to Florence began in a covered wagon. A covered station wagon. The six-year-old and his family drove cross-country from Pennsylvania to settle in Corvallis. “We came over with two dogs, two cats and three kids in a little car,” Webb said.

Webb’s grandfather was stationed in Tillamook when Webb’s dad was young. “My dad was very, very fond of Oregon. And when he had a chance to come back to Oregon, he took it.”

When he was 25, Webb moved to Florence. That was 1988. He worked for ten years in retail management going to work at Oregon Pacific Bank (OPB) in 1998, where he currently serves as vice president and commercial relationship manager in the Florence office. 

The bank encourages employees to be involved in the community, Webb said. He has served on the ambulance district board since 2005, and on the Florence Urban Renewal Agency board since around 2007, he said. 

Webb was appointed to the city council two years ago to fill the seat vacated by Bill Meyer’s resignation. Webb is running this election to complete the four-year term, as required by the Florence city charter. 

“I felt it was appropriate that I run to complete his term, and that’s why I’m running this time,” Webb said. Adding that he feels his experience in city government and his experience in banking give him a perspective different from most people.

As a commercial lender, he has gotten the chance to see businesses “of all shapes and sizes and get to understand what makes them tick, what makes them work, and what makes them not work,” he said. And like most, if not all, of the candidates, job growth is a key element of his campaign. 

When Webb arrived in Florence, his view of community service was shaped by Tom Grove, OPB president at the time. Grove helped get the events center and hospital built in Florence, Webb said, and was among the city leaders who transformed Florence into a retirement community and tourist destination. 

With all its upsides, the changes in Florence have also created a gap between those with money and those who work in the service sector, Webb said. We still lack a lot of workforce housing, and we lack a lot of workforce employment, employment that will pay a family wage.”

Jobs and affordable housing are among Webb’s priorities. The city is more constrained than many people believe, Webb said. Streamlining building permitting is a popular talking point, but Webb says much of that is controlled by the state, not the city. “Local decisions are trying to comply with state law. You try to streamline things, but it’s not quite as simple as you think,” he said. 

The council has begun looking at some projects that could grow the economy. Expanding the Florence Events Center and turning it into a convention center could bring more people in the off-season, mirroring the Seaside Convention Center.

“We’ve got some paper drawings and some conceptual ideas we are pursuing, exploring this further as part of our action plan,” he said. 

Reconfiguring Old Town to allow for more parking is another idea the city is looking at. “Is there a way we can get to undergrounding utilities in Old Town and doing some different sidewalks and maybe improving the parking and the traffic patterns to improve the utility of Bay Street and the surrounding streets?” Both of these ideas are concepts at the moment, and funding would need to be found, Webb said. 

One of Webb’s slogans is “Make Florence a Place to Be.” He said it means making Florence a place to live now, not just be from. He thinks of his own children who are both working out of state because there wasn’t an employment opportunity for them in Florence. “I’d like to change that,” he said. 

Along with jobs comes housing. “The industry is not going to locate here unless there’s housing available.” He is concerned about speculators who buy houses to flip them for a higher price. But he sees some potential solutions. Making more lots available and trying to streamline the building process would help, he said. Smaller lot sizes are another possibility. 

And Webb thinks the housing project built on Airport Road is a model that could be used again. The city worked with a non-profit to build low-cost housing using a land trust model. The land is held separately from the houses, allowing people to buy homes at a lower cost. 

“I think we’re moving in the right direction. I’m very excited about the city. I think we have good people thinking good things and dreaming good things. But we’re still struggling as a community because we don’t have an industry that’s paying family-wage jobs. We’re still a service industry and tourist-related industry, and that’s challenging,” Webb said.