POCATELLO — After 16 years of service as Pocatello’s mayor, Brian Blad gave his final State of the City address Thursday, reflecting on his four terms leading the Gate City and the legacy he leaves behind.

Blad’s final public speech as Pocatello’s leader came at the end of a 90-minute regular City Council meeting, about three times longer than last year’s State of the City. Blad’s speech involved brief comments before playing a nearly seven-minute video that outlined the Gate City’s 2025 milestones and ended with him thanking the employees he credited with making Pocatello such a great place to live.

“It’s amazing how much we do and how much we’ve done through this last year,” Blad said. “Typically, this State of the City address lasts for what, a half hour — 32 minutes was the last one. This could have gone on and on and on, and the city of Pocatello has been extremely busy.”

Fighting back emotions, Blad added, “Our employees are absolutely incredible. I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done as employees. It’s absolutely amazing what happens because we have employees that love this community. We have people that care about this community, and every day they come to work to make life better for every citizen that comes to Pocatello. It’s amazing to be able to work with people like you guys. So thank you very much, and please let everybody in your departments know how much we appreciate them.”

Blad, during an interview with the Idaho State Journal after the meeting, reflected on what he described as an extraordinary career as the Gate City’s longest-tenured mayor ever.

“I’ve had the privilege of serving for 16 years as the mayor of Pocatello, four terms, which is unprecedented and a great accomplishment in itself,” Blad said. “I believe Pocatello is a great place. It’s been wonderful to be able to serve the people that live here.”

Blad said one of his signature achievements during his long-lasting tenure was overseeing the economic transformation of a city that was once bankrupt when he first took office in 2010.

“Today we have a reserve for every fund that we have, and we have excess reserves,” Blad said.

Blad also outlined other accomplishments he’s honored to have had a hand in, including the construction of Lookout Point in historic downtown Pocatello, improvements to the animal shelter and various parks and recreation initiatives like the new Ross Park water slides and the Optimist Skate Park.

Blad’s also proud to have spearheaded the completion of the South Valley Connector, a project he said the city had been trying to finish for nearly 25 years.

During his State of the City address video, Blad described Pocatello as a vibrant, community-focused city, underscoring major investments over the past year. Blad spoke of the recent rebranding initiative — which transformed the city’s visual identity — major safety and infrastructure improvements, and numerous other projects that included new trails, parks and playgrounds.

Blad also gave kudos to all city staff, stating Pocatello is in its strongest financial position ever. He expressed optimism about the city’s future leadership and continued success.

Blad said his job as mayor never really felt like a job — it was a privilege. Despite the dawn-to-dusk events, meetings and extracurricular work outside of his duties, he loved every minute of his career.

“It was great,” Blad said. “There are some ups and downs like there always is in everything, but all in all, (I appreciate) the people that I’ve been able to meet. Those are lifelong relationships. I have friendships that will never go away, and I have friendships all over the state and all over the country. This literally and truly is a relationship-focused position and profession. It’s just absolutely amazing to see and have those relationships that I would have never have had before.”

Blad also placed significant importance on the city’s 2040 comprehensive plan.

“We went out in the community,” Blad said. “We had community involvement. We had citizens’ input. We went to the citizens. We didn’t expect them to come here. We went to them. That master plan literally is guiding our direction as a city right now. We’ve never had that before. We are implementing the desires of our community. That’s a big deal. We can do that because of the financial stability the city of Pocatello is under right now. Just to be able to turn it around from literally borrowing money to make payroll for half of the year to having excess reserves in a short 16 years is unheard of.”

Blad said disciplined budgeting and a willingness to endure tight years allowed the city to dig out from under what he recalls as roughly $100 million in deferred maintenance when he took office.

“Those funds that we have are sacred funds,” Blad said. “Tax dollars are sacred dollars to me. We had a lot of years of extremely tight budgeting that we could squeak by, but departments had to hold off on different things so that we could get to where we are.”

Blad framed the city’s current ability to follow that roadmap as a direct result of its financial health.

One thing Blad knows for certain is that the city employees do a lot of work for very little pay, he said, crediting them for their loyalty and dedication.

“They come in, they work, they are community-centered and focused,” Blad said. “They want to do what’s best for the community and 97 percent of them could probably go into the private sector and double their wage. They don’t do that. They do what they do because of the love of their community. The best employees in the country, I believe, are the city employees that I’ve had the privilege of working with.”

As for what comes next, Blad said there will be no long vacation. He is submitting job applications and hopes to find another community-oriented position.

“The feeling of accomplishment, the feeling that you get because you did something, that you made a difference in the world, is quite frankly what I want to do,” Blad said. “I want to make a difference in Pocatello. I honestly felt like we weren’t doing what we needed to do, and I feel like I have made a difference. There will be a lot of people that will argue that. I’m sure of that, and I don’t really care what they have to say. I know where we were, and where we’re going. You’d be a fool to say that things haven’t changed.”

Blad said he is excited to see what Mayor-elect Mark Dahlquist can do, that he is confident Dahlquist will seize the opportunity and be successful with it.

“The city is set up, and it’s ready to go,” Blad said. “He’s going to be great leading this community forward. I’m going to do everything I can to help Mark be successful. I’ve met with him a number of times. I’ll meet with him a couple more times before he takes office. We’re making this transition as smooth as possible, and quite frankly, I told Mark this, ‘I want to make this transition an example for the rest of the world to see how it should happen, that it is not adversarial at all.’ I want to make sure that everybody feels comfortable with that.”

For Blad, the future is uncertain, but he says that’s part of the appeal.

“For me, in the future, who knows?” Blad said. “It’s wide open for me. I’m pretty excited about it.”