Johnson is ready for his new role

GENEVA —Town marshal Rob Johnson recently came to a realization.
As he completed work in the police department office, Johnson realized he soon may not be wearing a police vest every day. A new role will let him loosen up a bit.
“I don’t know, I think I was an hour into it and I kind of glanced at my vest sitting on the chair and I thought, you know what, I’m not going to have to wear that thing every day now,” Johnson said. “I know … it doesn’t seem like a lot but for 17 years, I’ve wore this every day. It’ll be different.”
Beginning next year, Johnson will take on the newly-created, full-time position of workforce manager. While he will remain town marshal, it’ll be in a more administrative capacity.
Johnson, 46, has served as town marshal in Geneva since 2002. He was hired as a deputy marshal in December 1999.
The workforce manager post is an expansion of his current job of town advisor, a part-time role he was appointed to last year.
That role came about as fellow department heads saw Johnson’s ability to work with town council. In his spare time, he started working with them. Eventually, it spiraled into an official town position.
“They just started, I guess, gradually eventually talking to me and asking me for advice, you know, just making comments,” Johnson explained.
With Geneva completing more work in house, in an effort to stretch its tax dollars farther, it saw the need for somebody to shepherd its projects.
Town council hired Johnson for the new position at its September meeting. As workforce manager, Johnson will supervise employees in a number of departments and be responsible for identifying and prioritizing projects.
His job will include working to secure public funds and grants to put toward project.
However, Johnson emphasized the role will not an administrative job only. He intends to work with, not just supervise, town employees.
“If they need another person, then there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to be out and help them,” he said,
That’s the mentality he’s brought to the town advisor post.
“I think that was one side that the guys didn’t expect out of me this past summer,” Johnson said. "There were quite a few big projects that we did where I actually went out and you know, I was the first one down in the hole with them.”
While he’s spent the majority of the last 16-plus years as a police officer, Johnson isn’t a rookie to manual labor.
Johnson, a 1988 graduate of Bellmont High School in Decatur, spent nearly a decade following high school working in the Adams County Surveyor’s Office.
“That’s where I get my background in drainage,” he explained.
While Johnson has a background in public works, there are tasks he’s still learning. For instance, he did his first water leak fix this year.
“I’ve told the guys, if I don’t know how to do it or I can’t do it, I want to learn how to do it because otherwise I can’t correct you on it if I don’t know how to do it,” he said.
Prior to his tenure in Geneva, Johnson served as reserve officer for Adams County Sheriff’s Office from 1991 to 1999. He was also briefly part-time marshal for the Town of Monroe.
But now, Geneva is home. Johnson, who is married and has two children and two step-children, has lived in the town since 2000.
It’s where he’d like to stay.
“I’ve been here long enough I’d like to retire from here,” Johnson said.