Sugar Land, TX - City Secretary Glenda Gundermann plans to retire on May 31.
Gundermann was hired by the city in October 1983. She had previously worked for City of Cities Municipal Utility District, a governmental agency that provided water and wastewater services for Sugar Creek prior to its annexation by the city in 1985.
"Glenda is one of our longest-serving employees, and she will be deeply missed," said City Manager Allen Bogard. "We have some incredibly big shoes to fill. As much as anyone, she helped define the creation of what we call the Sugar Land way. Glenda continually exceeded expectations in service delivery for our citizens, anticipated and responded to new challenges and inspired confidence in governance."
During her 35-year city career, she has been part of a leadership team that managed numerous annexations, including Sugar Creek, First Colony, Avalon, Greatwood and New Territory. As one of the state's fastest-growing cities, she helped transform the city from a small bedroom community of about 8,800 to a full-service city of more than 118,000 that's routinely recognized for transparency, innovation and responsive governance.
Gundermann has been instrumental in technological innovations that made government more accessible to citizens. In fact, her efforts contributed to Sugar Land being one of the first cities to live stream its Council meetings on the Internet and repost videos on the city's website.
The Center for Digital Government has routinely named Sugar Land among the nation's top cities that successfully use technology to improve citizen services, enhance transparency and encourage citizen engagement.
Gundermann directly managed every city election and worked with five mayors and two city managers. Her expertise ensured legal compliance with election laws that resulted in bond projects that provided quality-of-life amenities such as parks, roads, trails, a recreation center and much more. She also managed requirements for open meetings and Freedom of Information Act requests.
More recently, Gundermann led the launch of Sugar Land's first automated agenda management process, which resulted in the transformation from a time- and labor-intensive paper system to a more efficient electronic format.
She was part of teams that delivered emergency response during incidents such as Tropical Storm Allison, Hurricane Ike and Hurricane Harvey.
While serving on the city's leadership team, Sugar Land achieved many other accomplishments.
The city completed many important mobility projects, including U.S. Highway 59, U.S. Highway 90A and S.H. 6. The 10-year, half billion re-construction of those three highways added 100 new lane miles of highway and frontage roads inside the city limits.
Through legislative and financial efforts, the University of Houston at Sugar Land was created in 2002, though the partnership goes back to 1997. The Texas Legislature subsequently deeded more than 660 acres for a university and park development -- the first time a Texas Legislature ever deeded land to a municipality.
A new minor league baseball stadium was opened.
The city opened the Smart Financial Centre at Sugar Land.
The Museum of Natural Science at Sugar Land was opened.
First Colony Mall opened in 1996, the city's first major public-private partnership that created a blueprint for future partnerships.
Planning for Sugar Land Town Square took off in 1999. The city opened Fort Bend's first full-service, four-star hotel and conference center in 2003. It was followed by a new City Hall and the complete development of Sugar Land Town Square.
"Glenda has been an important part of almost every success we've enjoyed," said Bogard. "She has created a lasting legacy that will never be forgotten and will always be a part of our Sugar Land family."
⇐Previous Sugar Land Public Safety Dispatcher Lands Top Texas HonorsNext⇒ Sugar Land Recognizes Volunteers of the Year