City Planner

It is Clovis’ personality that motivates Dwight Kroll

By Cindy Ryan / Special to The Independent Friday, Mar. 28, 2008

In just 49 short years, Dwight Kroll has saved a life, broken his back paragliding, traveled to the former Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War and rock-climbed in Thailand.

But he considers his greatest achievement to be his 25-year contribution to Clovis' personality.

"I'm proud to have been a component of what sets Clovis off from the rest of the state," said Kroll, city planner for the city of Clovis. "I enjoy seeing things work out [for Clovis], and my connection to what the community has become."

Mike Dozier, the city's community and economic development director, said Kroll should get the most credit for Old Town.

"He's given Old Town Clovis its character," Dozier said.

Kroll came to Clovis in 1981 with a bachelor's degree in city planning from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. The assistant city planner job was his first out of college.

A self-proclaimed thrill-seeker who loves adventure, Kroll also teaches a course in mountaineering and climbing at Westmont College of Santa Barbara. While on the college's outing this summer at Bridgeport, Kroll's friend of 26 years, Bruce Watts, became ill with flu-like symptoms and went into diabetic shock. They were about 15 miles from the road, so Kroll hiked to an uninhabited forest service cabin and called for a helicopter.

"He saved my life," said the 48-year-old Watts, a teacher from Lemon Cove, who ended up in the hospital in Reno for 11 days.

Another acquaintance, Dave Willis, recalled the situation and commended Kroll.

"I hope he's with me if I get in a jam out there," said Willis, coordinator for Wild Hope's Sierra Treks, the group based in Oregon that organizes the Westmont College outings.

"He has a gentle strength with the students on our trips," said Willis, 54, who said Kroll "was a crazy climber at Cal Poly" when he met him 25 years ago. "He's a presence, but he's unassuming and doesn't draw attention to himself.

"He has a heart of gold and a body of rawhide ... and his calves are humongous."

Kroll's physical strength may be what enabled him to survive the paragliding accident in 1991 that broke his back.

"I just thought I was going to have a really hard landing," Kroll said. "We were over a mile from the nearest road when I augered into the ground.

As luck would have it, my friend came over the horizon, then took off and got help. I put myself in the hospital for about three months."

Kroll said he flew a paraglider one more time after the accident, but now concentrates on climbing.

"He used my llamas for his own climbing trips while his back healed," said Willis, of Ashland, Ore.

Dozier said he has known Kroll since shortly after his accident.

"I met him over 14 years ago, when he had a rod up his back," Dozier said. "He's very easygoing. I've never seen him get upset, and I've tried many times.

"In his work he has a way of telling people, without offending them, that their plans might work better another way. They end up liking his plan or design better."

Kroll, who lives in a log cabin off Highway 168 toward Prather, said he marvels at towns older than Clovis. Towns on the East Coast took their design cues from Europe and those same features are still in use today.

"I wonder if we can put something on the map that people will want to use 400 years from now," Kroll said of the Loma Vista area in southeast Clovis.

Kroll explains the community will have a village green, and believes the active lifestyle neighborhood will keep evolving. "It's a challenging process to not lose Clovis but create a new community out there."

Kroll, who sports a ponytail, said he walks the trails of Clovis and is pleased when he sees people use and take advantage of them.

"I enjoy my work here -- I certainly feel very lucky to have the opportunity to work with these people," he said. "Every day you see something you don't expect, or is so cool," Kroll said.

"I never imagined myself in government," said Kroll, who spent a year as a disc jockey for a radio station near Pasadena where he grew up. Kroll said he played a lot of Motown and funkadelic music.

"It wasn't real fun and made me realize it wasn't what I wanted to do," Kroll said.

He dropped his DJ persona as "Mojo Harris" and became a city planner.

"I wouldn't have traded this job for anything else."

Friendly Faces is an occasional series about people in Clovis who make it a great place to live. To nominate someone to be profiled in this series, please e-mail Patti J. Lippert at plippert@clovisindependent.com.