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Supporters and detractors alike agree on this: Jim Melvin loves Greensboro.

At 76 , the retired banker spends as much time agonizing over improving the city today as he did when it was his job to do so as mayor from 1971 to 1981.

“I still come to work as excited today as I did 40 years ago because of the opportunity to work on some really meaningful stuff,” said Melvin, who has been CEO and president of the $100 million Joseph M. Bryan Foundation since his 1996 retirement.

His work has not gone unnoticed.

Most recently, the National Conference for Community and Justice of the Piedmont Triad honored Melvin last week as one of its two Brotherhood/Sisterhood Citation Award winners. Winners were selected by a committee on criteria related to improving the community.

“He wants to see people working together in harmony,” said Shirley T. Frye , co-chairman of the award committee. “He wants to see his hometown be the best it could be. And he’ll do whatever it takes.”

Frye met Melvin when he was mayor. He impressed her with his love for the city and with his acts of kindness that didn’t necessarily get publicized over the years.

She recalls Melvin arranging for air conditioners to be installed at what is now Gillespie Park Elementary School so poor children attending an after-school tutoring program there would not suffer in the heat.

But Melvin’s not without his detractors.

When he pushed for a new baseball stadium downtown, a vocal group pushed back. Some worried about the location. Others opposed abandoning the city’s War Memorial Stadium on Yanceyville Street.

The Bryan Foundation came up with $22 million to get what is now known as NewBridge Bank Park built. It opened in 2005.

“Minor league baseball was a generator of community spirit,” Melvin said. “We were determined to build that because we desperately needed one here. ... It has changed the attitude of a lot of people.”

He’s proud of the stadium, the Elon Law School and Center City Park, which he also had a hand in getting financed. Five years in the making, the privately funded, more than $12 million park bustles with activity — from concerts and movies to festivals and weekly exercise programs.

Melvin always puts Greensboro first, colleagues said.

Leo Lambert , president of Elon University, said that a meeting with Melvin got him thinking about putting Elon University’s new law school in Greensboro instead of in Elon or Charlotte. The university had been working on the law school plan for more than a year and a half at that point.

“I said, 'Give us 60 days,’” Melvin recalled. “I think he thought we were kidding.”

The Bryan Foundation put together $5 million and helped raise another $5 million from the community, Lambert said.

“He was one of these critical catalysts that came in, and it kind of intersected with our planning here on campus,” Lambert said.

Melvin’s long service to Greensboro began when he was a young businessman working in banking.

“Back in those days, companies encouraged you to be included in the community,” he said.

And included he was.

He joined the Greensboro Jaycees. Served as chairman of what was then the Greater Greensboro Open golf tournament in 1963 . Became Jaycees president in 1965 . Led the United Fund (now the United Way) in 1968 . Was elected to the City Council in 1969 . Spent 10 years as mayor.

Running for mayor was “a logical progression” after getting on the council, he said.

He ran on what would become a national award-winning ad campaign: “Greensboro Stinks.” His goal was to get a new metro sewage treatment plant. The city broke ground on it in 1981 , his last year as mayor, Melvin said.

“Did we make mistakes? Heck, yeah,” he said.

Pushing for a downtown convention center in 1979 was a mistake. Thankfully, he said, voters turned down the idea.

“It would have been too small,” he said. “It was just improperly done and improperly sold to the public.”

That issue caused a rift between him and developer Joe Koury , who built the Koury Convention Center far from downtown along High Point Road.

But the rift was never as big as it was made out to be, according to Melvin. He said that he and Koury continued to respect each other.

During the fight for the sewage treatment plant, Melvin earned his share of criticism. He remembers a public hearing that lasted until about 3 a.m. with nearly 1,900 people.

“I guarantee 1,890 of them could have killed me and sat down to eat a picnic lunch,” he said. “You gotta keep in mind there’s another 300,000 people out there that deserve representation.”

He’s never been the type to back down when faced with opposition.

“If you back up every time someone criticizes you, you ain’t going nowhere,” he said. “You have to truly believe it’s good for the common cause.”

While Melvin was mayor, the city fell under the national spotlight for the deadly Nov. 3, 1979 , shootings that involved the Ku Klux Klan, Nazis and Communist Worker Party members.

The Rev. Nelson Johnson , a longtime activist who was a CWP member at the time, disagrees with how Melvin handled that situation — by supporting the city and police in what remains today a controversial event in Greensboro’s history.

“I would never say there weren’t positive things that he’s done,” Johnson said. “But I think we kind of measure each other ... when all is added up, what is it that we mostly stand for.”

Johnson said Melvin stands for maintaining the status quo and resisting systemic change. He said Melvin supports changes that are more on the surface rather than changes that “alter the fundamental pattern of more and more people getting poorer and poorer.”

Attorney Steve Bowden also has run into situations where he and Melvin didn’t agree. He didn’t want to share those instances, saying they were handled out of the public eye. But he said Melvin always has been willing to listen and consider a compromise.

And he agrees that Melvin helps Greensboro in any way he can.

He said many people probably don’t realize that Melvin helped Bennett College secure resources several years ago when it was struggling financially.

“Joe Bryan recognized the man and trusted his treasure with him to use for the benefit of Greensboro,” Bowden said. “And he couldn’t have chosen a better person because he has really stepped to the plate.”

Melvin’s long association with Joseph Bryan began in 1968 when, as the head of the United Fund, Melvin asked Bryan to donate to a special enrichment fund that would help provide seed money for innovative human services programs.

That fund, now named after Bryan and his wife, Kathleen , has grown to about $150,000 and supported such projects this year as reading and outpatient therapy.

Melvin has an ability to gather people around him to get something done.

“Jim really has a penchant for results,” said April Harris , executive director of Action Greensboro. “He’s not afraid to take a risk, to get out in front of an issue.”

He’s been that way since he was a child, she said.

“Jim told me he got kicked out of nursery school because he was throwing pencils at the other kids,” Harris said. “So I think he’s always been like a maverick.”

He’s also humble, refusing to take credit for his role in successful projects, said Terry Grier , the former superintendent of Guilford County Schools.
 
Melvin often advocates on behalf of the schools and pushed for more funding and resources during Grier’s tenure.

But Melvin credits Bryan’s vision and resources, Grier said.

“Jim could help do these things if all he had was the shirt on his back,” Grier said. “Jim’s a great leader. He’s a great motivator.”

Melvin remains the longest-serving mayor in Greensboro’s history and is one of the few remaining civic leaders who have served the community for several decades.

“I don’t think there is another Jim Melvin,” Susan Schwartz , executive director of the Cemala Foundation, said. “But people rise to the occasion and he’s been a very good role model to all of us.”

Contact Jennifer Fernandez at 373-7064 or jennifer.fernandez @news-record.com