CLOSE What you need to know about life, government and business in Fishers, Ind. John Tuohy/Indystar Wochit

Buy Photo Stephanie Perry (at head of table), Assistant Director of Public Relations for Fishers, leads interns in a meeting at the office of Scott Fadness, the mayor of Fishers, Wednesday, June 20, 2018. The mayor, who has an office that contains a meeting table, has moved into a hallway, and allowed Summer interns to populate his office. (Photo: Robert Scheer/IndyStar)Buy Photo

Scott Fadness likes to think big.

But this summer he’ll be doing it from a tiny space.

The Fishers mayor responsible for luring international furniture maker Ikea and several high-tech headquarters to the northern suburb has moved his office to a hallway at City Hall.

It’s a single $209 Ikea table and chair. No phone or cabinet or windows. The table top is scattered with just a few of the day’s important documents.

Twenty feet down the hall, five teenagers have spread their laptops and iPhones, water bottles, energy drinks and backpacks on Fadness’ oval wood-paneled desk and across a roomy conference table in the mayor’s real office.

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The recent high school graduates are interns with the city this year.

And they’re not just killing time; Fadness has them swarming social media to boost the city’s summer events or digging into nerdy government issues and bringing him ideas.

The teens, he said, need room to operate — and since space is tight at the Municipal Center, Fadness told them to use his office.

“In the summer, I am rarely in the office so it didn’t make sense to leave it empty most of the day,” Fadness said. “I figured this was a chance for them to get some government experience in a real setting.”

Buy Photo Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness has moved into a hallway to allow five Summer interns to populate his office. (Photo: Robert Scheer/IndyStar)

Right hand man

The king of this crop, or at least the one to get Fadness’ desk, is Joe Bergin, 18, who had the advantage of incumbency over the other newbies: He served two other stints as a Fishers intern.

A former Hamilton Southeastern High School student council class president who will major in law and public policy at Indiana University, Bergin serves as a combination research guru, policy wonk and mini-right-hand man for Fadness.

“I do a lot of research to keep up on government policy,” Bergin said. “And I also attend a lot of important events with the mayor.”

In addition, Bergin has been answering questions from residents about a recent school safety summit the city hosted following the shooting at Noblesville West Middle School on May 25 and is researching a pending business development in the city.

Fadness said he’s making Bergin earn his seat at the big desk.

“He has to bring me five or six ideas from what other cities are doing each week,” Fadness said, before telling Bergin to get into gear for the city’s 10 a.m. staff meeting.

Buy Photo Intern Joe Bergin works at the desk of Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness this summer. (Photo: Robert Scheer/IndyStar)

The four other interns work in the communications department, publicizing city events on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms. The army of live content providers Is called the “Street Team” and is proving especially handy now.

The city is eager to promote Spark!Fishers, the Fourth of July celebration that is replacing the popular Freedom Fest, as well as its free summer concerts at a $9 million rehabilitated amphitheater that should soon be completed.

Live from ...

Interns Christina Poetz, 18, and Kaelyn Townsend, 19, have already been generating buzz for the concerts and Saturday morning Fishers Farmers Market with Facebook Live and Instagram posts. Townsend, who attended Park Tudor in Indianapolis, worked the crowd at a concert June 15, asking trivia questions about Elton John during an appearance by Dogs of Society: The Music of Elton John.

Poetz and Townsend have each done live posts from the market in which they interview vendors. Poetz said they also emcee the concerts and engage with the crowd before the acts come on.

“I just like promoting things, I think I’m pretty good at it and it feels good” when it succeeds, Townsend said.

Townsend is a freshman at Ball State University who is majoring in creative writing and public policy but wants to be a corporate lawyer. She said she was looking for a summer job and her father suggested an internship. But the gigs he had in mind – like for the Indianapolis Colts – were a bit different from what she chose. Townsend, however, said the city was a perfect fit.

Buy Photo Kaelyn Townsend works with other interns at the mayor's office in Fishers. (Photo: Robert Scheer/IndyStar)

“I liked the description of it, which included planning events,” she said.

Poetz, who graduated from HSE, will major in broadcast journalism at Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis, and hopes to be a television broadcaster or news producer. During a Facebook Live interview at the Sure Shot Coffee booth at the Farmers Market. Poetz deftly filled in the blanks as the owner gave an overview of the business.

Who built that table?

Back at the mayor’s conference table, the sun shines though large windows and the team — which also includes HSE grads Tom Simmons, 18, and Andrew Kolb, 19, — has plenty of space to discuss the day’s strategy with Fishers Assistant Director of Public Relations Stephanie Perry.

Fadness, meanwhile, said he has been dropping in more on other departments rather than staying tethered to his make-shift desk, a practice he said makes the department heads a bit jittery.

“When I told everyone I would have more time to see everyone personally, they were a little apprehensive,” Fadness joked.

But the mayor hasn’t surrendered every perk of the office.

The Ikea table that came to City Hall in a box and needed to be assembled? Fadness said he probably could have done it himself but directed an engineer from the Department of Public Works to build it during one of his drop-ins.

Call IndyStar reporter John Tuohy at (317) 444-6418. Follow on Twitter and Facebook.

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