Dodic’s experience benefits city By Bill Axtell For the <strong>Lethbridge</strong> <strong>Journal</strong> It’s obvious that everything in his more than five decades of life has perfectly prepared him for the highprofile position he has engaged since 2010. Rajko Dodic, whose roots reach across the ocean to Eastern Europe, and who served two terms as alderman before his election as Mayor two years ago, has emerged from his <strong>Lethbridge</strong> upbringing and from his private law practice to impart his own style of contemporary and unique leadership to meet the city’s constantly-changing needs of today. Yet, Mayor Dodic is quick to pass along the credit to others. “Unless we have an administration extremely competent and effective, we won’t have the ability to get where we need to go,” he says, giving due credit to the city’s team of qualified professionals. Dodic’s leadership style is fundamentally collaborative. He excels in bringing diverse groups together to pursue common goals, which arises from his background in law practice, a common successful technique in that field. While Mayor Dodic may have been born with gifts that are naturally suited for leadership, much of his ability has come from his experience, training and development. For example, he says “it’s difficult to attract people with business backgrounds to run for civic office, because of the time commitments involved, as well as the rates of pay being quite low. <strong>The</strong>refore, we rarely have people on Council with corporate or major business experience.” In contrast, Dodic, himself, gained a substantial measure of business experience due to the size of his former law firm, Dodic, Toone, Maclean, which he started along with two other lawyers in 1993. “we saved a photograph of me, wearing a baby bonnet, sitting on a large rock in a field” In <strong>Lethbridge</strong>, Dodic’s father found work at the farm operated by the Boras family; his mom worked in a canning factory, which processed locally grown produce. As a child, Dodic remembers earning spending money by picking up scrap metal and selling it to Varzari Salvage for 25 cents. His first close-up exposure to an elected civic politician occurred when Dodic enrolled at St. Basil’s Elementary School, where his principal, Steve Vaselenak, served for a number of years in public office in <strong>Lethbridge</strong>. Moving to Catholic Central High School for grades 9 to 12, Dodic graduated in 1970 and enrolled at the University of <strong>Lethbridge</strong>. Dodic explains that he interrupted his studies at U of L at various points to travel and to “find myself,” he says, describing how he first traveled to the Yukon, then later tried to hitchhike across Canada, but, after 10 days of travel, only made it to Kenora, Ont., “because of the difficulty of getting rides.” Another time, he moved to Vancouver for a short while. “Yet,” he says, “these periods gave me a life-long love of travel.” Returning to <strong>Lethbridge</strong> in 1977, he made a concerted effort to attend university full time. He graduated in 1978 with a Bachelor of Arts and Science degree. Because he excelled in the field, he was offered a National Research Council scholarship for a graduate degree program at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ont. Dodic surprised everyone by turning down the scholarship and announcing his plans to instead go to the University of Alberta in Edmonton to enroll in law school. “Besides the fact that the law interested me,” he says, “I thought that a law degree was fairly portable throughout Canada.” “<strong>The</strong> number of employees, the on-going need for recruitment and hiring as we grew, as well as the accounting and tax monitoring procedures for a firm all contributed to an education in business operations, beyond the basic law practice. Such experience in business has been helpful in understanding the key issues of the operations of the numerous enterprises of the city,” he says. “Moreover,” he continues, “legal training has proved beneficial because lots of our issues have a legal component. Besides lots of reading, I have found it never has become an onerous task to go through the large volume of material we deal with every week because of having a legal background.” Dodic was born in the former Yugoslavia. Dodic’s father, who had been captured by the German army and imprisoned in a POW camp, had - after the war - moved his wife and toddler son, Rajko, to Italy. <strong>The</strong>re, they lived in a relocation camp for 18 months, while arranging for immigration to Canada. Dodic’s father believed the family could start a better life there. “Although I have no memory of Yugoslavia,” he muses, “we saved a photograph of me, wearing a baby bonnet, sitting on a large rock in a field with the barracks in Italy in the background.” Sailing to Canada in 1957, Dodic’s family landed at the historical Pier 21 in Halifax, made famous for its thousands of immigrations between 1928 and 1972. Immediately, the family relocated to <strong>Lethbridge</strong>, where he grew up and received all his schooling. Upon graduation from the U of A with a law degree in 1981, Dodic fulfilled his plan to return to <strong>Lethbridge</strong> where he articled with the former firm, Maxwell, Larson & Co. “I always knew I wanted to return to <strong>Lethbridge</strong> to establish my career here,” he comments. “Even though I had not maintained close connections with high school friends, as others did, I remained close to my parents and my sister here.” Dodic joined Toone and Maclean in opening their new law firm in 1993. A short time later, Brad Stephenson joined them in the practice. “We began with only one desk and one support staff,” he says, recalling that the young lawyers “took turns using the one desk when a client came in.” Dodic met his wife, Amy, a local artist, in <strong>Lethbridge</strong>, marrying her almost 25 years ago. <strong>The</strong>y raised two children, now grown. Sometime before the civic election of 2004, Dodic’s friend, Ed Rice, a senior lawyer who had served on city council during the 1960s, discussed the idea of running for Alderman with him. While he was considering a run for council, Rice picked up a nomination package for Dodic. After winning a seat in 2004, Dodic began to wind down his law practice. “I still spend one to two hours a week on my six or so remaining cases, but I probably won’t need to renew my license again after this year,” he says. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• LETHBRIDGE JOURNAL • WEEK OF MAY 11, 2012 • www.lethbridgejournal.ca
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