Scotty Douglass comes to the City of Cottonwood with nearly 27 years of local government experience, 4 years in the private sector overseeing cyber and check fraud prevention in Tempe, and 4 years serving his country in the United States Navy. Most recently, he served as a Deputy City Manager for the City of Modesto with a direct focus on building and development, water/wastewater utilities, parks/recreation, public works, airport and transportation, urban forestry, and more. He also has a breadth of experience in public safety, human resources, finance/budget, and information technology management.
Early in his career, Scotty served as a 9-1-1 communications dispatcher and progressed to the role of General Manager/CEO of a consolidated regional public safety (law, fire, ambulance, medical) dispatch center. He also held the position of Reserve Deputy Harbor Master with the Santa Cruz California Port District in the late 1990s.
Some highlights of his teams’ accomplishments are a Citywide Blight Abatement Program to address the city’s beautification and cleanup efforts (illegal dumping, abandoned vehicles, abandoned shopping carts, etc.); a Smart Cities Strategy Program to ensure the city’s coordination of data collection and use to tie the citywide systems together including traffic signals, public safety cameras, permitting, and the city’s public workorder systems; and a city virtual meeting system to allow the public to interact during Council Meetings in over 30 languages.
Scotty earned an associate’s degree in computer systems administration, an undergraduate degree in business management, and a Master’s Degree in Leadership from St. Mary’s College of California.
Scotty was appointed by the Cottonwood City Council to the role of City Manager in April of 2023. He is pleased to return to the State of Arizona and is honored to serve his new community, joining an accomplished City Leadership Team and an amazing staff! Scotty looks forward to serving his community in a variety of ways.
As a private pilot, he enjoys flying single-engine airplanes and has spent a great deal flying throughout Arizona and the Verde Valley. In his spare time, Scotty also loves camping and riding off-road motorcycles with his wife Michele and son Jack.