Patrick Madden, when he was mayor of Troy in 2023, speaks during a swearing-in ceremony for the Troy Fire Department. Gov. Kathy Hochul appointed him to serve on Hudson Valley Community College’s Board of Trustees in December.
Lori Van Buren/Times Union
The Rensselaer County Legislature appointed Harry Tutunjian to Hudson Valley Community College’s Board of Trustees in March.
Tyler A. McNeil/Times Union
TROY — Patrick Madden and Harry Tutunjian are in a small club. And another really small club.
Madden, a Democrat, and Tutunjian, a Republican, are among a handful of former Troy mayors to serve on Hudson Valley Community College’s 73-year-old governing board — and together, they are the only two to serve at once.
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So far, they haven’t discussed the anomaly since Tutunjian, who led Troy from 2004 to 2011, was appointed in late March. The ex-mayors recently saw each other during a college event.
“(Photographers) joked about it during photos, saying, ‘All the mayors on this side,’ and things like that, but we haven’t really thought about that,” Tutunjian said.
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“More than anything, it’s probably just a coincidence,” said Madden, who served as mayor from 2016 to 2023.
HVCC spokesperson Dennis Kennedy confirmed that this is the first time that two former Troy mayors sat on the Board of Trustees at the same time. The Times Union independently verified it.
Overall, it’s rare for the mostly Troy-based college to be represented by past elected leaders of the city. Before Madden and Tutunjian came on board, Robert Conway Jr. was the last Troy mayor to sit on HVCC’s 10-member board. He served from 1975 to 1994.
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HVCC’s governing structure differs from that of nearby Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where sitting mayors are automatically granted an ex officio seat on the board. HVCC’s board is also considerably smaller than RPI’s 19-member decision-making panel.
In a statement, current Troy Mayor Carmella Mantello said that she is proud to see two mayors on the HVCC board.
“Their experience as former city CEOs brings a deep understanding of our community’s needs and perspective that is invaluable (when) important decisions are being made,” she said. “It’s hard to argue against having that level of institutional knowledge in the room.”
Tutunjian, a 1989 HVCC alumnus who went on to run his family’s auto shop before becoming mayor, has thought about serving on the HVCC board for several years. He said he often thinks back to 2009, during his second term as mayor, when President Barack Obama spoke to him during a visit to the college.
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“I’m really proud to be a part of the college alumni and the board now to try to get as many people to see that it is a possibility that someday you can be on stage with the president and recognized for what you did at Hudson Valley Community College,” he said.
Tutunjian is one of four Board of Trustees appointments from the Rensselaer County Legislature, where he also serves as an aide to the GOP majority. Four other trustees, including Madden, were appointed by a mix of Democratic governors over the last 16 years.
A wide variety of local officials have been asked to serve on the board over the years, including former Rensselaer County Legislature Chairman Neil Kelleher, former Troy City Manager Steve Dworsky and former county Legislator William Fagan.
Madden, a former executive director of Troy Rehabilitation and Improvement Program Inc. from 1987 to 2015, who has served on a bevy of nonprofit boards, hopes that more than elected experience was taken into account when Gov. Kathy Hochul appointed him in October.
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“It’s a great board,” he said. “And I hope that I wasn’t chosen just because my credentials included being mayor, but because of a breadth of knowledge that was developed over a career that would be useful to the college.”
Madden, an alumnus of the University at Albany and Farmingdale State College, never attended HVCC. That is a big perk of having Tutunjian on the panel, according to Madden.
“Harry brings a perspective as having been a student there — and that’s important,” Madden said. “Despite all of the things we need to look at and focus on, whether it be investments, new buildings, new programs, new policies, you have to keep the focus on, ‘How does this impact the student?’”
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Prior to joining the board, Tutunjian said he’d see Madden from “time to time.” But overall, he doesn’t typically encounter past mayors.
Madden, on the other hand, regularly runs into longtime friend and neighbor Mark Pattison, who in 1996 became the first full-time mayor in about three decades to serve Troy after the city dissolved its city manager form of government.