Gene Dulaney, Ward 7 city councilman, grew up in the small, southern town of Prattville, knowing he had a mind for business and a heart for people.
He spent the majority of his time as a boy playing basketball, baseball and football. His love for sports has not diminished, as he and his family have been season-ticket holders for Auburn baseball for a good while.
Dulaney proudly shares stories of his son’s collection of foul balls from Plainsman Park that he scavenged by slipping through the wrought iron bars of the stadium and into the coliseum lot where the treasures would land. His daughter still enjoys sitting alongside her father, carefully filling out score cards.
Dulaney said he was beyond happy to return to Auburn, his alma mater and his wife’s home, to start a family after a brief cruise around the state.
“Having been here as a student and then coming back as a working person, you see things from a different perspective,” Dulaney said. “That was eye-opening.”
The two moved around for Dulaney’s work in banking and lived in Montgomery for two years and Birmingham for four.
“I always knew I wanted to do something in business,” Dulaney said.
Dulaney started in accounting, and after changing his major to finance, he found the idea of banking much more appealing and a viable option for his future. At this time, banking wasn’t an ideal profession to go into, as the economy was on a steep decline.
This didn’t stop Dulaney, and after 25 years in the industry, he is happy he didn’t shy away.
Dulaney met while at Auburn University. While in school, Dulaney found himself involved in a fraternity and other academic groups through the business school. Dulaney had proposed to and married his wife before her graduation, taking them to Birmingham where she continued schooling at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
The Dulaneys returned to Auburn in 1987.
“We weren’t necessarily looking to come back, not that we were opposed to it, but in banking, you go where the opportunity is,” Dulaney said. “We got an opportunity to come to (Auburn) and run a branch of a bank, and we did that.”
Even though the family wasn’t searching for a way to return to Auburn, Dulaney sees it as a blessing.
“Auburn is such a great place to raise a family,” Dulaney said. “I would like to tell you we did plan it that way, so we could get back and raise a family here, but God just allowed that to happen.”
Once in Auburn, Dulaney began to find involvement opportunities in United Way, the Auburn Chamber of Commerce and Miracle League, a baseball program for children and adults with special needs.
Miracle League has been a large part of Dulaney’s life, and he enjoys time on the field and the interaction with children and adults from the community. He has been volunteering with the program since 2008.
“I’d been involved with United Way and other organizations, so I had the opportunity to see what the community’s needs were and that there are a lot of people in this community that are less fortunate,” Dulaney said. “Our community is still small enough that people take an interest in helping out their neighbors.”
Alongside caring for the individuals of the Auburn community, Dulaney spent time working with the Auburn Chamber of Commerce where he is grateful to have learned about Auburn’s small businesses. Dulaney said both of these experiences led him to consider running for office after many of his close friends pushed him in that direction.
Dulaney said his experience in banking and knowledge of finance help him bring a different, much-needed skill base to the Auburn City Council. Dulaney is always curious to see what helps small businesses grow over time and works to continue making positive changes.
Dulaney has been serving on the council for 14 years and has grown to know the town and his district well. Dulaney said he and the other representatives are working to assess concerns over growth in Auburn and work toward a solution.
“When I started in 2002, the economy was good and the city was in an uptick in growth. In 2008 and 2009 that cycle turned and went the other way,” Dulaney said. “Things slowed down, the economy wasn’t as good, and now we’ve cycled back again. We are in a period of unprecedented growth for our city in terms of population and our economy. That brings challenges with it to make sure we manage it properly.”
Dulaney said steps toward infrastructure changes and advancements are on the table for the upcoming months in order to address the growth.
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