The controller's desk: the city's purse

1960 – today

The office under two names: The city's fiscal officer — the official who keeps its accounts, certifies its money and presents its budgets — has served under both of the office's historic titles in this record: comptroller in the usage of the Parent and Kernan years, controller in the modern one. The full succession of the desk is not verified in the sources reached for this section; the holders the documents name are printed here, and the line between them is printed as line, not as roster.

The holders the record names: Frank J. Bruggner was city controller when Mayor Voorde died in September 1960, and it was from the controller's desk that he succeeded to the mayoralty itself, as the Government section tells. Joe Kernan was the city's comptroller from 1980 to 1984 under Mayor Roger Parent — the apprenticeship, carried in his People profile, for the mayoralty and the governorship that followed. A generation later the desk appears in the council's own honors: on 13 October 2014 the council passed a resolution "publicly honoring and thanking Mark Neal for his exceptional public service to our city and the citizens of South Bend as City Controller and Deputy Mayor" — Neal had headed the Department of Administration and Finance as controller, and the February 2013 minutes record his department winning the Government Finance Officers Association's Certificate of Achievement for the city's annual financial report.

Murphy, Hockenhull, Parker: Neal's deputy was John H. Murphy, who presented the budgets as controller from 2014 — his name stands on the 2016 budget book and the 2016 comprehensive annual financial report — and the State Board of Accounts' own schedule of the city's officials fixes his tenure's end with an auditor's precision: City Controller John H. Murphy, 1 January 2016 to 24 July 2017; Jennifer C. Hockenhull, from 25 July 2017. Hockenhull, a certified public accountant who had been deputy controller under Murphy, held the desk through the end of the Buttigieg administration. Dan Parker is documented in the office by August 2019, presenting to the council's Personnel and Finance committee in the clerk's minutes of that month. The exact day of the Hockenhull–Parker handoff is not in the records reached for this section and is left open.

Sources:

1. Indiana State Board of Accounts, Supplemental Compliance Report of the City of South Bend, 1 January 2016 – 31 December 2016, Schedule of Officials — "City Controller: John H. Murphy, 01-01-16 to 07-24-17; Jennifer C. Hockenhull, 07-25-17 to 12-31-17."
2. City of South Bend, 2016 Budget Book and Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for fiscal year ending 31 December 2016 (city document archive) — John Murphy, City Controller; Jennifer Hockenhull, Deputy City Controller.
3. City of South Bend, Common Council minutes, 11 February 2013 and 13 October 2014 (city document archive) — the GFOA award to the department "headed by City Controller Mark Neal"; Resolution 14-88 honoring Neal as City Controller and Deputy Mayor; presenter John Murphy, City Controller, October 2014.
4. City of South Bend, Common Council Personnel & Finance committee minutes, August 2019 (Office of the City Clerk) — Dan Parker as city controller.
5. The Government and People sections of this history — Frank J. Bruggner's controllership and succession of 1960; Joe Kernan's comptrollership, 1980–1984.