After 26 years, Glen Whitley has learned a thing or two. Most of all, how to get along.

In 2007, shortly after he first took office as Tarrant County Judge, Glen Whitley grabbed a sheet of yellow paper and jotted down some ground rules in neat blue cursive.

“Answer phones.”

“Not manager — team member.”

“Write out letters.”

And at the top of that list, “Not only his way — Let those doing it do it their way.”

The rules sat folded in a top drawer of his massive wooden desk for 16 years, until Whitley found it recently while cleaning out his time capsule of an office.

For Whitley, the emphasis of his work for the county has always been about teamwork — it’s why he jotted down the notes, and it’s the advice he gave to Tim O’Hare, who takes office Sunday as the new county judge to lead the commissioners court.

And after 26 years of service as the top leader and a commissioner, all Whitley asks for is that the collaboration continues after what will be a significant change in county governance.

This election cycle marks the exit of nearly 70 years of experience from the commissioners court. Whitley is joined in his departure by Republican J.D. Johnson of Precinct 4 in northwest Tarrant County, whose service of 35 years is the longest on record for a county commissioner here, and Democrat Devan Allen, who also didn’t seek reelection in Precinct 2 after her one term.

Johnson will be succeeded by Manny Ramirez, a Republican who is president of the Fort Worth Police Officers Association. Replacing Allen is Alisa Simmons, a fellow Democrat who is president of the Arlington NAACP.

Though leadership is changing, the board maintains its makeup of three Republicans and two Democrats.

The 2022 elections were tough for Whitley, even though he wasn’t on the ballot. The brutal primaries left the local GOP fractured, and Whitley took heat for his rejection of political warfare and his endorsements that defied the party line.

Now comes the real test for Tarrant County’s new leaders as they take office. Divisive politics can be what gets candidates nominated during contentious primaries, but actually getting things done in local government often requires compromise and reaching across the aisle.

Whitley has long been considered a middle-right leader in Tarrant, one of the last large urban counties in Texas that is mostly red on election days. Tom Vandergriff, who was county judge for 16 years before Whitley, was a Democrat in Congress but a Republican when he led the county. With O’Hare’s election, Tarrant stays red but takes a deeper swing to the right than ever before.

On the five-person commissioners court, no one voice counts more than another, but it takes a vote of three to make a decision on the county’s top priorities, which include setting the tax rate, deciding which roads to repair and what resources will go toward the public hospital system. While Whitley has had critics, he is an affable straight-shooter who has always seemed to be able to do whatever it takes politically to get the job done, including compromise.

A start in service

Whitley learned from his father the value of giving back to the community and never sitting on the sidelines. For most of his life, he has heeded that advice.

He got his first job scooping ice cream at 13, thanks to a boy who lived next door named George Wages. They would become lifelong friends. When Whitley turned 14, Wages got him involved in DeMolay, a leadership organization for young men. Whitley climbed the ranks and became chapter president. The experience planted a political bug.

By the time he was 20, Whitley became the organization’s state president and was traveling all over Texas. It was during this time he met Jim Penn, who became Whitley’s partner at their tax and audit firm, Whitley Penn & Associates, in 1983. His involvement in the organization also led him to meet his wife of 47 years, Brenda.

Ask Penn about Whitley today, and he doesn’t tell you about Judge Whitley. He’ll tell you about Glen.

Penn said he’s always respected his friend, whom he remembers as being a great adviser for his clients and as someone who was always the first to step in when anyone was in need.

“Number one, he’s honest,” Penn said. “What you see is what you get, and he’s willing to tell it like it is. He can do it in a professional manner, but he will speak his mind, but not insult the person on the other side when they disagree with him and vice versa.”

Even when they had debates, Penn and Whitley were able to hear each other out and respect the other person’s opinion.

“That takes a lot of character to be able to listen to other people’s opinions, and respect them for their opinions, but still hold on to your true beliefs,” Penn said.

Whitley became involved in the local CPA chapter, became its president, and got involved in the state chapter. It wasn’t long before politics came calling.

He served around five or six years on the city’s planning and zoning committee and three years on HEB’s school board.

At a fundraiser for Republican U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, Whitley was asked if he ever thought of running for county government. A school board member who went to Whitley’s church knew how much he loved details, and told him that county government could allow him to dig deeper.

He left his firm and became Tarrant County’s Precinct 3 commissioner on Vandergriff’s court in 1996. Whitley served three terms before becoming county judge in 2007.

Top accomplishments

Whitley sat to the left of Vandergriff on the commissioners court for 10 years, so when he stepped into Vandergriff’s shoes, Whitley thought it would be an easy transition.

County government wasn’t always as high-profile as it is today, and Whitley remembers a time when hardly anyone came to meetings. That changed when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020, which Whitley called his biggest challenge in office. All of the pandemic response went through county government.

Whitley’s top accomplishments include transportation projects such as the North Tarrant Express, which aided travel on I-35 and State Highways 121 and 183, and the DFW Connector at the north end of DFW Airport.

County commissioners aren’t in charge of schools, but Whitley is proud of his efforts to help students with asthma. The Asthma 411 program in collaboration with JPS Hospital, UNT Health Science Center and Cooks Hospital helped put nebulizer machines and asthma medication in schools. Whitley is also proud of the work the county did to get the Mental Health Jail Diversion Center up and running.

But at the top of Whitley’s accomplishments is the collaboration he has helped foster in Tarrant County. He believes it was on full display during the pandemic, when county leaders would meet with service agencies affected by COVID during 8 a.m. Monday calls. Wednesday afternoons, county leaders would call city leaders and ask what they needed. Wednesday evenings were when they would check hospital capacity.

“I don’t think there’s anything more important,” Whitley said.

Fractured exit

There’s no doubt Tarrant County is politically diverse.

It has long been heralded as a purpling state bellwether, but Whitley says the political environment has never been like this before.

Former Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price was the heavy favorite for county judge among prominent local Republicans, including Whitley. O’Hare all but bulldozed her in an aggressive campaign that attacked the former mayor’s political record to prove she wasn’t the conservative choice.

O’Hare, a Southlake attorney, ended up taking the race after seeing large support from his northern Tarrant suburbs.

Whitley didn’t shy away from openly criticizing O’Hare’s campaign style and said he couldn’t believe an attack campaign worked in Tarrant County. Later, Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker distanced herself from Republicans, saying they ate their own.

When Whitley endorsed Mike Collier, the Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, the party split further. The Tarrant GOP denounced Whitley’s endorsement. But behind the scenes, Whitley said, more Republicans were happy about what he chose to do.

Whitley said he hopes O’Hare’s campaign style doesn’t reflect how he’ll lead the court. He said he has been disappointed in how both parties have run campaigns.

“If you read George Washington’s farewell address, he basically says his biggest concern about the ability for democracy to last is the party system, because they’re more interested in wins for themselves than they are for wins for the people that they serve,” Whitley said.

It’s something Whitley hopes new commissioners can set aside.

Advice for the rookie

How does 26 years of being a leader in Tarrant County change a man?

For one, it’s made Whitley listen more intently. It’s opened his eyes to issues like mental health and poverty.

In his more than a quarter of a century of leadership — though Whitley prefers if you’ll just call it 26 years because it sounds less long — he’s watched as the county’s growth exploded and it became even more diverse.

His legacy isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. At a Dec. 13 meeting, outgoing commissioner Allen told a crowd that she’s learned from him, and told a story of how the judge once tried to rush her on a motion. Whitley later apologized and told Allen that she might need to hit him over the head with a two-by-four.

And as he makes his way out the door, Whitley jokes that his office just off the commissioner chamber now has an echo to it.

Four wooden bookshelves sit nearly barren. Gone are the family photos, the model of the F-16 fighter jet he once flew in, and all the awards he earned.

In the coming days, the office will be repainted in preparation for O’Hare’s arrival. But some items will stay.

A two-by-four with the words “Don’t rush me on my motion!” on one side and “ACT RIGHT!” on the other, a gift from Allen, will remain on the shelf.

And Whitley knows what he’ll do with that yellow sheet of paper with the rules he followed over the past 16 years as judge. It won’t go in the trash. It won’t come with him, either.

It will go right back in the top right desk drawer where it was before.