Trafford Councilman Frank Bruno knows he's not liked by everyone.

He's outspoken. He's abrasive. He's confrontational.

And he's the 2010 Citizen of the Year for Trafford Borough for being the architect of the six-year fiscal plan that got the borough out of debt.

Bruno's governing style and some of the early consequences of his plan made him unpopular with some after joining council in 2003.

But his plan worked, and the oppressive debt was paid off last year--soon after the borough won the Governor's Award for Local Government Excellence in fiscal accountability for its financial recovery plan.

Bruno said he attended some budget work sessions before taking his seat on council. That's when he realized the borough--with a $1.2 million operating budget and $800,000 debt--was in bad shape.

"I immediately started rocking the boat and suggesting things to trim costs that the borough wasn't used to--things like firing employees or not awarding certain contracts," Bruno says. "Essentially, what we were doing was cutting the operation budget and having a portion of that going toward the debt.

"We were telling people, 'You're going to continue paying the same taxes, but we are cutting back on staff.' You'd hope you could convince a town you're pitching in for the good of the community, but people see things as what's best for the individual, not the community. There was backlash because it was a different approach."

To get the plan off the ground, borough council initiated a series of personnel cuts. Council eliminated the positions of two public works employees, a borough secretary and eventually the police chief. Remaining employees experienced a wage freeze.

Work on the new borough building--which was completed in 2007 after more than a decade--was sporadic as the borough waited for funding. In sticking with Bruno's austere finance plan, officials refused to finish the building with local tax money, instead using only state grant money to complete the project.

"In the very beginning, I started to feel it wasn't going to get off the ground," he says. "Trying to sell it was the toughest part. It ran fairly smoothly after those initial years."

Not all council members agreed with the plan. By May 2004, Lester Race, Chris Espenshade, Vince Babeo and Tom Babeo all resigned from council. Gina Lloyd, Rita Windsor, Marco Bortoluzzi and Rich Laird were appointed to take their place.

Bruno said that made it easier.

"People didn't want to be associated with such a bad cloud. I'm grateful that the people who agreed with the plan stayed on and those who didn't left," he says with a laugh. "People who came on agreed on the general direction the borough should head in, and it was easier to show a solid face to the community."

Councilman Casey Shoub was one of the councilmembers who chose to stay. He says he was cautious about the plan at first.

"I was pretty much for it, but I was skeptical at the same time," he says. "We needed someone to change the course of things and get a handle on things.

"It was basically changing how things were done and how I was used to them being done. A lot of hard decisions had to be made," Shoub says. "And quite frankly, I wasn't happy with some of them."

Borough manager Lisa Mallik says she, too, wasn't sure about the plan when she first heard about it.

"I was afraid for everyone's jobs, but Frank said the remaining employees wouldn't be affected, and he kept his word," says Mallik, whose own future with the borough was uncertain when council decided in 2004 to replace her old position of borough administrator with the title she now holds. "The wage freeze had to be done. I don't know that I would have done it the way he did, only because I wouldn't have been brave enough.

"He took the hard road. I felt bad for him in the beginning because he was getting beat up, but he was truly dedicated."

Bruno's stance on issues such as public comment during borough meetings and of a teen curfew drew rebukes from civil rights advocates, and his brash, blunt style has made some enemies.

That's to be expected, he says.

"In politics, you're always going to have people that don't like you, and the more outspoken and energetic you are, the more of a divide there is between the people who like you and the people who don't," he says. "I think I have a positive rapport with people who have worked with me. They might not agree with me, but they can say, 'Damn, he's a hard worker.'

"If you spend your time worrying about your political perception, you'll fail. I have to do what I think is right, and I would hope people will look back and say, 'This is what he accomplished.'"

In the end, it's all worth it, Bruno says.

"A lot of people say it's not worth it, but I think it is," he says. "You have to take the hit in the chin and you risk your reputation, but if you love the community enough, you have to do it."