Ending the drama: The theme of the Kronenwetter board race
Ending the drama: The theme of the Kronenwetter board race
One major theme emerged of the four candidates who showed up for the forum Tuesday evening
I once sat on a panel held at Rib Mountain in which municipal leaders could ask area journalists questions. I recall a question then-Kronenwetter administrator Richard Downey asked me during the forum — it was about how to get media attention.
I mentioned to him that, though it might be counter intuitive, we pay the most attention when things are going wrong.
It’s similar to the police — if you don’t have encounters with police, that means typically you’re not breaking the law. (We could unpack that in a number of different ways but let’s just keep that as a general given right now.)
If things are going right in the village, that’s supposed to be the norm, so not something we would pay attention to. We come in when things are going either exceptionally right (above and beyond the norm) or very wrong.
I once went to a meeting in the village of Plover in Portage County discussing taxes. I expected a large turnout since people care about taxes. The place was empty. I asked Plover Administrator Dan Mahoney where everyone was. He told me they weren’t raising taxes, so it’s no surprise no one was in the audience. When taxes go up a lot, that’s when the village would be packed.
In other words, attention tends to come when things are going wrong.
Careful what you wish for.
It’s with that in mind that The Wausonian made its way to the candidate forum held at Village Hall Tuesday evening. One thing was abundantly clear: people are now paying attention.
A packed hall
Easily more than 100 people attended the candidate forum Tuesday. I received word that the holding of it on village hall grounds might have been illegal. It was suggested that the board could, and should have, shut down the forum on those grounds. That didn’t happen. (See footnote for more.) 1
Four of the five candidates for the village board (village residents will select three) sat behind tables on the right side of the room, while village president candidates Chris Voll and Ken Charneski sat on the left, waiting more than an hour for their turn.
Candidates took turns asking questions that had been sourced from the audience beforehand.
Four of them, I mentioned. Not on hand was current board member Kim Tapper. One of the questions asked where exactly he was that evening. Forum organizers explained he’d been reached out to online several times, as well as once in person. He declined to attend, they said.
A ‘blank-show’
In the little more than one-hour of questions, finding things any of them disagreed on proved challenging. The main reason all of them are running is to end the drama going on with the board currently. Unnecessarily long meeting times, board members using the board for their personal agendas or to benefit family members, board members rage quitting (first I heard about that!), abuse of staff, etc all came up during the course of the evening.
Basically, they’re all against those things.
That creates an interesting scenario for incumbent Chris Eiden, who served on the board through all this. Eiden said that none of the drama on the board came from his direction and he would like to see it stop as well. Of all the board members I reached out to, Eiden was one of two who responded (but not timely enough for the final piece, despite being given weeks.
Joining Eiden on stage were challengers Alex Vedvik, a utility worker who started the petition in the village calling for an ethics commission; Guy Fredel, an attorney with municipal experience, and Kelly Coyle, a power plant worker with an MBA, all sent that message of restoring some normalcy to the board and the village.
Coyle was perhaps the most blunt, saying the current board is a “blank” show (I’ve heard the non-PG version used a lot to describe the situation by people in casual conversations). Coyle said sometimes it’s embarrassing to admit being from Kronenwetter with all the negative attention.
Vedvik pointed out that no one on the Kronenwetter staff has been there more than a year. The major staff turnover is something The Wausonian was alerted to, which is why this publication first started looking at Kronenwetter and broke news about the situation in our multi-part series.
And Fredel pointed out that even the village attorney refuses to work with the village anymore because of the behavior of certain board members toward him. It might be the first time in my nearly two-decade career I’ve heard of a municipal attorney quitting over being mistreated. After all, the attorney is supposed to be on the village’s side.
The Wausonian is not in the election prediction business, but expect Tuesday’s turnout to be high - all eyes are on Kronenwetter.
I did some research on candidate forums and where they should be held. I found nothing suggesting a village hall couldn’t be used for a forum. Guidelines available online only suggest a non-profit hosting a forum ought to choose a neutral ground. Chapter 12 of the state statutues prohibits electioneering at the polling place on the day of the election. But a forum in which all parties are invited is tough to construe as electioneering, and it took place a week before the election. A candidate campaigning using public property is another matter, as we saw with Mayor Robert Mielke when he announced his re-election campaign on the steps of City Hall using some of the city’s equipment.