Kronenwetter campaign animosity boils over at Kronenwetter meeting

Targets of an attack livid, and say so, at Monday's board meeting

This campaign ad stirred up controversy at Kronenwetter’s Monday meeting.

Kelly Coyle wasn’t too happy, people found out Monday.

The village board member somehow ended up on an attack again against three of the Kronenwetter candidates in the village board race. Coyle was angered and perplexed, since he isn’t on Tuesday’s ballot.

Coyle joined several board members and community members in speaking out against the campaign ad during the public comment section of Kronenwetter’s Monday village board meeting. Addressing campaign matters during a municipal meeting is pretty rare, and even rarer for members of that governing body to take to the mic to talk about something like that.

What sparked it? Candidates Ken Charneski, Sean Dumais and Cindy Lee Buchowski-Hoffman were named in campaign materials suggesting that they are the only three in the race who represent traditional values.

It then calls out the other three candidates — Aaron Myska, Ryan Leff and Scott Daual — as supporters of Community for All, suggesting they are being promoted by a group that wants to replace family values with a group that wants to make the community “queerer, browner, witchier and transgender.” The phrase comes from a photo of a woman holding a protest sign that was posted on the Community for All Facebook page. (It doesn’t appear to be someone from CFA.)

The ad also named current board members Kelly Coyle, Alex Vedvik and village board president Chris Voll as being supporters of CFA.

The ad also references a Wisconsin Ethics Commission investigation The Wausonian first reported into the CFA’s political activities.

Coyle responded angrily to the assertions made in the letter. Coyle told the board Monday that he has long been a conservative and voted his conservative values. But, Coyle said, that doesn’t necessarily conflict with wanting to be inclusive.

“Their page says they do not endorse candidates but have their preferred candidates,” Coyle said Monday. “It’s based on ‘do they support inclusiveness, and do they support the Marathon County Public Library.’ That’s pretty innocuous to me.”

The preferred candidates come from lists Community for All started putting together two years ago. Those lists lean left wing, but not exclusively. For example, on their Marathon County board list, Kurt Gibbs and Jacob Langenhahn, who are conservatives, are included.

Coyle went on to attack Charneski, saying he voted no on most village board votes, that he is facing a workplace harassment suit and that he is suing the village including asking for damages. “The moment you asked for damages, it demonstrated you don’t have in mind the best interests of the village,” Coyle says.

Current board member Alex Vedvik also decried the campaign literature, and his wife Elizabeth Vedvik said they’ve endured harassment including hate mail and email, and having cars drive by their homes at night shining their lights in their windows.

Charneski in response to allegations made at the meeting pointed out that the language people are reacting to — “queerer, browner, etc” — comes from the CFA Facebook post mentioned above. He said he thought the post had been removed but The Wausonian found the post still active. He later directed people to see more of his thoughts on the situation at kencharneski.com, including questions from another reporter and his response. In his response, Charneski blasts the reporter for having a left-wing bias while pointing out the language the reporter says is considered racist came from that post.

The three candidates attacked in the ad took the top three spots in the primary held last February. How the ad and the blowup to that ad will impact Tuesday’s election is anyone’s guess.

Meanwhile, at least one person named in the ad is considering legal action. Coyle implied that he’d spoken to an attorney and would be considering a libel and/or defamation suit.

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