WDC enjoying Public Enemies

The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign sent the following email out, which plays on the Public Enemies filming in Oshkosh:

1. The other "Public Enemies" make news
The daily newspaper in Oshkosh has been spilling serious ink on "Public Enemies." There was another story on the subject this morning, but of a distinctly non-Hollywood variety.

An Oshkosh-area legislator who earned a "bystander" ranking in the Democracy Campaign's analysis of roll call votes and bill sponsorships on political reform issues criticized our assessment for not including the votes on the constitutional amendment dealing with the so-called "Frankenstein veto." Our latest Big Money Blog lists three reasons why Frankenstein was not considered.

2. Which enemies will they be filming at the Capitol?
It's official. Makers of the Johnny Depp movie will be filming at the Capitol. Makes sense. If they need extras, there are 54 with offices in the building who fit the bill.

According to WDC:

The roll call votes on an ethics enforcement reform bill (January 2007 Special Session Senate Bill 1) that was enacted into law last year were included in the analysis for both houses. The other three roll call votes in the Senate were on electioneering disclosure (Senate Bill 77), publicly financed state Supreme Court elections (SB 171) and requiring legislators to wait one year after leaving office before becoming a lobbyist (SB 23). In the Assembly, the other roll call votes were on banning campaign fundraising during the state budget process (Assembly Bill 61), publicly financed Supreme Court elections (AB 250) and electioneering disclosure (AB 272).

Local Election Results

Oshkosh voted - are you happy with the results?

School Board

Due to the lack of challengers for Common Council, the School Board race took center stage. John Lemberger seems to have surprised quite a few by winning one of the two seats on the School Board along with incumbent Tom McDermott. The race was close - only 550 votes separated fourth place finisher Michelle Monte (3,554) from first place finisher McDermott (4,101). Monte went from finishing in first place in the Primary to fourth place yesterday. Did she benefit from the Presidential preference primary somehow, or was there a change in the electorate's mood between Feb 19 and April 1?

But more importantly, what do these results mean for the School Board and the direction the district will be taking regarding facilities planning, school closings, and boundary changes? Teresa Thiel has already started this conversation on her site. What are your thoughts?

County Board

Of the four contested races in Oshkosh, the incumbents managed to hold their seats in each race except for Donna Lohry, who was redistricted to face off against fellow incumbent Claude Thompson. The results by the numbers:

District 14 (North-central Oshkosh):
Claude Thompson (I) - 369
Donna Lohry (I) - 200

District 15 (Northwest Oshkosh):
Kathy Lennon (I) - 152
Travis Swanson - 114

District 18 (East-Central Oshkosh):
Bill Wyngren (I) - 475
John Daggett - 48

District 21 (South side Oshkosh):
Bob Warnke (I) - 164
Christine Kutnick-Richards - 91

The most interesting race, Thompson v. Lohry, resulted in the Democratic Party and CUT the Board endorsed Thompson defeating first term Supervisor Lohry, who was really counting on support from the portion of the new district in the Town of Oshkosh. I haven't seen the breakdown by district yet, but Thompson's east-side district typically has higher turnout than Lohry's north-central district, and it appears that it was more than enough to give him the victory.

No surprise with the Wyngren - Daggett race, and props to UW Oshkosh student Travis Swanson for putting a good show against incumbent Kathy Lennon. Bob Warnke was targeted by the CUT the Board group, and his win reflects his support among his constituents.

How will this impact the direction of the Winnebago County Board?

Are you happy with the results?

Monitor Elections in Oshkosh, Cutting the Board Question

Election monitors are needed for Oshkosh next Tuesday April 1 for the general election. If you are able to help any time between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m., please let me know. It's not difficult, we'll train you, and you learn a lot! Please email Ann at afrisch@voyager.net

The Oshkosh Chamber of Commerce posted candidate questions online here. The asked county board members what their stance was on cutting the board. To no surprise, many support the cut. Also to no surprise, their reasons are horrible.

State Senate Race is now HOT

Carol Roessler (R-Oshkosh) has finally announced what many were suspecting - she is not running for reelection. The writing on the wall was that she wasn't raising any money, but now that she has made it official it is time to see who pops up to challenge for her seat.

Jessica King (D-Oshkosh), currently on the Oshkosh Common Council, has already thrown in her hat and has area Democrats lined up behind her. Peg Lautenschlager is supporting Jessica King, and that carries a lot of weight around here. King will already have a time and money advantage against a Republican opponent as well.

What about the Republicans? Sheriff Mike Brooks (left) is the name thrown around most frequently. Whether Brooks had considered running for Carol Owens open Assembly seat or not is unknown, but the State Senate seat of Roessler is a much bigger catch for Brooks.

Roessler's Senate District consists of the 52nd, 53rd, and 54th Assembly Districts. The 52nd is held by Republican John Townsend of Fond du Lac. Would he be thinking about stepping up to the State Senate now that the Republicans are a minority in the State Assembly? Townsend is up there in age, and may be considering retiring himself. Fond du Lac however could turn out any number of Republicans that might vie for the seat.

The 53rd AD is open with Carol Owens retirement, and Republican candidates for her seat have been entering and exiting the race too fast to keep track of. A Democrat even entered and exited that race. The 53rd is a tough nut - LuAnn Bird in 2004 made a play at Owens as a Democrat and got close but not nearly close enough to consider the race "winnable". It seems likely that the Democrats won't run in the 53rd, and instead (wisely) put their resources on the State Senate race with King.

One thing we should look forward to - based on the Hintz - Pung-Leschke race in the 54th in 06 this Senate seat is going to have a LOT of outside money thrown at it. Republicans lost the Assembly in 06, and are only three seats from loosing the State Senate. Roessler's retirement makes this race a key race for both the Democrats and Republicans.

Who do you think might run? Who do you think will win?

Oshkosh Local Primaries Today

Don't forget to vote today!

Local primaries today in Oshkosh include OASD School Board (Vote for 2)
John Daggett
Kevin Jahnke
John Lemberger
Tom McDermott
Michelle Monte
Ben Schneider

Winnebago County Board of Supervisors District 14 (Vote for 1)
Donna Lohry
Harold Steineke
Claude Thompson

Click here for polling locations and election results.

Diebold TSX in Winnebago County

Ann Frisch's community column in Wednesday's Northwestern referred to a study that Dr. Frisch conducted with Dr. Corrine Donley with the assistance of County Clerk Sue Ertmer.

The data from that study has been posted here at the request of Dr. Frisch for your perusal.

Frisch wrote:

On Oct. 19 last year, a colleague and I reviewed the touch-screen ballot summaries from the November 2006 election, the first election in which every polling place in Winnebago County had a touch screen voting machine. It was not our intent to conduct an audit to see if every vote was counted accurately. Our goal was to determine the number of voters who used the Diebold TSX touch screen machines by polling place.

She concluded with:

In spite of a reputation for clean, well-run elections in Winnebago County, it's clear that voters did not trust the touch screen machines – neither in the spring of 2006 when the issue of purchasing touch-screens came before the county board and not in November 2006 when they were first put to use. In my opinion, the distrust is coming from real vulnerabilities nationally. See http://www.votersunite.org.

A 100 percent audit of the touch screen ballots would allow evaluation of over counts and under counts. At a minimum, duplicates of the computer tapes could be made at each election and placed in our public libraries.

The voting clerk's statistical report could include the number of touch screen voters with less difficulty than reporting the absentee ballots.

Finally, a Citizens' Commission is needed to listen to voters about their experiences with touch screen machines, to monitor the reliability of the machines and to make recommendations for municipal and county ordinances to protect our election systems.

In my opinion, faith in the accuracy of our voting system is critical to our democracy. One look at Kenya in December, Ohio in 2004 or Florida in 2000 makes it painfully clear that we need to have in place a solidly secure election system, not a faith-based voting system. Our existing system of optical scan ballots by Diebold has served us wonderfully. Implementing a simple tool to allow the visually impaired and people with disabilities to vote using the same optical scan ballots as everyone else would have been (and still can be) the most cost effective and secure means of complying with HAVA (Help America Vote Act), which is why we got the TSX machines in the first place. Lets not forget that HAVA required a system in place to help the disabled vote, it did not require electronic voting machines.

Candidate Forums WILL be Televised

But the District 14 forum will not be live, rather it will be taped for later playback on OCAT. Here are the details from LWV to follow-up my last post:

Oshkosh Area League of Women Voters To Host Two Primary Election Forums

The Oshkosh Area League of Women Voters will hold two
separate candidates' forums before the February 19th primary election.

A forum for the six Oshkosh Area School Board candidates
is set for Thursday, February 7, 6:30 to 7:30 in the Oshkosh City
Council Chambers, 4th floor City Hall.

The six candidates are incumbents Tom McDermott and Ben Schneider II.
The challengers are John Daggett, Kevin Jahnke, John Lemberger and
Michele Monte. Panel members are Jim Fitzhenry, managing editor of
the Oshkosh Northwestern and Frankie Mengeling, vice-president Oshkosh
Area LWV.

This forum will be broadcast on Oshkosh Community Access Television
CitiCable 10 and simulcast by WOCT 101.9 FM, Oshkosh Community Radio.

The other forum centers on a primary race for County Board District
14. The reduction of the county board from 38 to 36 districts has put
two incumbents, Donna Lohry and Claude Thompson vying for this newly
created district. Their challenger, a former county board member, is
Harold Steinike. To see the outline of this district go to
http://www.co.winnebago.wi.us/, click on "election information" and
then "supervisory district maps."

This forum is set for Monday, February 4 at St. Andrew's Lutheran
Church, 1100 E. Murdock Avenue from 5:30 to 6:30. Panel members are
Alex Hummel, editorial editor for the Oshkosh Northwestern and Frankie
Mengeling, vice-president Oshkosh Area LWV. This forum will be
videotaped for later showings on OCAT CitiCable 10.

The public is invited to attend these forums. They may submit
questions for the candidates in person at the forum or electronically
to fgmem@sbcglobal.net.

The League of Women Voters is a non-partisan, political organization;
one of its main goals is to provide election forums to increase voter
awareness of issues.

UPDATE: District 14 Forum may be broadcast

I just received the following from the Oshkosh LWV:

After hearing from some of you last night and this morning, Frankie
Mengeling, the league member arranging the forum, is working to have
it broadcast.

Great news! It sounds like nothing is for sure yet, but I will relay any further information I receive.

District 14 Debate will not be televised?

The word on the street is that the Oshkosh area League of Women Voters will be hosting a candidate forum for the three seeking the Winnebago County Board of Supervisors District 14 seat this spring. Because there are three candidates running there will be a primary on February 19, the date of the Presidential Primary in Wisconsin.

The Forum is scheduled for Monday Feb 4 at 5:30 at St. Andrews Lutheran Church, 1100 E. Murdoch.

But at this point you won’t be able to watch it on OCAT, because the League has decided not to televise it. This has a number of people, including a number of LWV members, quite upset. One league member in an email said:

I would think televising an important forum would be giving strong support to “encouraging informed and active participation in government.”

The reasons why the League doesn’t want to televise the forum havn’t been revealed, but there has already been pressure on the LWV to change their mind, as well as discussions of arranging for an independent recording and rebroadcast of the forum, possibly even online. One possibility is to post the forum online here at mainstreetoshkosh.com, which is willing to work with others to make this happen. I feel strongly that the forum should be made available to as many potential voters as possible.

District 14 is a newly drawn County Board district that includes Oshkosh Ward 10 (where I live) and Oshkosh Ward 8 and Town of Oshkosh Ward 4. The redistricting was due to the County Board’s decision to reduce its own size from 38 to 36 members. Because of the redistricting, two incumbents (Claude Thompson in ward 8 and Donna Lohry in ward 10) have been pitted against each other. The primary is a result of a third candidate jumping in the race, Harold Steineke, who is a former County Board Supervisor that Donna Lohry defeated 2 years ago. The County Board is a non-partisan race.

District 14 is a strangely shaped district that stretches from Wisconsin St. on the far West all the way to Lake Winnebago on the East, following Murdoch and Nevada the entire way. The eastern portion, wards 4 & 8, include portions of Hazel, Hickory, Menominee, and the lump that sticks out into Lake Winnebago on the northern shore of Millers Bay. The western portion, ward 10, includes a large block of central northern Oshkosh bordered by Wisconsin, Melvin, Main St, and Murdoch. The two portions are connected by a three block wide strip of Oshkosh between Murdoch and Nevada.

(cross posted on Babblemur)

Oshkosh School Board election

Two seats are up for election on the seven member School Board, and four candidates are challenging the two incumbents. All quotes below are from this article by the ONW.

The incumbents are Ben Schneider II and Tom McDermott.

Ben Schneider has served on the School Board for six years, and is billed in the ONW article as a budget and finance guy:

"I'm always looking to the future and how a resolution will impact our future education or future budgets," said Schneider, who has three children in the Oshkosh school district. "I feel that frankly it is a perspective that is ignored on the board and I do feel that in order for us to kind of move and get some health back to this district we're going to have to start changing the way we do business and not always making decisions that seem like a good idea for a short period of time."

Tom McDermott is also seeking a third three year term. He says he wants to see the 10-year facilities plan completed:

McDermott said he is seeking a third term because he thinks it's important to complete the 10-year facilities planning process.

The long-range facilities planning process, which began more than a year ago, will close some schools, add onto and renovate other buildings and redraw boundary lines to create equity among schools throughout the district.

"We're at an important point in developing and moving that plan forward and I'd like to be a part of that process," McDermott said. "It's a really important process. The plan will provide for facilities that are going to last for a long time."

Challenging these two incumbents are John Daggett, Kevin Janke, John Lemberger, and Michelle Monte.

John Daggett, who is also challenging Bill Wingren's County Board seat, has run for School Board before along with a handful of other offices. Daggett has raised the bar on the label "perennial candidate" at this point.

Kevin Janke, a parent with children in the OASD who was involved with the community response team aspect of the facilities planning, appears to be running to get that facilities plan completed:

"I am to the point of frustration because this process is taking so long," he said. "I'm very disappointed in some of the board members for being so negative about the district and the facilities plan."

John Lemberger, a UWO education professor and ONW community columnist, may be the most qualified academically with a doctorate in curriculum and instruction. He is a former teacher and has a history with the OASD. Lemberger:

Among the issues Lemberger hopes to address are neighborhood schools, district spending and teacher hiring practices. He said he also hopes to strengthen the relationship between UWO and the school district.

"I think we ought to preserve our neighborhood schools," he said. "I don't agree with spending $46 million to basically close a bunch of neighborhood schools."

Michelle Monte is launching her third run in three years for a seat on the School Board. Based on the conversations on the blogs, Monte is the "Hillary Clinton" of this race - people either love her or hate her. Will this be the year that she breaks onto the school board?

"I'm running because I never give up on the future of my children or the community's children," said Monte, who has two children in the Oshkosh school district.

Monte has a degree in education from the University of Wisconsin–Green Bay and is currently pursing a master's degree in English at UWO.

With no Common Council race we can expect a lot more attention to be paid to this school board race and the various County Board seats this term.

There is chatter already taking place on online forums around the city including Michelle Monte's blog, Theresa Thiel's blog, The ONW forums, and more soon to come. And of course we encourage discussion here on this site as well.

Who do you like at this point?

No one wants to be on the Common Council

The filing deadline came and went, and no one decided to run for the Common Council except for the three incumbents - Paul Esslinger, Dennis McHugh, and Burk Tower.

What does this mean? Is the city satisfied with the direction the Council is taking us in? It is possible. Or is it possible that no one wants to be in their shoes right now, given what the Common Council has to deal with over the next year? This Common Council will be hiring a new City Manager, handling the Riverfront Development projects, overseeing Millers Bay and dealing with the annual increase in expenses and the cap on the tax levy.

Two questions:

One: If we can't find anyone to run for Common Council, will we be able to find someone interested in being the City Manager?

Two: Since we won't have a competitive election for Common Council, applying the logic of the Northwestern, the LWV, and the "CUT the County Board" group shouldn't we be considering cutting the size of the Common Council from Seven to Four?

And a last thought - without a competitive common council race, what are we going to talk about for the next three months? The weather?

Spring Elections Countdown

Next week is the deadline for papers to be filed to run for local non-partisan offices. So far it looks as if the most competitive races will be for County Board seats rather than the School Board or Common Council. So far 10 of the 36 new districts may see competitive elections, with two of them possibly seeing three candidates vying for a single seat.

While some may lament that only 10 of 36 (28%) districts are competitive, it should be noted that the last county board elections saw only 4 of 38 (11%) districts competitive.

Oshkosh districts that may see competitive races include:

• District 14 (North Side) Incumbents Donna Lohry and Claude Thompson are both running, along with a possible challenge from Harold Steineke, who lost to Donna Lohry in 2006.
  
• District 15 (north of UWO) Incumbent Kathleen Lennon may face challenger Travis Swanson.
  
• District 18 (East Side) Incumbent Bill Wingren may face challenger John Daggett.
• District 21 (South Side) Incumbent Robert Warnke may be facing challenger Christine Kutnink Richards.

The Oshkosh School Board has two challengers so far, Kevin Jahnke and John Daggett, running against incumbents Ben Schneider and Tom McDermott, to elect two members. With the tensions surrounding the School Board this last year the lack of challengers is surprising.

The Oshkosh Common Council has three seats up for election, and the three incumbents (Paul Esslinger, Burk Tower, Dennis McHugh) only have a single potential challenger so far (Robin Eckstein). This is also surprising considering the intense scrutiny on the Common Council this last year.

Will we have competitive local elections this coming Spring? What are your thoughts?