Trustee Race Focuses on Downtown Development, Funding Issues

In the race for Sussex Village Board, four candidates are seeking three seats and an opportunity to shape the community for a long time.

The top three vote-getters in Tuesday’s election will serve two-year terms on the board and one will replace incumbent Steve Berger, who isn’t seeking re-election. However, with several major projects on the horizon, the decisions the next board makes could shape the village for generations.

Here is a look at the candidates and their positions on the issues facing the village.

Timothy Dietrich

Incumbent Trustee Timothy Dietrich, 57, N60W22995 Silver Spring Dr., is finishing his first term on the board and he said his skill sets will continue to be useful as Sussex moves forward.

“I’ve got good common sense and I’ve worked really hard at my job,” he said. “Besides my own committee assignments, I also go to other committee meetings so I’m well informed on all the issues and I can cast my vote in a smart manner.”

While on the board, Dietrich, a tractor-trailer driver who along with his wife have six adult children and raise their young grandson, has used his own skills to save the village large amounts of money in implementing quiet zones in the community.

When the issue first came up, he said leaders would told a consultant on the issue would cost $50,000 alone, but by doing the work himself, the entire project cost less than that amount.

Dietrich said there are several major issues coming up that are all equally important, such as the expansion of Village Park and the redevelopment of the downtown area.

“The Village Park project is very exciting, but exciting can be really expensive, so we can’t do it in one phase, so it will take many, many years to complete,” he said. “Village Hall is also going to be a tough one because most people don’t use Village Hall, so it can be hard for them to understand why the work needs to be done.”

 The proposed project is going to help develop the eastern side of Sussex in the coming years, Dietrich said, but he isn’t  pushing for a particular business or type of housing unit in the proposed development, saying those decisions are made by the developer.   

Dietrich said Sussex has been very fiscally sound in past years and the potential state budget cuts will most likely not impact the community as much according to projections village administration has supplied him.

“It’s not probably going to be big enough to panic over,” Dietrich said. “Now if it turns out to be $500,000 we’re losing then you’ll see some scampering, but right now I don’t see it being a big problem.”

Jim Batzko

Jim Batzko, 45, W245N5713 Partridge Ln., served as a trustee from 2005 until 2010, when he resigned, but said he still wants to help out the community.

“I’m going to be the only board member with three young, grade school age kids on the board,” he said. “So I have an interest in keeping this a family community.”   

While on the Village Board, Batzko, who also works as a Delafield police officer, said he served on the Public Safety Committee and his experience in that field would be very beneficial to the community.

Batzko said the biggest issue facing the village is the ramifications of Gov. Scott Walker’s proposals in funding for local municipalities. In order to deal with the changes, Batzko said Sussex should look to control health care costs further and consider furlough days for employees, if necessary, along with any other necessary spending cuts.

“I think we could look at across the board cuts,” he said. “We might have to tell department heads that what you planned to spend, you might have to make one or 2 percent cuts.”

Batzko said he’s also excited about the potential redevelopment of the downtown area, but the public hearings need to continue because such a project must be made by more people than just the Village Board.

With the development, Batzko said he would like to see a family dining restaurant in the mix so residents spend their money in the village as opposed to going to other communities all the time.  

As far as replacing Village Hall, Batzko said he’s concerned with putting money into it in the short term while leaders decide what steps to take next. Batzko said he’s supportive of a referendum on the issue as they move ahead.

“Being off the board for a year, I haven’t gotten the nuts and bolts of this project, but I do have some real concerns about the viability of this building,” he said. “I don’t like the idea of throwing a lot of money into a building that may only last another seven to 10 years.”

Michael Knapp

Michael Knapp, 56, N65W23945 Vista Lane, served as a trustee from 1995 to 2001 and village president from 2001 to 2007, and wants to return to help lead once again.

“I’m a fiscal conservative,” he said. “I look at the village budget for ways to save money and I know a lot of the history of the village, so I think I would complement the Village Board with the knowledge I have."

Knapp, a married father of three children, said Sussex will lose a lot of money in transportation aid and shared revenue, so leaders need to be careful spending money as they go forward.

A major spending issue for Knapp is Village Hall and he believes it wouldn’t be prudent to spend money on a new facility.

“One thing that bothered me is they’re looking to increase the size of the building with a new Village Hall,” he said. “That really bothered me that they wanted to increase the size of the Village Hall because we really don’t need to grow government, we need to shrink government and if you put in a bigger building, they’re going to fill it.”

In order to overcome state aid losses, Knapp said the village will need to continue controlling costs because residents can’t afford any tax increases and services need to be prioritized.

With downtown redevelopment, Knapp said he wasn’t fond of the old plan of reconfiguring the Silver Spring Drive and Main Street intersection because he doesn’t see a need to purchase and tear down buildings because of an angled intersection.

Knapp said he also is supportive of the Cannery project and would like to see the development and the rest of the downtown area promoted as the community moves forward.

“You’ve already got Piggly Wiggly, and Village Hall and the Library down there,” he said. “But you need a business to help keep people downtown.”

Jason Wegner

Jason Wegner, W238N6449 Elmwood Ave., is seeking his third term on the board and said the village has done a lot to keep its fees and taxes in check.

“It’s a good fiscal long-term range for the village to do this,” Wegner told attendees of a candidate forum Wednesday.

Wegner said he has lived in the village for 36 years and his family has been there for five generations and he wants to continue to see the village move forward.

He said he is glad to see Sussex retaining business and said the village has its finances under control.