Appleton will be holding its spring primary election on Tuesday, Feb. 21. The primary ballot will include half of the Appleton Common Council, the members from odd-numbered districts. The Outagamie County Executive will also be up for reelection. Additionally, voters across the state will elect a new Supreme Court Justice. These elections are officially nonpartisan, so first and second place candidates in each primary election will advance to the general election on Tuesday, April 4. The exception is the school board race, in which all candidates will advance to the April election. The deadline to register to vote is Feb. 17 and you can vote at City Hall or at your district polling place.
Appleton Common Council
In the Appleton Common Council, Alderpersons Bill Siebers (District 1), Brad Firkus (District 3), Katie Van Zeeland (District 5), Alex Schultz (District 9), Kris Alfheim (District 11), Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) and Chad Doran (District 15) are running for reelection. All are running unopposed. District 7 Alderperson Maiyoua Thao is stepping down from her seat, which will open up the only contested election for the Common Council. The candidates are Patrick Hayden, the Democratic candidate who challenged and lost to Assemblymember Dave Murphy (R-Wis.) in 2022, and Karl Koenig.
Hayden, who currently works as the Lead Software Engineer at Thrivent, considers himself a progressive, and hopes to address issues such as public safety, housing affordability and climate change. Some of his proposed plans include changing tax incentives for developers to develop affordable housing, embedding more mental health professionals in the Appleton Police Department (APD) and developing greenways in the city that could become transit corridors. Like Hayden, Koenig works in IT, as the Manager of Applications Engineering at Rosen’s Diversified, and has also been a pastor at Appleton Alliance Church. He identifies more as a libertarian, although he said he is open to listening to anyone. His stated priorities are education, keeping taxes affordable, lowering debt and increasing public safety. Some of his proposed plans include conducting a yearly external audit of APD, encouraging sustainable behavior by the city government and looking into constructing a system of electric vans that people could request at specific times and locations.
Notably, no candidates filed to challenge Hartzheim, who won her election in 2021 by only two votes. Doran and Alfheim will also be running unopposed, despite Doran’s work for the Republican Party of Wisconsin and Alfheim’s unsuccessful run for State Senate as a Democrat. Siebers also failed to draw a challenger, despite a stronger-than-expected showing from his progressive challenger in 2021, Wendy Bolm. Sophomore Sam Brewer, Outreach Coordinator of LU Dems (Lawrence’s chapter of the College Democrats), is disappointed by the fact that most of the races are uncontested, specifically Doran and Hartzheim. Brewer said that every elected official should be challenged for their seat because he feels that it keeps them honest and allows them to highlight their records in ways they can’t if they are running unopposed.
Kelly Fenton, Second Vice Chair of the Democratic Party of Outagamie County, said that local progressives tried to find candidates to run in these elections, but that it was hard to find candidates and they were put off by the rigors of the job and the salary. He added that his wife, District 6 Alderperson Denise Fenton, works a full time job but is paid a salary that reflects a 10 hour per week job. Assemblymember Lee Snodgrass (D-Wis.), who serves as Second Vice-Chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, agrees that the pay was likely a contributing factor along with the fact that candidates and their families receive personal attacks and their privacy is often violated. She added that she’s received violent threats in direct messages on social media.
“People…have to say yes and if you can’t get someone to say yes, there’s not much you can do about it,” said Snodgrass.
Outagamie County Executive
Following his unsuccessful run in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate in 2022, Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson, the Chief Executive of the county government, is running for his fourth term. Nelson has two opponents, Kevin Sturn and Justin Krueger. Sturn served on the Outagamie County Board of Supervisors until 2020, while Krueger currently serves as the County Supervisor for District 9, as well as serving as a Trustee for the Combined Locks Village Board and the Fox Valley Technical College Board. The election is open to everyone in Outagamie County.
Sturn is running on a platform of public safety, fiscal responsibility and improving county services. Sturn sees the County Executive’s office as a non-political administrative position. He feels that Nelson has made the office overly political and is thus an ineffective leader. Krueger is running on a platform of affordable housing, filling the vacant jobs at the county and mental health, as well as public safety. He is running against Nelson because he believes Nelson has used the office as a springboard for higher office and has unnecessarily politicized it. He also said he’s the only candidate with experience running a business. Nelson is running for reelection because he wants to continue to provide a steady hand of leadership to the county. He listed accomplishments such as the expansion of Appleton International Airport, saving the paper mill in Combined Locks from being sold off, paying county employees $15 per hour with a competitive benefits package, building treatment courts for people struggling with addiction and rejecting a new county jail, hiring a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Coordinator, flying the pride flag at the county courthouse and overseeing the creation of the methane recovery system, which uses methane from the landfill to power homes. He disagreed with Sturn and Krueger’s comments that he has politicized the office, since Outagamie County has an Executive, not an Administrator, and said that he ran for higher office to better advocate for the county, not to use his current job as a springboard for higher office.
Wisconsin Supreme Court
Currently, conservative judges make up a 4-3 majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. One of the conservatives, Justice Patience Roggensack, is retiring. The four candidates running to replace her are Milwaukee County Judge Janet Protasiewicz and Dane County Judge Everett Mitchell from the progressive side and Waukesha County Judge Jennifer Dorow and former Supreme Court Justice Daniel Kelly from the conservative side.
Protasiewicz believes that Wisconsinites deserve a fair and impartial court and said that this election is about protecting democracy and reproductive rights in the state. Kelly declined to comment and Mitchell and Dorow were unavailable for comment.
Snodgrass said that the Wisconsin Supreme Court race is important because, due to the fact that Wisconsin has a Democratic Governor and a Republican Legislature, many contentious issues are getting decided by the courts. She feels that a progressive majority on the court could force the state to implement fair legislative maps or strike down the abortion restrictions from 1849 that don’t provide an exception for rape or incest and that she said make women and people with uteruses second-class citizens in the state of Wisconsin. She said she could also see the court taking up issues that have to do with pollution and climate change. Brewer agreed that fair maps, reproductive rights and the environment are the issues that make the Supreme Court race important and added that there will likely be rulings on copper and iron mining on state lands in the future.
AASD School Board
There will be three seats up for grabs on the AASD Board. School Board Vice President Kristine Sauter and School Board Clerk Deb Truyman are running for reelection, while School Board Treasurer James Bowman is not, meaning that there will be at least one new member of the board. The three non-incumbent challengers are Nick Ross, Jason Kolpack and Sam Blackwell. Since there are three seats up for grabs, and the amount of candidates does not exceed twice the amount of available seats, all five candidates will advance to the general election.
HOW-TO GUIDE FOR VOTING AS A LAWRENCE STUDENT
Key Dates:
- Feb. 17: Final day to register in person to vote for the primary.
- Feb. 21: Election Day (primary). Voters can register to vote at the polls before voting.
- Mar. 31: Final day to register in person to vote for the general.
- Apr. 4: Election Day (general). Voters can register to vote at the polls before voting.
Where to Vote:
- Lawrence students on campus reside in District 11, with a polling place at 404 W. Lawrence St. (Saint Joseph Parish Center).
- Students can also vote early at City Hall before Election Day.
What to Bring:
- You must present a valid Wisconsin photo ID on Election Day. Most students use a Wisconsin driver’s license or a voter ID card issued by Lawrence University.