Letter: Jeff Johnson is her choice

Dear Editor,

I am writing this letter to urge support for Jeff Johnson as town chairman in the upcoming town of Hudson election. Jeff has served our town as a board member and chair for 19 years.

I was fortunate to work with him for 15 of those years. He is honest, efficient, capable, caring and knowledgeable. We are lucky to have someone of his caliber representing us.

I worked with Jeff while serving as town clerk, chairperson and town clerk a second time and came to know what a hardworking, ethical person he is. Over the past 19 years Jeff has run his business and served the town of Hudson. During that time, he lost both parents within a year of one another and had two hip replacements. Yet, you can count on one hand the number of meetings he missed in 19 years and have fingers left over.

As I recall, his opponent, Gregg White, resigned from the Planning and Zoning Committee of the town, citing lack of time for meetings. Speaking from experience, the job of town chair is 24/7 — it takes time!

I read with interest Todd Mullinax’s comment on the chair making more than the mayor. A mayor has staff serving public works, parks, roads, budgets, financial planning, etc. The town chair wears all those hats and more.

Change from dedicated town officials to inexperienced ones is not what the town needs. The fact that only “hourly wages” and office hours are given by challengers as arguments shows they have little idea of what each job entails and how much time is spent to get jobs done.

The town of Hudson local per capita tax is among the lowest in the state. Our town officials are working to keep costs down. I think the wise thing to do would be to express concerns about expenditures to the board, get their explanation and understand all the facts before making blanket and misleading statements.

The Wisconsin Towns Association has always had a suggested formula for town officials’ salaries. The town of Hudson has historically been under the recommended salary figures. In these economic times, I doubt, there will be much of an increase in salaries.

There is an old saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

“It” may need a little tweeking, but it ain’t broke! Jeff Johnson deserves our vote. I am proud to support him!

Rita Horne, Hudson

Former town of Hudson clerk and chair

Tags: opinion, hudson, letter, town, chairman, jeff_johnson