Clerk issues continue in town of St. Joseph

Talk about it

Prior to the town of St. Joseph meeting Thursday, Oct. 6, Deputy Clerk/Treasurer Kelly Spaniol formally resigned her position, after tensions arose with some members of the board. Spaniol was Deputy Clerk under former clerk Mary Stanley, who was removed from the position this summer. Spaniol was saddled with several months of back work, such as unwritten meeting minutes and unpaid bills.

As of Thursday’s meeting however, the clerk’s office is caught up with back work, but a comment on timeliness and the specific format of written meeting minutes raised tensions to a breaking point and Spaniol decided to resign. The board thanked her for her service, which was met by applause from those in attendance. The board appointed Marie Colbeth, wife of Supervisor Rick Colbeth, to take on the role of clerk for an interim basis to take notes during the meeting, and produce the subsequent minutes.

In regard to previous minutes turned into the town board for review, both Supervisor Brian Gullickson and Jim Traeger had issues with specific formatting. Gullickson made a motion to have citizen Susan Hueiser, who has also provided the board with minutes, review and revise those already turned in by Spaniol.

However, speaking out against this was former Clerk/Treasurer Marie Schmit, warning that any changes to the minutes must come directly from the town board. Despite this, the motion carried with Supervisor Kevin Adkins being the sole nay-vote.

Impact fees

The push from the board to temporarily suspend the collection of impact fees took its first step forward Thursday night. Supervisor Jim Traeger initiated a vote to start the process of suspending the fees from March 1, 2012, through Feb. 28, 2013. While the current ordinance that is used to collect the fees cannot be changed, another ordinance can modify, or change the existing ordinance. However, this must go through several steps, such as having a public hearing, before being implemented.

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