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GSR QUIVERS IN FEAR

Small town favoritism at its very best. Mayor Mayor of the City of Lake Geneva is at it again.

Last week Mayor Mayor threatened an employee of the Geneva Shore Report, along with other staff and the paper itself. Why? All because the goats eating their way through the Hillmoor property were mentioned in the daily news reports the GSR puts out.  The GSR staff thought the goats getting lose in that Texas town, the story making it onto national evening news, was funny, so that story, of the wild foraging of the goats through a residential neighborhood, was ascribed  being motivational to encourage local citizens to let the goats loose. The goats are on public property and paid for by the residents. There are about fifty goats total munching their way over several acres of land.

They were talked about in numerous meetings, open for sponsorship, and the talk of the town so why are they suddenly being kept a secret? There are also residents checking on the goats, making sure the fence stays intact and that they have plenty of water. Some question what else is Mayor Mayor hiding?

Last week the Regional News used the goats as its front-page story. Their reporters were even allowed on the property to get pictures and a video of the goats eating away.  Not so the GSR staff. Did Mayor Mayor threaten the Regional News staff?  Not very likely. We don’t all have to agree about everything, but we all are supposed to have the city’s best interest at heart, evidently except for the Mayor Mayor of Lake Geneva.

In the last issue of the GSR, in very tiny print (out of terror, ~~smile) the GSR ran the exact words the Mayor Mayor typed before sending by text message.  Here’s the quote, in bigger letters, as the staff has consumed considerable medication to mitigate the effects of pure terror: “PLEASE, refrain from talking about the goats on your videos!!!  I am trying to keep a low profice for the to protect them!! If we have vandals out there now I will hold you and the GSR responsible.”  She signed her first name to the text although the GSR will continue to refer to her as Mayor Mayor since she is so somehow written ‘between the lines’ from the movie Catch 22.”

Evidently, this Mayor Mayor has not researched the law, including the U.S. Constitution about the freedom of the press, and the U.S. is a nationally and state registered newspaper.  Making such threats and then putting them in print can usually be classified, among journalism students and employees, as making a mistake, as has been written here.  The introduction of the goats was, and remains. a stupidly expensive idea, whether the goats get away or not (the town in Texas ended up paying the bill for the neighborhood’s goat eating damage, as the developer skipped town).

The GSR has no intention of sending reporters, investigators, or others onto the forbidden (to everyone who pays taxes locally) land known as Hillmoor. Mayor Mayor was once head of the Friends of Hillmoor and is best known for trying to raise money by creating a bumper sticker.  That sure worked.  Tina Trahan came through and funded the effort to get legal representation for the group at the time.  The Geneva Shore Report was directly responsible for the Friends getting funded, and, in fact, that was the only funding the group had.  Since the Walworth County Center for the Treatment of Terrorized Journalists never opened, the only thing the reporters and other staff of the GSR can do for getting any succor is to ‘endeavor to persevere’ and wait for the next election date to come around.

Image by Daniel Mooney