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STRAIGHT INTO THE HEDLUND

Just what in the world is Hedlund trying to pull?  Once incident after another, when it comes to his boorish behavior, and then the blocking of Meetings of the Whole and all personnel committee meetings. What is this man doing to the very nature of the infrastructure of Lake Geneva’s primary governing body, and what’s supposed to be the city council?

The city’s administrator, the city’s comptroller, the city’s clerk, the city’s public utilities director and more, all appointed, would appear to make about a hundred thousand dollars more each year and, consequently, have more security and power than the elected city council members they are supposed to be working at the instruction of.
The ‘planetary’ shift in the power structure has been brought about by Rich Hedlund, the council’s president, and approved by Mayor Mayor.  The alderpersons, except for Hedlund himself, are effectively muffled, which means the voters and citizens living in their districts have no representation at all.  They simply get to pay the bills for everything the other “real” leaders of the city order, many times in secret and silence.  It’s a damned shame what has happened to the city’s once highly touted and vaunted leadership team.

It’s hard to believe that the same city council that voted to improve the dilapidating Riviera Complex downtown, and then was instrumental in acquiring Hillmoor for the citizens of Lake Geneva, is the same one acting like a favored majority of pain-inducing and slippery-acting human beings when governing, supposedly, on behalf of the voters that put them there.
Howell, Hedlund, Straube, Yunker and Mayor Mayor, have formed a reinforced concrete block, or cabal, in order to basically cause nothing but headaches and trouble for the townspeople.   Six figure salaries to most high-level appointees, four-dollar parking and fifty dollar fines, along with appointing ad hoc committee after ad hoc committee to accomplish what?  The only thing the citizens can do is vote.  This year and next year.  Change the people and therein change the performance.  That brings into question; “What performance is everyone seeking?”

The answers to that question are many, as it’s much easier to criticize work or projects that are underway or completed than it is to come up with projects that don’t exist yet. What is to be done with Hillmoor is probably the biggest question that the city needs to consider answering.  So far, the answer is goats.  The “Y” would like the land for free.  There are certain elements that prefer the rebuilding of the golf course, no matter what the cost. It would seem, however, in the unscientific polls the Geneva Shore Report has conducted, however, that most of the citizenry, by some substantial margin, would like the Hillmoor property to be park-like, with walking and biking trails leading alongside the White River and through the forest-like portions of the property.

The coming election, April 4, 2023, could change a lot of things.  Peg Esposito replacing Hedlund would be a major move toward sanity and fiscal responsibility.