Damakant Jayshi
Tuesday marked the start of a new era for local government with Wausau swearing in a new mayor, and representatives sworn in to the City Council and Marathon County Board of Supervisors.
Both the council and the board adopted the their rules for the next two years. Municipal Judge Mark Sauer was also sworn in on Tuesday.
Kurt Gibbs was re-elected chair of the Marathon County Board of Supervisors. In Wausau, former City Council President Lisa Rasmussen will resume her role. Becky McElhaney was the most recent council president but declined to seek the role this term, despite being nominated.
New Dist. 3 Alder Terry Kilian nominated Gary Gisselman while McElhaney proposed Lou Larson for consideration. Rasmussen’s name was put forward by Sarah Watson.
All three accepted the nominations. During the secret ballot, Rasmussen was elected president with six votes, the minimum required in the 11-member council.
After her election as president, Rasmussen said she would work together with the mayor and council colleagues for the common good of Wausau.
Alder Watson was reelected without objection to the Wausau Plan Commission. That required a two-thirds majority but since no one else was nominated, her election was unopposed. McElhaney was elected, also without objection, to the Wausau Water Works Commission. She replaces Dawn Herbst, who lost her re-election bid this month.
Mayor Diny also distributed a list of his appointments to six standing committees. Committee appointments do not need to be approved by the council. Members of the Executive Committee will be known after the respective chairs of the standing committees are elected, which will happen at the first meeting of each committee, either without opposition or through ballots.
During his remarks near the end of the organizational meeting, Mayor Diny said that he would market Wausau as a place to work in addition to promoting tourism in the city. He also said he would work with the council to address the rising property tax, water and sewer rates in the city.
At the Marathon County Board level, Gibbs was elected unopposed with no other nominations to head the 38-member board. There was a contest for vice-chair, with Supervisors Chris Dickinson and John Robinson vying for the position. Dickinson won 19-16 in a secret ballot voted on by 35 members who participated in the vote.
Supervisor-elect Bill Conway from Dist. 16 could not be sworn in because of a potential challenge from his opponent in the spring election. His margin of victory over incumbent Tony Sherfinski was reaffirmed in a recount by the Marathon County Board of Canvass on Monday, but a five-day challenge window forced the delay. After the recount, Conway’s tally victory margin increased by two votes, making it 257-254. The challenge period ends Monday.
This is the second consecutive term in which an apparent winner was deprived from taking the oath of office with the group. The same scenario happened in 2022 for Dist. 11.
The board also voted to change the meeting time of the body from 7 p.m. to 6 p.m. Two other amendments, one related to deadlines for the meeting packet and agenda and the other related to the process of the electing chair and vice chair of standing committees, were resoundingly defeated. The current practice is that board chair, in consultation with vice chair, names the heads and deputy heads of the committees.
