Former County Commissioner Margery Paeltz has withdrawn from the race to replace the late Rick Eagan as County Commissioner.
That announcement was made by a press release from the Brown County Democrat Central Committee on July 23.
Paeltz was slated to run against current Republican commissioner Tony Applegate in November to complete the rest of Eagan's term.She told the Press she is withdrawing because she is currently employed as the Emergency Response Coordinator for Brown County.
As such, she is responsible for applying for and administering state and federal funds.
After being named as a candidate for commissioner by the Brown County Dem-
ocrat Central Committee on June 14, Paeltz said she began researching whether her responsibilities at the
health department would interfere with the race.
"I wanted to make sure there would be no ethics issues with my handling fed-
eral or state money while I was a candidate for political office", Paeltz said.
She added that she didn't anticipate her employment being an issue, but the length of time it would take to get a ruling would prevent the Brown County Democrat Party from replacing her on the ballot if necessary.
A candidate must be named by mid-August.
Brown County Democrat Party Chairman Dallas Hurt said that the Central Committee would meet prior to the mid-August deadline to choose a candidate.
Tim McKoewn and Rob Starrett, were the other two candidates who asked the committee in June to consider them for appointment.
Hurt said a decision whether to choose between McKoewn and Sterrett or to open the process back up to other candidates had not yet been made.
The entire press release from the Brown County Democrat Central Committee is as follows:
"Former County Commissioner Margery Paeltz met with an ad hoc gathering of the Brown County Democrat Executive Committee on July 22 and read a letter declining the Party's offer of nomination to campaign for the unexpired Commission term left by the untimely death of Rick Eagan. Mrs. Paeltz stated that she currently held an appointed public office which was covered by the "classified" civil service rules and was uniquely responsible for much or all of Brown County 's Federal Emergency Preparedness Grant monies. She said that questions had arisen about her being able to run for partisan office and remain active in that role of handling Federal Funds.
After exhaustive inquiry, Mrs. Paeltz was unable to get a clear legal opinion as to how the civil service rules apply to this situation and that any unfavorable ruling might come too late in the campaign to allow a clean and orderly resolution to any conflict . Therefore, she has withdrawn her name from consideration as a nominee for this campaign cycle. The Committee thanked Mrs. Paeltz for her continued service both to the party and the Brown County general public at large.
Brown County Democrat Party Chair, Dallas Hurt said the Central Committee will convene near the end of the month and decide what to do about getting a candidate for the seat. The filing date to get a candidate on the ballot falls in mid-August."
No, what this really means is, Margery did some research into whether or not it would be a walkover, and since Applegate has resources and is able to fight a decent race, then she decided since she might lose, screw the people and serving them and let me just stick around and stay in my guaranteed position.
As a sage woman said, "In my opinion Margery Paeltz has now lost the commission race twice in a little over a year and a half...once to Rick Eagan and once to Applegate" because she was too scared to give up her job if she wasn't guaranteed a win.
And then, of course, is Ms. Paeltz's role in the fiasco that has become the Brown County General Hospital, or how she basically became the defacto Mayor of the county when the Democrats swept the commission, and Jennings and Geschwind basically became rubber stamps for whatever Margery wanted. So, some people may just not remember her tenure as all that great.
However, the main reason she got out was she didn't want to come out and have to work again. No, better to stay in my government job and collect my pay, and leave the hard work of dealing with you little peons to another shlub. She is making too much money in her new job...but wait, I thought that didn't matter to dems. I thought it was all about serving and being a public official. Guess Mrs. Paeltz isn't even true to her own party's principles of collectivism and hatred of money.
