The following letter to the editor was printed in the September 1, 2015 West Bend "Your Views" section.
Making government bigger won’t serve Richfield residents
I am responding to the Daily News Aug. 27 article “Richfield petition wants term limits for board.”
The article stated that more people are needed to make decisions for the village by increasing the board from five to seven. Adding two more trustees could increase the cost to the village residents when the current number of trustees are handling the job. In reference to the term-limits statement, we have term limits — they are called elections. The Richfield residents are currently involved using representative government with decisions made by voting for the trustees.
If residents want to be more involved they have an option: Run for the board or volunteer for one of the village commissions. It was stated: “We want more representation so that the president doesn’t have as much power and there are more people to make decisions — more citizen decisions and less government decisions.” If this was true then wouldn’t adding two more board members increase government decisions, not decrease them? Looks to me like toying with words; once a citizen gets elected to local government, they are the government.
The village of Richfield has 8,384 registered voters with one village president and four trustees who cover all the village of Richfield. That’s one elected official for every 1,676 registered voters. By increasing toseven it would reduce that number to 1,197.
The village of Germantown has slightly more than 13,000 registered voters with one village president and two trustees for each of the four districts. That is 1,444 voters per trustee. I don’t see how adding two more board members, or having term limits, is in the best interest for the village of Richfield.
Marie Graziano Richfield
I am responding to the Daily News Aug. 27 article “Richfield petition wants term limits for board.”
The article stated that more people are needed to make decisions for the village by increasing the board from five to seven. Adding two more trustees could increase the cost to the village residents when the current number of trustees are handling the job. In reference to the term-limits statement, we have term limits — they are called elections. The Richfield residents are currently involved using representative government with decisions made by voting for the trustees.
If residents want to be more involved they have an option: Run for the board or volunteer for one of the village commissions. It was stated: “We want more representation so that the president doesn’t have as much power and there are more people to make decisions — more citizen decisions and less government decisions.” If this was true then wouldn’t adding two more board members increase government decisions, not decrease them? Looks to me like toying with words; once a citizen gets elected to local government, they are the government.
The village of Richfield has 8,384 registered voters with one village president and four trustees who cover all the village of Richfield. That’s one elected official for every 1,676 registered voters. By increasing toseven it would reduce that number to 1,197.
The village of Germantown has slightly more than 13,000 registered voters with one village president and two trustees for each of the four districts. That is 1,444 voters per trustee. I don’t see how adding two more board members, or having term limits, is in the best interest for the village of Richfield.
Marie Graziano Richfield
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