June 21, 2025
VIROQUA, Wis. – The Vernon County Board of Supervisors and county managerial staff held a second all-day session as part of long range strategic planning process that started last month. The first session in that process place on was May 29 at the Pedretti Party Barn and day two was intended to build off of and refine some of the work in the first session. The planning sessions were guided by UW-Extension Local Government Education Specialist Daniel Foth, with the goal of developing a three-year mission, vision statement, guiding principles, and strategic goals for Vernon County.
In the first session small groups were asked a series of questions related to how staff and board members see county government in specific areas, and then brought the small group answers back to the group as a whole to find common themes and ideas. Foth asked about things the county does well, things the county does not do well, county vision, county mission, shared values and what are the county’s three year aspirations.
The second planning session was focused on information gathered on day one and turning that into short-term and long-term goals that will include a plan for implementation.
Following the planning sessions the county will release the draft plan to the public followed input sessions to get feedback from the public, and municipalities, businesses, and other key stakeholders. Those public input session will be announced in the near future.
The planning process comes at a good time now that county has filled out its management team and is in the process of implementing countywide financial and payroll computer systems.
The county finance director position had been vacant for almost a year forcing County Administrative Coordinator Cassie Hanan to fill both roles that entire time. The county hired Annie Lockyer to fill the finance director position in March, and she started in the position on March 31.
The shift from committee and board led management to centralized professional management has been slow but steady since the county switched to an administrator back in 2020.
In 2020 the county decided to create the county administrator position. Every county is required to have one of three types of executive that carry various levels of authority and responsibility. In the state of Wisconsin under statute 95.18 counties have three types of administrator to choose from: county executive, county administrator or an administrative coordinator. All three types are attempts to move away from the form of government Vernon County has always operated under, that is being both the legislative and executive at the same time. A UW-Extension information sheet describes the three choices as “The clear progression is a diminishing of county board administrative functions, and greater specification of administrative authority in one of the three county administrative position options.”
- A full county executive is elected, and is considered a coequal to the county board, answering to voters.
- A county administrator is not elected but hired by the board and answers to the board. A county administrator is responsible for the day to day operations of county government with department heads answering to them. A county administrator has the authority to appoint all the non-elected committee members. In Vernon County the elected committees include Conservation and Education, Infrastructure, Human Services and Veterans and Vernon Manor Board of Trustees.
- An administrative coordinator authority is less explicit. Department heads do not necessarily answer to a coordinator nonetheless state statute 59.19 states: “The administrative coordinator shall be responsible for coordinating all administrative and management functions of the county government not otherwise vested by law in boards or commissions, or in other elected officers.”
Historically the Vernon County Board of Supervisors did appoint a county coordinator every year at their organizational meeting as required by state law, but it was viewed as largely a ceremonial title and was not a true coordinator. Some years they placed the title with the solid waste administrator or the county clerk, and other years with various county department heads. The change to an actual administrator came after numerous meetings and months of discussion at various committees about the pros and cons of creating the position. County leadership had discussions with other counties who already had administrators to gather input. Running and the majority of the board expressed a desire to hire professional management and centralize decision making. Previously, county department heads reported to their oversight committees and budgeting was handled by the finance committee with the county clerk compiling the budget from numbers submitted from department heads.
County committees consolidated
Under former County Board Chair Justin Running’s leadership, in July of 2021 the county legal affairs committee agreed to consolidate most of its standing committees, going from 16 committees down to six. The next month the full board of supervisors approved those changes in six separate resolutions. Here is a list of those changes.
- Law Enforcement and Emergency Management Committees was consolidated under the Public Safety Committee.
- Human Services and Veterans Services Committees were consolidated under the Human Services Committee.
- Tourism and Economic Development and Economic Development Loan Committees were consolidated under the Tourism and Economic Development Committee (Later changed to Economic Development).
- Administration, Legal Affairs/Land Sales, Personnel, Information Technology and Buildings and Facilities Committees were consolidated under the Administration Committee (now the General Government Committee).
- Highway, Zoning and Solid Waste Committees were consolidated under the Infrastructure Committee.
- University of Wisconsin – Extension and Land Conservation Committees were consolidated under the Conservation and Education Committee.
Board of supervisors downsized
The third structural change to county government was a downsize of the board of supervisors from 29 to 19 in October of 2021. The county was already in the process of redrawing district maps as required by law every 10 years following the federal census. Districts are adjusted every 10 years to account for population shifts and to keep districts equal in size. Several county board supervisors brought forth the idea of downsizing the board, an idea that had been brought a number of times in the past. Maps were drawn with alternatives of 19, 23 and 25 districts.
Administrator picks committee members for first time
In April of 2022 the county administrator appointed supervisors to some of the committees for the first time. This had traditionally been done by the county board chair, but state statute gave that authority to the administrator for all committees not required to hold elections. The board still elected supervisors to those committees which included the Conservation and Education, Infrastructure, Human Services and Veterans Affairs, and the Vernon manor Board of Trustees. Redington, would however, for the first time appoint supervisors to Finance, General Government, Health, Public Safety, and Economic Development committees. This marked a major shift for the board, and some supervisors commented they were not aware the administrator had statutory authority to pick some committees. Redington explained the process she developed at the time for making her selections to committees with the goal of making sure each supervisor served on at least one committee and meeting with supervisors individually to get their input on where they wanted to serve so she could best utilize their skills and expertise. The board did still retain approval authority over Redington’s choices and voted to approve her picks in that April 2022 meeting.
Finance manager position created and hired
The county would later (June 2022) create a finance manager (Bobbi Johnson) and began to consolidate budgeting and bookkeeping functions under Redington. That meant moving some the functions from the clerks office that had previously handled those functions to the finance office. These management changes were undertaken to move the county closer to its long-term goal of getting a better handle on it’s bookkeeping and budget process. The county finance committee has been discussing the possibility of adopting better budgeting processes like Priority Based Budgeting (PPB) for a number of years. The county has been running a structural deficit, sometimes as high as $2 million, on a budget of about $25 million. The deficit grew more in recent years when the county jail lost a contract to house state inmates that brought the county close to $1 million in annual revenue. The county has used various ways to make up for those deficits year in and year out by using various reserves like the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds or cash reserves in various accounts, but has been discussing how to close that gap to make sure revenues match expenditures for a number of years.
Business as usual, centralization continues
Throughout the summer of 2022 and into the fall things seemed to be progressing with the centralizing of management and the new committee structure. The finance committee brought in other counties in Wisconsin that had successfully transitioned to Priority based Budgeting and presented committee members with the pros and cons of the approach. The feedback from that work indicated it would likely take four to six years to transition to that process. Discussions around the topic included the possibility of hiring an outside firm with expertise in priority based budgeting to help the county make that transition. Discussions also took place around the need to update the county’s outdated enterprise computer system, that was over 35 years old, to integrate functions such as accounting and payroll across numerous departments.
County Board votes to downsize from county administrator to administrative coordinator
In October of 2022 the Board of Supervisors voted to switch from a county administrator to an administrative coordinator. That downsizing of the county manager position would cause Redington to step down and leave the county. The county would hire Hanan as administrative coordinator in the summer of 2023.
Fiance director resigns over tax bill mistake
In March of 2024 Vernon County Finance Director Bobbi Johnson resigned after it was discovered that the county tax levy was miscalculated by over $2.2 million dollars. Hanan filled both administrator and finance director roles until the hiring Lockyer as finance director this spring.
Ready to move ahead with long range planning
With all those changes seeming to be behind the county and all the management pieces in the place there are several long range plans coming together at the same time. The centralized countywide accounting and payroll systems purchased during the pandemic with ARPA funds are now being implemented. The county previously managed finances by individual departments with as many as 18 separate spreadsheets. The previous county computer system was a DOS system dating back to the 1980s and there was no centralized payroll system.
In addition to these internal changes the county has also undertaken a rebranding project in conjunction with UW-Extension as well as a countywide housing study and newly completed comprehensive plan that was adopted in February of this year .
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