GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – We are almost exactly one year away from when the job of Green Bay mayor will be back on ballots, but there appears to be an effort to put the position to a vote a few months earlier.
Green Bay resident David VanderLeest is behind the recall effort. He’s tried this before, with no success.
11 years ago, VanderLeest collected the necessary signatures to recall Democratic State Sen. Dave Hansen. Hansen retained his seat, however, defeating VanderLeest, who ran as a Republican.
A year later, VanderLeest unsuccessfully ran for State Assembly against Genrich, a Democrat.
In 2015, VanderLeest also lost in the primary race to be Green Bay’s mayor.
VanderLeest says issues with three of Green Bay’s elections in the past two years are why he is registering a committee at city hall today to recall Genrich.
“Mayor Genrich has screwed up three elections,” said VanderLeest in a statement to FOX 11. “Under his watch we have suffered an election with only two voting locations, causing three hour waits, an election where central count had security issues, and an election where ballots were being counted without poll watchers, leaving thousands of city residents disenfranchised.”
A commercial attacking Genrich with election-related allegations was also recently released. The ad is from Restoration of America, a political action committee out of Illinois.
According to state data, Restoration has spent about $60,514 on the ads and robocalls, plus about another $23,676 on mailers for six city council candidates.
“They’re just putting a magnifying glass to everything and they are exaggerating,” said Randy Scannell, a Green Bay alderperson.
“They remind me of someone yelling fire in a crowded theatre while they’re rubbing sticks together. It’s just pathetic. It’s sad.”
Scannell says the election with long lines in April 2020 should have been postponed, as it was just weeks into the coronavirus pandemic. He also says there is no proof for the allegations related to the November 2020 election and a public notice error for the spring primary in February was an unfortunate glitch.
His stance is similar to what Genrich has said in the past about the elections.
FOX 11 asked Genrich for an interview or statement on the potential recall, but he provided neither.
Scannell says he doesn’t understand the timing of the recall.
“I think it sounds, from everything I hear, it sounds kind of petty and desperate.”
Scannell is on the ballot next week, trying to win another term on the city council.
Scannell’s opponent, Rob Miller, declined an interview, but said he believes the recall effort is ill advised and not going to succeed. He also said he’d like to see a bipartisan review of the elections, because the reviews so far have been one sided.
If the recall is registered today, like VanderLeest says, he’d have until May 30th, 60 days, to collect more than 9,700 signatures. That is 25 percent of the amount who voted in the last governor’s race in Green Bay, which is the requirement to trigger the recall election.
State law says Green Bay’s clerk would have 31 days after the signatures are turned in to determine whether they are valid. If they are, a primary or general recall election would be held on the sixth Tuesday after the petition is validated.
If there is a primary, the general election would be four weeks later. That is unless a candidate takes a majority of the votes in the primary. Then they would automatically become the winner.
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