Winnecke’s Waffling Points To Lack of Leadership

Evansville, IN – Gail Riecken released a statement regarding the 2016 Evansville Municipal Budget. Leadership begins and ends with action.

When it comes to the 2016 City Budget, Mayor Winnecke did not act.
If anyone is to blame for the budgetary cuts the City Council made, it’s Mayor Winnecke.

I spoke about our city finances and the difficulties the city faces quite a bit over the last 9 months. We have more money going out than coming in, rising debt, and a Mayor who thinks neither of those things are a problem.

At the same time, Mayor Winnecke was told about how the 2016 Budget needed to be both cut and balanced. He knew the budget process would be a difficult one. He could have spent the time finding ways to trim the budget in a way the City Council would approve, ensuring that his priorities were included.

Instead, the Mayor punted.

Mayor Winnecke refused to make the cuts necessary, and made a deeply political decision. He let the City Council make the budgetary cuts for him, refusing to be the leader Evansville deserves and make the budgetary cuts himself.

He did so in order to blame someone else for the cuts he knows must be made. Anyone who looks at the budgets, looks at the city finances, and understands how government can and should function, can easily see that budgetary cuts must be made.

Mayor Winnecke wants to let someone else do his dirty work so he can keep his hands clean, and avoid having to take any responsibility for the budgetary cuts other leaders MUST now make to keep our city financially solvent.

Mayor Winnecke refused to act, so other leaders had a duty to do so.

Its unfortunate the Mayor would not make the hard choices. I do not agree with all the budgetary cuts that were made, but what is most disappointing is that the Finance Chair of the City Council, and not the Mayor, had to be the one proposing the cuts to the budget.

At his 3pm press conference today, Mayor Winnecke said “Politics has gotten in the way of good public policy”.

Frankly, I couldn’t agree more.

Winnecke has refused to put forth a realistic budget, playing politics and pushing the hard choices off to other leaders. His choice to play politics is the budget we now have for 2016.

A city without leadership is a ship without a captain.

As Mayor, I will take the leadership role, with open meetings and discussion about budget issues longer before the eleventh hour.

Together, we can make Evansville better.

Sincerely,

Gail Riecken

Candidate For Mayor of Evansville

Gail Riecken is running for Mayor of Evansville and is a former Evansville City Council-woman, Evansville Parks Director, and a current member of the Indiana State House of Representatives. She is a lifelong Evansville resident, has been married for 47 years, and has 2 children and 3 grandchildren.

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Mayor Lloyd Winnecke
City of Evansville
1 NW Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd., Suite 301 Evansville, IN 47708

Dear Mayor Winnecke,

Pursuant to Indiana Code §5-14-3-3, I am making a public records request of your office concerning the investigation of former City Council At-Large candidate Jack Schriber (“Schriber investigation”). According to the law, you have 24 hours to acknowledge that such a request has been made.

I am requesting copies of public records that contain the following information:

• ï‚·  Records, including but not limited to written correspondence and emails, between the officeof the mayor (including you) and any and all law enforcement officials involved in theSchriber investigation from the time the investigation began until present.
• ï‚·  Records, including but not limited to written correspondence and emails, between the officeof the mayor (including you) and any non-law enforcement staff of the City of Evansville, orany other person regarding the Schriber investigation.
• ï‚·  Records, including but not limited to written correspondence and emails, between or amongyou, your official staff, your campaign staff and any officials with the Vanderburgh County Republican Party regarding Jack Scriber during 2015.For purposes of clarity, we are hopeful that by seeking this information, the people of Evansville, of Vanderburgh County, and of the state will have answers to the following questions by reference to the requested records:

1. At what date did you, Mayor, first learn of the Schriber investigation? What information were you told about the nature of the investigation?
2. How often were you kept apprised of the progress or new details in the investigation? From the time it has been reported that Mr. Scriber “confessed”, what work was done on the investigation prior to its closure?
3. Did you give any direction to investigators as to what you wished to learn or not learn during the course of the investigation?
4. After you learned of the investigation, did you continue to make personal or campaign committee contributions to Mr. Schriber’s political campaign? Did you publicly support his candidacy in general following the investigation being opened and your knowledge of it?
5. What conversations did you have with Vanderburgh County Republican Party officials regarding Mr. Schriber standing as a candidate for public office while there was an active investigation?6. Similarly, what conversations were held about how the investigation’s outcome might impact Mr. Schriber’s chances for election? Were there conversations about whether, if victorious, he would serve or resign, and how such a vacancy would be filled if a resignation occurred?

The nature of the investigation and the subject matter involved are sensitive. However, to maintain the integrity of our democratic system, it is critical that the people of Evansville, specifically, have a full and transparent understanding of the conduct of their elected and political leadership.

With respect to the records requested, in conformance with your obligations under Indiana law, we hereby expressly request that you provide partial responses where documents are immediately available. Further, to the extent you make any claim of exception to production of responsive records, we request in accordance with your obligations under Indiana law that you identify each subsection of the Indiana Access to Public Records Act upon which such exception purportedly is based. Moreover, we remind you that records for which you claim an exception to disclosure may not be withheld in whole, but rather must be redacted only as to the parts of such records for which the exception is asserted.

Finally, we realize that there may be charges associated with producing copies of responsive records and hereby provide you advance notice of our willingness to make immediate payment for such charges upon identification by you of a complete or any partial response.

Thank you for your attention and prompt response.

Sincerely,

John C. Zody

Chairman of the Indiana Democratic Party