Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties

Wisconsin voters head to polls Tuesday

Voters across Iron County and the state of Wisconsin will head to the polls on Tuesday for the general spring election.

Locally, voters will vote on municipality leaders, with most of the contested races taking place in Mercer.

Incumbent Jim Kichak will face-off against Opal Roberts for town chairman. Roberts is currently the town clerk, but is not seeking re-election for that seat.

Christan Brandt is running unopposed for the clerk position and two people are vying for the Brandt’s current position as treasurer.

Sue Schenk and Lin Miller are both vying to become treasurer in Mercer. Also in Mercer, Jeff Stenberg and Bonnie Banaszak are running unopposed as town supervisors.

Across the county, two races for local school boards take place in the Mercer and Hurley school districts.

Two seats are open on Mercer’s school board, with incumbents Deanna Pierpont and Denise Thompson going against challenger Paul Juske.

The Hurley School Board has two seats open as well, with Mike Fontecchio challenging incumbents Perry Elsemore and Dave Pajula.

The top two vote getters for each board will receive a three-year term.

The remaining municipalities in the county will either run unopposed or unfilled positions.

In Oma, write-in votes will be used to elect the next town chairman, while Larry Erickson and Richard Christianson run unopposed for two supervisor positions. Also in Oma, Denise Schmitz-Enking is running unopposed as clerk and Linda Kuduk is running unchallenged as treasurer.

In Pence and Sherman, one person is running for two seats. Joe Olson is running unopposed in Pence as supervisor, with another seat available, and Robert Lepper is running unopposed in Sherman as supervisor with the second seat also available. Write-in candidates are being sought for the positions.

Other county communities electing officials unopposed include:

— Anderson: Bud Benter, chair; Jerry Rice and Patrick Hanson, supervisors (two seats).

— Carey: Robert Walesewicz, chair; Diane Schmidtke and Thomas Bainbridge, supervisors (two seats).

— Gurney: Tom Innes, chair; Darren Rowe and Vernon Moore, supervisors (two seats).

— Kimball: Ron Ahonen, chair; Ray Kivi and John Smith, supervisors (two seats); Irene Salzmann, clerk; Pamela Backman, treasurer.

— Knight: Dan Soine, chair; Kendall Koski and David Leinon, supervisors (two seats).

Montreal: Brian Livingston, Ward One council member; Leola Maslanka, Ward Two council member.

— Pence: Michael Paternoster, chair; Joe Olson, supervisor (two seats).

Saxon: Shane Wyzlic, chair; Kelly Thurow and Karl Krall, supervisors (two seats); Mark Beaupre, clerk; Sue Brauer, treasurer.

— Sherman: Patricia Matula, chair; Robert Lepper, supervisor (two seats); Gail Sprangers, clerk; Janet Gutknecht, treasurer.

In races for state and judicial offices, incumbent Tony Evers faces off with Don Pridemore for State Superintendent. In the race for Justice of the Supreme Court, Ed Fallone is challenging incumbent Pat Roggensack, and for the District 3 Court of Appeals, Lisa Stark is running unopposed.

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. in every community.