By Gail Peckler-Dziki/Correspondent
Silver Lake residents will decide this November if they wish to dissolve the Village of Silver Lake. If two-thirds of the voters say yes, then in six months, Silver Lake will have the same status within the Town of Salem as does Camp Lake, Wilmot and Trevor, as a neighborhood within the town.
Silver Lake resident Bruce Nopenz spearheaded the effort of “Moving Silver Lake Forward” and presented village clerk Terry Faber with 55 pages of a petition at about 2:15 p.m. on June 25. He was not alone. Other members of the group including Bruce Francart, Ralph Jankovic and Brendan and Kathy Sellers were there.
The petition contained approximately 440 signatures of Silver Lake residents who wish to see the question on the Nov. 4 ballot. That question is, “Should the Village of Silver Lake dissolve?”
“Our original goal was 300,” Nopenz explained outside the village hall prior to entering. “But when we got the 300 we needed, we just decided to keep going. It was an effort by a dedicated group.”
After Nopenz and Bruce Francart gave the petition to Faber, they asked that the number of pages be verified. Faber and deputy clerk/treasurer Suzanne Nelson counted the pages several times. Faber explained that it would take 15 days to verify the signatures. Then the group moved out.
On advice from those outside, Nopenz returned to the village hall to ask Faber for a written receipt for the petition.
According to Jankovic, the precipitating event that tipped people over the edge and got the dissolve movement rolling was, “The government. We’ve got big government spending big money in a little town that doesn’t have it.”
Kathy Sellers said it’s the village board. “The board members act as if they own the village. They have personal agendas and are not doing what’s best for the residents. They have done a lot of underhanded things and its time for the people to speak up.”
Jankovic continued, “They have no idea how to manage a budget. We can’t afford our fire department and yet they bought a building for a library with no consent from the people and we already have a beautiful library just five miles away.”
“They’ve got $250,000 for a library building,” he concluded, “but not enough money to buy tires for the fire trucks.”
In a later telephone interview, Nopenz clarified the idea. “This is not about the village board or personalities,” he said. “For 90 years, the village has done all it can to maintain its identity.”
“We are a small village, one- and-a-half miles square,” Nopenz said, “and we can no longer afford the services people need and want. We have a full-fledged police department that costs too much. If we contracted with the county, it would cost half what it does to maintain our own.”
“The bottom line is getting better services for everyone and lowering taxes,” he concluded.