Brookfield, WI

2002 Election

Summary

This page is a bit long winded, but it has a lot of technical information about the 2002 spring election that is usually found only in the City Clerk's office.

This was the first year under the new system of having alderman serving four year terms with half of them up for election every two years. The class II seats are for only two years this one time to create that staggering. There is no difference in the authority granted to the seats.

The following map shows the city's aldermanic districts in different colors. The dark lines are the ward boundaries, but they are a bit difficult to see in such a small picture.

If you want to see the map for district 5 only, see: District 5 Map

District 1

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Brunner	Alderman Write in
1	192	240	3	312	5	302	6
2	306	171	0	294	3	283	2
3	308	206	1	354	0	334	2
Total	806	617	4	960	8	919	10

Mayor Jeff Speaker is the first of three former Brookfield police officers serving as elected officials during this term.

This first table shows a frequent observation in elections. Since you could only cast one vote for mayor, there were at least 806 + 617 + 4 or 1,427 ballots cast, Yet there were only 968 votes cast for judge and 929 for alderman. Thus, a significant number of people only voted for mayor. In any event, it is common to leave a few blanks on a ballot. This is sometimes called "under voting."

· One interpretation is that many people only vote in a contested race.

· Another interpretation is that people only care about the executive (mayor) and not the legislative (alderman) positions.

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Steinke	Alderman Write in
1	312	5
2	287	2
3	329	3
Total	928	10

District 2

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Waffenschmidt	Galfano	Alderman Write in
4	324	175	0	329	1	308	132	0
5	337	223	4	368	1	290	204	1
6	332	250	3	385	1	220	300	0
Total	993	648	7	1082	3	818	636	1

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Wolff	Alderman Write in
4	336	0
5	408	1
6	399	0
Total	1143	1

Alderman Dan Waffenschmidt was re-elected to his third term. Alderman Waffenschmidt also ran for mayor in 2002 but was defeated in the primary.

Paige Galfano lives in ward 6, the only ward she won. Alderman Waffenschmidt lives in ward 4 where he enjoyed his largest margin of victory. You will see this idea of winning your home neighborhood repeated many times.

In an odd twist, Alderman Waffenschmidt resigned from his office a few months after the election in order to take the position of City of Brookfield Chief of Staff. His spot was taken by Cindy Kilkenny, who was appointed by the Council.

Alderman Jerry Wolff makes the second retired Brookfield police officer serving as an elected official. Alderman Wolff served as Brookfield Chief of Police, as alderman for four years and was a candidate for mayor in 1998.

District 3

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Garvens	Alderman Write in
7	147	166	1	200	1	199	0
8	206	175	1	259	2	250	22
9	244	224	1	304	2	292	8
10	173	130	0	176	4	169	6
Total	770	695	3	939	9	910	36

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Shaw	Alderman Write in
7	182	0
8	238	3
9	278	1
10	159	1
Total	857	5

Mike Jakus has lived in ward 9 since 1987, yet he only won in ward 7.

There was a last minute write in campaign against Alderman Garvens by a candidate named Denise Petrovich who lives in ward 8. Sometimes that kind of campaign works, as in the 2002 race for mayor of Oconomowoc. See: MJS - April 3, 2002 - Oconomowoc's Mayor ran a Guerrilla Campaign

District 4

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Schultz	Alderman Write in
11	184	176	0	248	1	224	8
12	248	245	4	319	1	331	16
13	227	178	0	262	2	258	2
Total	659	599	4	829	4	813	26

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Ponto	Alderman Write in
11	248	2
12	358	6
13	301	4
Total	907	12

District 5

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Mahkorn	Alderman Write in
14	155	112	0	189	1	179	0
15	281	120	0	271	2	246	7
16	183	132	0	208	1	201	2
17	274	308	2	382	3	373	4
Total	893	672	2	1050	7	999	13

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Berg	Soper	Alderman Write in
14	157	67
15	252	80
16	210	74
17	415	87
Total	1034	308

Mayor Speaker lives in ward 15.

Alderman Gary Mahkorn lives in ward 17. While he was not opposed, he did campaign very hard for both Mike Jakus and Alderman Berg. Again, a candidate has the most influence in his own neighborhood.

Alderman Berg lives in ward 15 and his opponent, Rocky Soper, lives in ward 14.

District 6

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Heinrich	Alderman Write in
18	316	180	1	333	15	320	0
19	291	192	3	316	4	310	5
20	266	176	4	299	6	280	1
Total	873	548	8	948	25	910	6

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Clappier	Steinberg	Alderman Write in
18	344	125	0
19	233	200	1
20	215	199	0
Total	792	524	1

Alderman Kari Clappier lives in ward 18 and her opponent Rick Steinberg lives in ward 20. Note that Mr. Steinberg did best in his home district.

District 7

Class I - Serves 2002-2006, 2006-2010, etc.

Ward	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in	Schellinger	Sage	Alderman Write in
21	113	78	0	120	2	54	127	0
22	218	151	2	257	2	221	131	0
23	126	129	2	160	0	163	76	0
24	263	203	1	297	4	265	177	0
Total	720	561	5	834	8	703	511	0

Class II - Serves 2002-2004, then 2004-2008, etc.

Ward	Franz	Frenn	Alderman Write in
21	79	64	0
22	180	140	0
23	83	121	0
24	236	147	0
Total	578	472	0

Alderman Mike Franz makes the third former Brookfield police officer serving as an elected official. Both Alderman Franz and his opponent Frenn live in ward 21.

Alderman Schellinger has a huge amount of name recognition in the city due to his two successful campaigns for alderman, two failed campaigns for mayor and one failed campaign for state senator. Yet, his race seems fairly close (58% - 42%) with opponent John Sage actually winning in ward 21. Alderman Schellinger lives in ward 22 while Mr. Sage lives in ward 21.

	Speaker	Jakus	Mayor Write in	Steinberg	Judge Write in
City Wide	5714	4340	33	6642	64

The undervoting mentioned earlier shows up here as well. There were 10,087 votes for mayor but only 6,706 for municipal judge, or about one third of the people who voted for mayor not voting for judge.

Newspaper Articles

MJS - October 3, 2001 - Mayor Bloomberg Retires

MJS - March 21, 2002 - Candidate Comments

MJS - March 21, 2002 - Officer Speaker's Personnel File

MJS - March 26, 2002 - Mayor Candidates Raise $73,000

MJS - March 29, 2002 - Mayor Campaign Spending

MJS - March 29, 2002 - Jakus Endorsed by Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

MJS - April 1, 2002 - Laurel Walker on Mayor Race Costs

MJS - April 2, 2002 - Jeff Speaker Wins Mayoral Election

MJS - April 2, 2002 - Waukesha County Election Results

MJS - April 3, 2002 - Comments on Speaker's Victory