Galesville Mayor withdraws request to remove council member after Monday hearing

Tory-Kale Schulz will not face removal from his elected seat on the Galesville City Council as originally scheduled next week.

Schulz received a letter on Wednesday notifying him that Mayor Vince Howe has rescinded his request to remove Schulz from office as councilor in city ward one.

Howe submitted the request as a city resident as is allowed by state statute 17.16, which says an elected official can be removed by a vote of the council “only upon written verified charges brought by a resident taxpayer.” 

The complaint was filed by Howe May 11—as a resident and not in his duty as mayor—through attorney Matt Klos of La Crosse law firm Hale, Skemp, Hanson, Skemp & Sleik.

Howe did not return a call from the Times on Wednesday requesting comment on him rescinding the request to remove Schulz, but the withdrawal notice sent to the city by Klos on Wednesday reads that Howe still believes his petition met “cause” for removal of Schulz.

“Mr. Howe’s initial petition outlined numerous charges that clearly constitute ‘cause’ for removal under the Wisconsin Statutes, however, it has become clear that certain members of the city council have already made their decisions in this matter and Mr. Howe’s petition to remove Alderman Schulz is unlikely to succeed and Mr. Howe has no desire to further compound this issue,” the letter from Klos reads.

The action comes two days after a special council meeting on Monday at which rules were set for a hearing next Thursday that would have required a city council vote on whether to remove Schulz from office.

The city council is set to meet this Thursday, a meeting that will be Schulz’s first back on the council since his suspension due to Howe’s removal request—Schulz also received an order vacating this suspension on Wednesday.

“Mr. Howe could have taken his argument to the Common Council and the Citizens of Galesville in a public hearing, but after learning that he would need to follow the rules of a fair and impartial Galesville Common Council, and laws defined by Wisconsin State Statute and City of Galesville Ordinances, he wisely made the decision to end his personal, retaliatory attack on a duly-elected alderperson,” Schulz said in a written statement on Wednesday.

“Howe's attorney can state that the charges levied against me constitute cause, but given the facts of the matter seen in authenticated evidence, there isn't a reasonable person who would see it that way.”