There’s a nice story in the Washington County Daily News with West Bend Mayor Kraig Sadownikow reflecting on his time in office. A couple of statements really jumped out at me:

“I am super proud that we’ve cut the city’s debt almost in half; we went from about $85 million in debt to just below $50 in debt now and still continuing to decrease, while we increased our savings account by over 300 percent,” Sadownikow said. “The actual cost of doing business in West Bend is lower now than in 2011 when I was elected, so we’ve been able to do some fiscally prudent things that allows us as a community to start investing in fun things, like the riverfront, that can make a quality of life impact because we did some belt tightening over the last five to six years or so.”

[…]

“Right after I was elected, one of our state politicians called to congratulate me and said, ‘Remember, all you have to do is make 50 percent plus one person happy to be successful in politics,’” he said. “I thought, ‘No way, I live here; I grocery shop in West Bend and I need to shoot a heck of a lot higher.’ “So hopefully a significant majority can look back and say, ‘whether I love or hate the guy, at a bare minimum he worked hard and worked honestly.’”