Can a member of a common council or village board simultaneously serve as a county board supervisor?
Yes. Wis. Stat. sec. 59.10(4), authorizes
a member of a common council or village board to simultaneously serve
as a county supervisor. Section 59.10(4) provides as follows:
No county officer or
employee is eligible for election or appointment to the office of
supervisor, but a supervisor may also be a member of a committee, board
or commission appointed by the county executive or county administrator
or appointed or created by the county board, a town board, a mosquito
control district, the common council of his or her city, the board of
trustees of his or her village or the board of trustees of a county
institution appointed under s. 46.18.
In the past, the relevant statutory
provision clearly and unambiguously provided that a county supervisor
could also serve on a common council or village board. Unfortunately,
the statute has been amended over the years and the gradual cumulative
effect of the amendments is that there is no longer a clear exemption. A
technical reading of the current statute indicates that a supervisor
can also serve on a committee, board or commission appointed by a common
council or a village board, but does not seem to say that the
supervisor can serve on the governing body of the municipality itself.
Nonetheless, it is the League’s opinion, based on the legislative
history of the statute, that a court would conclude that the statute was
clearly intended to make the offices of county supervisor and member of
a common council or village board compatible. For a more detailed
discussion of the statute’s legislative history, see Compatibility 604,
published in the June 2002 issue of the Municipality.