Klekamp discusses her role as La Crosse County administrator, and talks of how the city might create a similar position

While voters in the city of La Crosse will have to choose a new mayor in April, a proposal for adding a La Crosse city administrator is still being studied by a committee.

La Crosse County administrator, Jane Klekamp, discussed her role on WIZM’s La Crosse Talk this week, as well as what it might take for the city to develop the same position. Klekamp, who has worked for La Crosse County since 1989, also spoke about how the county came to create her position back in 1999.

La Crosse Talk airs weekdays at 6-8 a.m. Listen on the WIZM app, online here, or on 92.3 FM / 1410 AM / 106.7 FM (north of Onalaska). Find all the podcasts here or subscribe to La Crosse Talk wherever you get your podcasts.

Klekamp says city leaders would have to figure out whether an administrator would report to the mayor or to the city council. She described how the county leadership is set up.

“So we have the county board chair, right? And then there’s a first and second vice-chair, so I think of them as board leadership, and who I report to,” Klekamp said. “There isn’t a mayor, and I don’t know how that would make it easier, or more challenging.”

Klekamp added that it wasn’t easy for the county to arrive at the post of administrator, after trying other similar management positions for several years.

“I think that’s why they started with something called an administrative coordinator,” Klekamp said, because state statutes give a coordinator less authority than a county administrator.”

“There were at least two people that were administrative coordinators, and then when Steve O’Malley was hired, then it was the county administrator,” Klekamp said.

She also argued that counties have services like a health department and a jail, that the city doesn’t have to worry about operating.

The working group in La Crosse has spent several months discussing the idea of hiring a city administrator. It is scheduled to make a recommendation after the April elections when a new mayor will take office. Over half the city council is also on the ballot.