Innsbrook residents will have their choice between seven candidates for three available seats on the board of trustees during the April 8 municipal election. 

The three open seats currently belong to Board Chairman Dan Reuter and trustees Cynthia Cook and John Simon. Both Reuter and Cook will be running for re-election, Simon did not refile. 

The other challengers are Lynda Baker, Linda Buschman, Mike Caton, Alice Jensen and Sandra Zahradka. 

The board held a candidate forum during their town hall meeting on March 11 which was moderated by village consultant Cynthia Freeman. 

Meet the candidates

Trustee Cook has served on the board for two and a half years and currently works as a CPA. She cited that experience and her work with the village’s finances when discussing her candidacy. Specifically her work auditing the village’s finances and addressing communications between the village and the IRS for tax compliance. 

“I bring those skills to the board and have been instrumental in gathering documents and ensuring that everything is done with our audit which we did for the current year even though it was not required,” said Cook. “The board has been under a lot of criticism for our finances and so we just wanted to give the public some extra assurance that all of our financials represent, clearly, what they are portrayed to represent.”

Reuter has served as board chairman and has sat on the board for four years. He is also a trial attorney and spent most of his career working with lawsuits and also ran a private practice focused on elder law. 

“I’m just finishing my second term, so I have four years of experience which gave me a lot of knowledge about municipal law and how villages operate,” said Reuter. “We are governed by state law. There are procedures and those procedures are designed to kind of remove the emotions and really focus on what the role of a government is.”

Baker is a longtime resident of the village and currently serves on the planning and zoning commission. She cited her experience in the private sector working for AG Edwards and Sons, along with her volunteer record with the No Time to Spare Animal Rescue as relevant experience for the position. 

“I’ve lived here for 30 years, I love Innsbrook, and there’s been a lot of issues in the last couple years. I want to go back to the way it was,” said Baker. 

Jensen is another long time village resident and discussed her involvement in the community from the Innsbrook Garden Club to the Silver Sneakers Exercise Group and the Innsbrook Historical Society. Most importantly she also pointed to her experience as a member of the Wright City R-II School Board for nine years. 

“That has given me a lot of experience with budget planning, with figuring out the complications of school board finances,” said Jensen. “I understand board etiquette, constituent communication, planning, prioritizing and grant writing.”

Caton is an attorney working primarily in real estate and has been an outspoken critic of the board in the past year and also cited his record attending board and P&Z meetings as his motivation for seeking office. 

“I really decided to run to be part of the change in the direction of the village around communication between the trustees and the public and increase transparency to really listen and act upon what residents want from the village,” said Caton. 

Zahradka has worked as an engineer with Boeing and served in the Air Force Reserves for 31 years. She cited that administrative experience across multiple disciplines as qualifications for a seat on the board. 

“There’s comfort in what was, and there’s places for what was, but we need to move forward and we need to find ways to make money to pay back what we’re spending, and to keep the village progressing forward,” said Zahradka. 

Buschman discussed her long career in the nonprofit sector and her work with grant writing and fiscal planning in that area and her service on the Boonslick Regional Planning Commission. 

“I am committed to our community, and building a capable, well-run, fiscally sound village for all of us,” said Buschman. 

Candidate Priorities

While Zahradka said she wanted to focus on moving the village forward, more specifically she said she wanted to help the village develop and attain additional resources including a fire station and additional businesses like restaurants and shops for residents to use. 

“We just don’t have enough options that are right here, that are going to feed the village back with taxes that can be collected on those items,” said Zahradka. 

Reuter said his main priority would be the completion of the new village hall that was approved during his tenure, as well as addressing issues with business licenses and short-term rentals which were also a focus for several other candidates. 

“I really believe that our next step is to hire a zoning enforcement officer,” said Reuter. “To make sure things are being done properly.”

Jensen said, if elected, her first priority would be assessing the board’s current situation to make informed decisions moving forward. 

“One would be understanding the current finances and where they’re going or not going, and secondly, would be to get a better understanding of policies, procedures and laws related to the board,” said Jensen. 

Cook said if she was re-elected she would stay the course she has held in her current term on the board, and wanted to use the recent survey sent out for the development of the village’s comprehensive plan to guide her decisions moving forward. 

“What I would do if I were re-elected would be to listen to not only everybody in this room, but the people that answered the survey that was sent out,” said Cook. “So I would continue to look at those and evaluate what people want, what their priorities are, and do my research and my homework to make the best decisions based off of that.”

Caton said he would prioritize communication with the public and work to make sure that the remainder of the new village hall project was handled responsibly. The village also signed a financing agreement for that project, and he said he would work to clear that debt from the village finances as quickly as possible.

“The other thing I think has to be done, because the village is going to incur debt, that’s got to be paid off as quickly as possible, within reason,” said Caton. 

Buschman echoed those sentiments about handling the debt from the financing agreement effectively and said she wanted to improve communication on what issues fall under the purview of the village and which ones are the responsibility of the Innsbrook Resort. 

“I would agree that, nobody likes debt, and so developing a plan on how can we generate that revenue where we can pay off our debt, because who wants that debt? So that would be my two priorities,” said Buschman. 

Baker said she would also prioritize transparency and showing constituents what the village’s finances are and how their tax dollars are being spent. 

“They’ve collected a lot of taxes and for the most part, the village is covered and we have a good base here in the Innsbrook Resort that keeps paying us … But those numbers all need to be transparent so everybody can see it,” said Baker. 

Candidates were also asked if they would abstain from votes in the event of any conflicts of interest, and all of them expressed their intention to avoid any discrepancies.