At the Walden Village Board meeting last Tuesday, the board discussed residency requirements for its appointed officials. The village’s appointed officials are the clerk, treasurer, village manager and police chief.

Currently, the village board requires its appointed officials to live in Walden. However, in 2000, the treasurer was granted a waiver to live outside of the village.

Each board member had their own view on this matter. Trustees Larry Kraus and Dan Svarczkopf believed that the village manager and police chief should live in the village if they are needed in the event of an emergency. Svarczkopf added that he would be okay with allowing the treasurer and clerk to live outside of the village, as long as they live within close proximity to the village.

“I think the chief should live in the village, the manager as well,” Svarczkopf said. “If there are emergency situations, those two need to be here.”

Trustee Lynn Thompson did not believe that it should be a requirement for an appointed official to live in the village. She believes that requiring appointed officials to live in Walden whittles down the pool of candidates for those positions. Thompson noted that she would approve of allowing appointed officials to live outside of the village as long as they live within the Town of Montgomery.

“We’ve had some really good applicants for some of our jobs and we’ve had to turn them away because they don’t live in the village,” she said. “I think we can broaden our pool a little bit. I don’t know if I agree with anywhere in the county but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say the Town of Montgomery.”

The board discussed drawing a radius of where appointed officials could live. They plan to write an updated draft of the residency requirement for appointed officials, which they will discuss at the next village board meeting on Feb. 4 at 6:30 p.m. in the Bradley Assembly Room.