No Wonder Village Board Wants Radisson Hotel...So Village President Can Get His $256,500 Cut?

No Wonder Village Board Wants Radisson Hotel...So Village President "Can Get" His $256,500 Cut?

The Vanguard has obtained copies of court related documents involving the most recent legal proceedings of the well over $18,000,000 taxpayer funded Radisson Hotel on Main Street in Menomonee Falls that outright gives the hotel to the Menomonee Falls Village Board and puts into perspective why the Village Board wants the Radisson Hotel so bad.

Judge Kieffer, Waukesha County, on July 24, 2013 agreed with the Village Board, Village Manager Mark Fitzgerald and Village Attorney Mike Morse through their hired gun legal counsel (Randy Crocker), to give The Radisson to the Village Board in hopes that it can be sold instead of going through foreclosure at a more substantial loss (http://www.jsonline.com/business/court-rules-in-favor-of-menomonee-falls-in-dispute-over-radisson-hotel-b9961798z1-216929121.html).

Court related documents will show that Village President Rick Rechlicz (2005-10) stood to perhaps gain well over $250,000 personally and professionally as a result of, in his words on his law firm's billing statements, for "procuring the funding" of the hotel in 2010.

If true, that would of course be a federal and state criminal offense(s) and if prosecuted, would lead to jail time as in the case of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (http://www.justice.gov/usao/iln/pr/chicago/2008/pr1209_01a.pdf) and Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (http://www.fbi.gov/detroit/press-releases/2013/former-detroit-mayor-kwame-kilpatrick-his-father-bernard-kilpatrick-and-city-contractor-bobby-ferguson-convicted-on-racketeering-extortion-bribery-fraud-and-tax-charges) for attempting to do the very same thing as Rechlicz appears to have tried doing with the Hotel Owner Group in Menomonee Falls if they wanted their $18,000,000 taxpayer funded loan.

In the words and broken pronunciation of the famous cartoon character Elmer Fudd (http://forum.bcdb.com/forum/Elmer_Fudd_quotes_P8960/),

"Dis is getting berry, berry intowesting."

Much more on that later in this posting that will actually show excerpts from the billing statements to the Hotel Owner Group from Village President Rick Rechlicz asking for over $250,000 in exchange for getting the $18,000,000 taxpayer funded loan approved by the Village Board of which Rechlicz sat on for 5 years leading up to the approval of the loan for the hotel's renovation in April of 2010 days after Rechlicz left office.

Hotel Has Lost Well Over $1,000,000 a Year Since It Opened in 2011

Court related documents show that the Radisson Hotel lost well over $1,000,000 in 2011 and 2012 in spite of not having to make any principal or interest payments on the $18,000,000 taxpayer funded loan.

The Village Board did retrieve $1,200,000 from the Hotel Owner Group from the hotel's line of credit when the loan went into default in November of 2011, but even that was or is being legally challenged in the Dane County Courts by Gregg Raupp who filed a lawsuit against the Hotel Owner Group accusing them of stealing the $1,200,000 from him when the Hotel Owner Group allegedly used Raupp's money for the line of credit required by the Menomonee Falls Village Board to approve the $18,000,000 loan.

Dane County Court documents show that the Hotel Owner Group from Menomonee Falls provided Raupp with monthly financial statements that showed the funds were in Raupp's various bank accounts when they weren't and that violated the hotel management agreement between Raupp and the Hotel Owner Group.

Why would the Village Board, Village Manager and Village Attorney want the Radisson Hotel so badly unless the possibility exists that someone(s) on the Village Board had something to gain from approving the $18,000,000 taxpayer funded loan or that maybe some of the other Village Trustees had cut a deal with Village President Rechlicz to approve the loan so he could ask for his cut from the hotel group and the other Trustees could ask for cash or get an empty theater on Main Street paid for by the taxpayers for their Falls Fest non-profit group.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...?

The following court related documents have been copied and pasted from scanned documents showing the substantial operating losses for the hotel in 2011 and 2012:

2011 Results

Radisson Hotel of Menomonee Falls

Comparative Balance Sheet of December 31, 2011

Equity:

Capital Contributed (3,467)

Retained Income (1,497,527)

Deferred Income 914,301

Net Income (-$1,203,224)

2012 Results

Form 1065 U.S. Return of Partnership Income 2012

Name of partnership - Lodging Investors of Menomonee Falls, LLC

Employer identification number: 20-4585927

Date business started: 03/29/06

Line 22 Ordinary business Income (loss). Subtract line 21 from line 8..............22. (-$1 229 097)

Village Manager Mark Fitzgerald Blocks the Release of Hotel's 2013 Financials and Ignores Offer to Restructure the $18,000,000 Loan With Hotel Owner Assuming the Entire Debt

Based on the condition of anonymity, various sources have shared with The Vanguard that Village Manager Mark Fitzgerald, with the apparent blessings of the Village Attorney and Village Board, has been blocking the release of the hotel's up-to-date financials for 2013 to the only remaining viable hotel owner.

In hopes that a restructuring of the $18,000,000 loan, originally publicly suggested by the Village Manager Mark Fitzgerald in January of 2012 (http://www.jsonline.com/business/menomonee-falls-may-restructure-new-radissons-loan-du3ppvv-137366363.html), could be reached with the Village Board before going in front of Judge Kieffer on July 24, 2013, the only remaining viable hotel owner submitted a proposal to the Village Manager, Village Attorney and Village Board that would have him assuming the entire remaining debt service on the hotel over the next some 20 years without exposing the taxpayers of Menomonee Falls to any real liability.

Having solicited a number of interested potential investors as partners with the restructuring of the loan idea and who wanted to see the hotel's 2013 Financials before they signed on, the only remaining viable hotel owner was completely ignored by the Village Manager, Village Attorney and Village Board.

Why would the Village Manager, Village Attorney and Village Board not at least meet with the hotel owner to consider the loan restructuring idea that they, the Village Board, suggested in the first place in January of 2012?

Perhaps there are documents that the Village Manager, Village Attorney and Village Board don't want the public to see that would go along way to answering that question.

Village President Rick Rechlicz Wants His Cut of Over $250,000 for Procuring the $18,000,000 Loan

Court related documents will also show Village President Rick Rechlicz, after having promised the taxpayers of Menomonee Falls that he "wouldn't lead the Main Street Redevelopment Project" shortly after he was elected Village President in 2005 to avoid a "conflict of interest", stood to personally and professionally gain in excess of $250,000 for his law firm's (www.lrilaw.com) Consulting Agreement with the Radisson Hotel Owner Group as a result of Rechlicz being the Village President and "assisting and procuring the funding for the construction of the hotel" from 2005-10 when he left office.

Much more to come on that later in this posting.

Falls Taxpayers Into Hotel for Well Over $18,000,000

Menomonee Falls Taxpayers have invested well over $18,000,000 since April of 2010 with little, if any, repayments from the Radisson Hotel Owners, in the form of loans, reserve account for sub-contractors, sales tax payments to the State of Wisconsin, waiver of bond interest payments, paying off existing loans on the old hotel, bank wire cash transfers to the hotel owner group, property tax payments to Waukesha County, franchise fees to Radisson Corporate, computer reservation fees, monthly hotel management fees of over $14,000 a month to one of the hotel owners who was in bankruptcy at the time and payroll for employees of the hotel.

Since the taxpayers of Menomonee Falls gave the hotel owners well over $18,000,000 since April of 2010, the Hotel Owner Group of 5 have all filed bankruptcy and or are all out of business.

The Village Board has not challenged the bankruptcy filings of most of the hotel owners.

The nearly $18,000,000 taxpayer funded bond issue was interest free to the hotel owner group for the first two years with the nearly $750,000 annual interest payments being picked up by Menomonee Falls Taxpayers and apparently cost close to 10 Village Employees their jobs and benefits in 2012 to make up for the some $1,500,000 interest payment shortfall from the hotel owner group.

Village Attorney Mike Morse's Friend Blows Through Nearly $1,000,000 In Legal Fees

Attorney Randy Crocker is a friend of Village Attorney Mike Morse and represents the same law firm (www.vonbriesen.com) that Mike Morse did for many years prior to being hired full-time by the Village Board and former Village Manager Dick Farrenkopf as legal counsel in the '90's.

Farrenkopf was the Village Manager who mysteriously "retired" for 24 hours in June of 1996 to draw his full Wisconsin Retirement Pension from taxpayers and then came back to work full-time in the same position in a "wink-wink nod-nod" pre-arranged rehiring deal with Village President Joe Greco and Trustees Mike McDonald, Jeff Steliga and Jim Jeskewitz at the time.

Jeskewitz is still on the Village Board and McDonald and Steliga were finally defeated in April of 2013.

Farrenkopf's salary and benefit package from the taxpayers of Menomonee Falls in "retirement" totaled somewhere close to $2,000,000 before he retired the second time in January of 2007 when the Village Board hired the current Village Manager, Mark Fitzgerald, who is now one of the highest paid public employees in Wisconsin, if not the highest according to the Patch (www.patch.com).

Nearly $1,000,000 in legal fees have been paid to von Briesen since the hotel group went into default on their loan in November of 2011 per the Village website (Page 7 of 9 http://agendas.menomonee-falls.org:8085/docs/2012/VBREG/20120820_227/694_GG%208-20-12.pdf) and one example of those fees is from the August 2012 Village Board Meeting that totaled over $94,000 for one month from the taxpayers:

GG

8/3/2012

VON BRIESEN & ROPER, S.C.

164450

PO2012002588

001

61601

$2,952.00

8/11/2012

GG

8/3/2012

VON BRIESEN & ROPER, S.C.

164450

PO2012002588

001

61801

$60,283.69

8/11/2012

GG

8/3/2012

VON BRIESEN & ROPER, S.C.

164450

PO2012002588

001

62001

$9,143.00

8/11/2012

GG

8/3/2012

VON BRIESEN & ROPER, S.C.

164450

PO2012002588

001

63001

$21,260.00

8/11/2012

GG

8/3/2012

VON BRIESEN & ROPER, S.C.

164450

PO2012002588

001

63101

$612.00

Sub-Contractors Reserve Account Raided by Village Board to Pay Legal Fees to Crocker

The Village initially had a reserve account of over $1,000,000 for final payments to sub-contractors to guarantee completion of work on the hotel in June of 2011.

Sub-contractors, at great sacrifice and under unbelievable pressure from the Village to complete work on the hotel that was six months behind schedule because two of the original hotel partners and general contractor for the hotel went out of business and filed bankruptcy, started getting all kind of excuses from the Village and the Hotel Owner Group why they wouldn't be paid in the fall of 2011 just prior to the hotel going into default and receivership.

This led to many months of empty promises from the Village and the hotel owner group to pay the sub-contractors that spilled over into 2012.

Sub-contractors filed lawsuits against the Village and the hotel owner group seeking payment with the Waukesha County Courts as well as attending Village Board Meetings.

After the Village Manager and Attorney Crocker publicly denied in writing that such an account existed, Waukesha County DA Brad Schimel visited Village Hall in the summer of 2012 only to discover that an account did exist for the sub-contractors according to the Patch (www.patch.com).

The sub-contractor account has apparently been drained by the Village Manager and Village Board to pay Attorney Crocker. The Village Manager will not respond to Open Record Requests and refuses to answer any questions at Village Board Meetings regarding payments to Crocker instead of the sub-contractors.

Village President Rechlicz Promised to Avoid Conflict of Interest in 2005 For Main Street Redevelopment

Citing that he wanted to "avoid a conflict of interest" because he owned property on Main Street in Menomonee Falls that consultants and planners had described in their reports on file at Village Hall as an example of what needed to be changed on Main Street, Village President Rick Rechlicz (2005-10) apparently must have had a change of heart when he thought he could maybe cash in with the Madison Hotel Owner Group according to the Menomonee Falls News headline of July 20, 2005 that The Vanguard copied and pasted from a scanned document:

Rechlicz won't lead east side project

Because of conflict, he will abstain; hearing scheduled for July 26

By Steven Benter, Staff Writer

   Village President Rick Rechlicz, citing a conflict of interest, has announced he will abstain from all meetings and discussions relating to.the redevelopment of east Main Street.

Rechlicz is a partner in a law firm whose office is in the targeted zone, at W15125 Main Street .

'"I am of the opinion that my position on the Board of Trustees and my ownership of property on Main Street creates a conflict of interest," Rechlicz told the Menomonee Falls News this week.

"Accordingly, I do not want to taint any of the proceedings with my vote nor influence any discussion with what. may be categorized as improper comments," he said.

Rechlicz's recusal means that responsibility for publicly leading the east side plan will not lie with any single person, but be diffused among officials on the seven-member Community Development Authority, seven-member Plan Commission and the seven-person Village Board, minus Rechlicz.

Radisson Hotel Owners Hit With Bills From Rechlicz for $256,500 for "Procuring" $18,000,000 Loan

Shortly after Village President Rick Rechlicz left office in 2010, bills totaling $256,500 started showing up on the doorstep of the newly opened Radisson Hotel asking for payment to Rechlicz in exchange for Rechlicz "procuring" the $18,000,000 loan for the Hotel Owner Group.

Because Rechlicz required "new faces" for the hotel project in 2006 for approval, the original hotel partner stepped aside at the request of the Village President and turned the negotiations over to one of the four new partners from Dane County, Dean Grosskopf, of Waunakee.

In court related documents, The Vanguard has copied and pasted from scanned materials excerpts from the Village President's Law Firm stationary showing the amount of the bills to the Hotel Owner Group and for what purpose below:

LADEWIG, RECHLICZ & IGGENS, LLP

May 31, 2011

James Heyden, Member

Lodging Investors of Menomonee Falls, LLC

PO Box 327

Richfield, WI 53076-0327

File No. 09-152

Statement for Legal Services Rendered

 Consulting Agreement (assisting and procuring for client the funding

for the construction of the hotel located at N88 WI4776 Main Street;

Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, now known as The Radisson Hotel,

pursuant to agreement for compensation equal to 1% of total gross funds procured

for said hotel construction:

Total Bond for Hotel Construction: $17,650,000 1% = $176,500.00

LADEWIG, RECHLICZ & IGGENS, LLP

June 26, 2012

File No. 09-152

James Heyden, Member                               

Lodging Investors of Menomonee Falls, LLC

P.O. Box 327

Richfield, WI 53076-0327

Lodging Investors of Menomonee Falls, LLC

5508 Woodland Drive

Waunakee WI 53597

Statement for Legal Services Rendered

Legal services rendered regarding:

Consulting Agreement (assisting and procuring for client the funding for the construction of the hotel located at N88 W14776 Main Street; Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, now known as The Radisson Hotel):

Attorney fees agreed upon by James Heyden, Dean Grosskopf and Rick Rechlicz during office conference on August 31, 2011: $80,000

That's a total of a cool $256,500.

Not a bad pay-off for being Village President if you can get it.

Village President Rechlicz Widely Known for His Ways of Getting Things Done

Shortly after Rechlicz became Village President in April of 2005, word quickly spread to business people that if they wanted to get their projects approved by the Village Board of Menomonee Falls they would have to use Village President Rechlicz as their attorney even if they had never used him before he became Village President.

Rick Rechlicz never legally represented any of the following business people until he became Village President in 2005 even though he had been on Village Committees since the '80's. According to one businessman who spoke to The Vanguard on the condition of anonymity when his project(s) weren't getting approved by the Village Board, reached out to a businessman whose projects were getting approved and the businessman said that Rechlicz requires business people of having to go through him if they wanted their projects approved.

The following is a partial list of those business people who Rechlicz shook down and some paid him back in various ways in exchange for him getting their projects approved by the Village Board:

*JBJ Construction

*Sing-A-Rama

*Carl Tomich

*Don Arenson

*Radisson Hotel Group

*Horizon Development

Rechlicz would then make it look like he was recusing himself to make the approvals appear to be ethical and to avoid a conflict of interest in the public's eye when behind the scenes there were trade-offs that apparently included under the table bartering agreements, campaign contributions, referrals, joint marketing efforts with his law firm and in some cases it has been suggested that perhaps cash was given in exchange for Rechlicz getting their projects approved by the Village Board.

A close friend of Village President Rechlicz and fellow North Hills Country Club Member was Municipal Judge Mike Hurt who was engaged in similar behavior as Rechlicz was and was reprimanded by the Wisconsin Office of Lawyer Regulation for taking cash under the table in 2007 (http://www.wisbar.org/newspublications/wisconsinlawyer/pages/article.aspx?Volume=80&Issue=6&ArticleID=1294#3) and was ultimately disbarred in 2008 due in part to this and other issues (www.leagle.com/decision/20081674749NW2d925_11673).

Hurt resigned as Menomonee Falls Municipal Judge in 2007 and lost his home off of Pilgrim Road in Menomonee Falls to foreclosure.

Hurt solicited cash along with Trustee Mike McDonald starting in 2004 from the Hotel Owner Group if they wanted to get their project approved by the Village Board. Rechlicz also told the Hotel Owner Group when he became Village President in 2005 that they would need new faces for approval of the hotel project because the original owners were too closely associated with Jefferson E. Davis and Chris Slinker.

One of the original hotel owners paid Hurt cash with the understandig that Hurt and McDonald would get the project approved.

The other original potential hotel partner refused to give cash to Hurt and McDonald because he was from Illinois and told Hurt and McDonald that when elected officials ask for cash in Illinois that someone eventually ends up in prison, a landfill or the trunk of a car.

The Hotel Owner Group was also told by Hurt and McDonald that they would also have to separate themselves from any working relationship with Trustee Chris Slinker and Village President Jefferson E. Davis because Hurt and McDonald were leading a group along with the Greco's, Steliga's, Jeskewitz's, etc. to make sure that Davis and Slinker would be out of office soon with the efforts of this group working closely with the Menomonee Falls Police Department to do so.

Too bad the original hotel owners followed the direction of Hurt, McDonald and Rechlicz as all of the current hotel owners are either bankrupt, out of business or both.

JBJ Construction gave Rechlicz several months of free rent in 2007 when Rechlicz moved to Sussex to live in a JBJ Rental because Rechlicz's home sold in Menomonee Falls for nearly $100,000 more than what it was assessed at by the Village Assessor after the Village had just gone through a village wide reassessment just months earlier (http://www.jsonline.com/news/waukesha/29482034.html).

JBJ's employees poured thousands of dollars into Rechlicz's Campaign Account in early 2007 shortly after Rechlicz got one of JBJ's Projects approved by the Village Board.

Rechlicz had served on the Zoning Board of Appeals and Planning Commission for many years prior to becoming Village President in 2005.

Rechlicz, using his position as Village President and his law firm's brochures, engaged with Horizon Development in a joint marketing effort to sell Horizon's Condos (www.horizondbm.com) in Menomonee Falls in 2006 after getting one of Horizon's projects approved in late 2005 at the Planning Commission and Village Board levels.

Horizon and Rechlicz then had their brochures mailed and dropped together in newspaper boxes in Menomonee Falls and surrounding areas.

Below is a partial copy of Rechlicz's Law Firm brochure that Rechlicz would have inserted with the joint marketing pieces for the solicitation of selling condos for Horizon Development promoting himself as a real estate attorney and Village President:

RICHARD A. RECHLlCZ,

a graduate of Marquette

University Law School, 1977; admitted to the State Bar

of Wisconsin in the same year; also admitted to practice

before the Eastern and Western District of the United

States Circuit Court, the Seventh Circuit Court of

Appeals. and the United States Tax Court. Rick has been

a frequent lecturer on real estate topics. He has served

the Village of Menomonee Falls in the past as a member

of the Zoning Board of Appeals and is currently the

President of the Village of Menomonee Falls and a

member of the Planning Commission. Rick is a founding

member and past President of the Menomonee Falls

Scholarship Foundation.

These are just a few of the many examples that Village President Rick Rechlicz was engaged in to apparently benefit himself personally and professionally while holding public office.

Rechlicz Promised Hotel Owner Group A New Deal With Village and Then Bailed While In Receivership in Late 2011

Some have described Rechlicz as a bully in his ways when dealing with people, businesses and transactions both as a real estate attorney and certainly as Village President.

The Vanguard was told by more than one businessman, on the condition of anonymity, that they were in Rechlicz's Law Office on Main Street when he would pick up the phone and immediately get the Village Manager and Village Attorney on the phone to order them to get things done for his client(s).

When things started to get hot financially for The Radisson in late 2011, Rechlicz promised The Hotel Owner Group that he could get them the Metropool Apartments next to the hotel on Main Street for $1.00 if they used him and would agree to the receivership appointment of Seth Dizard over the hotel operations (http://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/print-edition/2011/09/30/hotel-project-marred-by-legal-claims.html?page=all).

With The Hotel Owner Group desperate for a solution and for the opportunity to attain more parking space for the hotel in exchange for agreeing to the appointment of a receiver with the Village, they agreed to using Rechlicz.

As soon as The Hotel Owner Group signed off on the deal with the Village and Rechlicz, Rechlicz got the Village to renege on the deal with the purchase of the apartments.

Realizing that The Radisson stink that he rammed through the Village Board could ruin his lilly white image in the community, Rechlicz bailed on The Hotel Owner Group and got his hunting buddy attorney friend, David Frank (http://www.gierkefrank.com/WhoWeAre.html), to represent Lodging Investors in court proceedings to make sure Rechlicz's name wouldn't be tarnished.

Nice attorney huh?

Where are the Authorities?

So it is becoming somewhat very obvious why the Village Board has perhaps become so aggressive in obtaining the hotel with these revelations of what their close friend Rick Rechlicz has been doing for many years.

It would also apparently explain why the Village Board wants to make sure taxpayers, the press, media and talk radio never find out about the behavior of Rick Rechlicz who insisted the Hotel Owner Group be given $18,000,000 in 2010 when they could not get a private loan because of their lack of assets and legal issues across the State of Wisconsin that included severe financial doubts.

Some have asked, "How do these guys get away with this?"

Village Manager Fitzgerald, Village Attorney Morse, the Village Board, Police Chief Ruzinski, DA Schimel and the Attorney General's Office of Wisconsin have all been given a chance to look at these documents for possible criminal behavior and prosecution, but have all scoffed at any idea of doing so.

If they only would have taken the time to seriously look at the evidence this all could have been avoided. But when the person that signs the front of your paycheck or allows his name as a public official to be affixed to your campaign literature, it gets a little dicey especially for those that have something to gain by looking the other way.

Only Agent Ricardo Tijerino and one of his fellow DCI (Division of Criminal Investigation) agents felt there was enough evidence presented to them that warranted the Attorney General's Office in Madison to look at this in 2009 that would have prevented this mess from ever happening, but were met with closed doors when Asst. Attoryney General Roy Korte referred the matter to the DA of Waukesha County who blew it off in part for what is believed to have been the result of Rechlicz endorsing him for DA as Village President in 2006.

Dan Bice, Tom Daykin and the editors from the Journal Sentinel along with Tom McKillen, Express News, and Menomonee Falls Now have all been given numerous opportunities to look at these documents only to turn a blind eye and a deaf ear.

What do you think?

Should Village President Rick Rechlicz be given a free pass?

Should the Village Board at least meet with the current hotel owner to see if a deal to assume all of the remaining debt with new partners can be reached?

Should the sub-contractors be paid?

Should the new Village Trustees (Lemmer and Walz) ask for an investigation into the apparent Rechlicz extortion attempts of the hotel owners?

Should the pending sale of The Radisson be put on hold until an investigation is done?

Should Mark Fitzgerald and Mike Morse lose their jobs for refusing to look at this evidence and go ahead with the $18,000,000 loan anyhow?

Trustee Randy Newman purports himself on the Village Board as a numbers/financial/accounting type of a guy, where was he on this deal in April of 2010 when it was approved with his blessing?

Should more Trustees lose their positions on the Village Board like McDonald and Steliga did because of the hotel mess?

Should the Village Board hire Village President Rick Rechlicz for the closing on the Radisson Hotel sale to "thank him" for his service to the community as Village President?

Should the Milwaukee Office of the FBI (http://www.fbi.gov/milwaukee/) be contacted about this at 414-276-4684?

Contact Village Officials and Village Board Members to let them know what your thoughts are...

Village Board Member emails, street addresses and phone numbers on the link below

http://www.menomonee-falls.org/index.aspx?nid=292

Village Manager Fitzgerald - 532-4241- mfitzgerald@menomonee-falls.org

Village Attorney Morse - 532-4251 - mmorse@menomonee-falls.org