Miller holds off challenger in school race

Northern Ozaukee School Board incumbent Suzanne Miller will continue to represent the Town of Fredonia for another term after winning a close race against challenger Jason Stielow Tuesday.

Of the 676 votes cast, Miller secured 366 and Stielow got 307. Three write-in votes were cast.

This will be Miller’s fourth term.

Incumbents Dan Large, representing the Town of Belgium, and Rick Hamm, representing the Town of Saukville, were re-elected in uncontested races.

Miller, 52, is a risk product developer for Northwestern Mutual. She holds a master’s degree in higher education from Ball State University in Indiana and a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

She has been a town resident for about 20 years and has four children, three of whom graduated from Ozaukee High Sschool and the fourth who is a junior at the school.

Prior to joining the school board, she volunteered with district sports teams but wanted to become more involved in the district.

She said in recent years the district and school board have built a solid team.

“I’m really hoping to continue with the momentum we started and partner with the leadership of the school district,” Miller said.

In her next term, Miller said, her main goal is to support students, staff and the community at large.

One challenge the school district faces is an enrollment plateau.  To help address this, Miller said the School Board has worked with the Village of Fredonia to provide land for the Hillcrest residential development which will bring new homes, and students, to the district. While providing high quality staff, classes and programs helps retain students, it is difficult to boost enrollment without new housing options, she said.

“Until we have more business in town and housing available for people, it’s going to be hard to raise enrollment, but I think those two things will help,” Miller said.