Alexander Faces Challenge For County Board

Left to right, Marty Hagedorn (photo by Graham Kilmer) and Deanna Alexander.

Incumbent Sup. Deanna Alexander, 42, faces a challenger for her seat on the Milwaukee County Board representing the northwest side of the county.

John Martin “Marty” Hagedorn, 36, a teacher at Brown Deer High School, recently filed for candidacy in the district. This is Hagedorn’s first run for elected office.

Alexander could not be reached for comment on her candidacy for reelection. Alexander was first elected to the county board in 2012 and held the seat until 2020, when she did not see re-election. She was re-elected two years later in 2022, defeating then-incumbent Russell Antonio Goodwin, Sr.

District 18, which was re-drawn as part of redistricting in 2021, includes Brown Deer and a large swath of the Northwest Side of the City of Milwaukee. The district runs up against the county’s border with Waukesha and Ozaukee Counties.

County supervisors are elected to a two-year term. The part-time, non-partisan position pays $25,924 annually. The county board is the legislative branch of county government. The primary election isn’t until February 2024, and if Hagedorn and Alexander are the only candidates, they won’t appear on ballots until the general election in April.

Hagedorn is a graduate of Rufus King High School and UW-Milwaukee. In 2015, he completed a Masters in Urban and Regional Planning at UW-Madison. He is also a lifelong resident of the city’s northwest side. “And it’s never been a utopia in Milwaukee,” he said. “Maybe it was before I was born, but I’ve just watched it decay.”

This past summer, he started organizing with his neighbors and formed a “block alliance” but said, “I found it really difficult to get elected officials to respond to us, to join us.”

While this is Hagedorn’s first foray into electoral politics, he said he has experience engaging with social and civic issues while working with youth organizations and others. He has organized high school-aged students with a group called Youth Rising Up. He has also worked with All of Us or None of Use, an organization that advocates for people who are, or have been, incarcerated.

If elected, Hagedorn said he is interested in working on issues related to the county’s correction facilities. “You don’t ever want to see people dying in jail,” he said, referencing the string of in-custody deaths at the jail and Community Reintegration Center since 2022. “It’s really bad.”

Hagedorn also said he wants to work on improving transportation infrastructure in District 18. Specifically, he said he wants to see more bicycle and pedestrian-friendly infrastructure, as well as bus service. “It’s just really dangerous there,” he said. “It’s not bike and pedestrian-friendly.”

He also said he remains open to policy ideas and suggestions from the community. “I am still kind of collecting input and data from people, on what their needs are, what their wants are in this area,” he said. “So I imagine that my campaign is going to evolve and change as I get a little bit deeper into all this and talk to more people.”