Mayor's Office

I am pleased to again share our #TeamCity award winners. Below are my remarks on the individuals we recognized. As usual there was a lot of competition as our City employees have a work ethic as well as creativity and compassion that has really been put to the test in the past 15 months.

Good morning and welcome to the third installment of the #TeamCity Award Ceremony of 2021. We hold these ceremonies on a bi-monthly basis and every time I am delighted by the quality of work done by the employees we have at various City divisions. They show great commitment to the City’s mission, vision, and values and do their best to ensure the best services for our residents.

The last year-plus has been very difficult for us all in so many ways. I am glad to report this morning however, there is a light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to the pandemic.

Today we are celebrating five outstanding employees. These employees stood up amongst their peers by their dedication and work ethic. Each award recipient will receive a certificate and badge holder.

This month’s Administration #TeamCity Award goes to Erin Nunez. Erin is a Judicial Clerk at the Municipal Court. Her duties involve assisting defendants and attorneys, processing adult and juvenile court orders, pleas, and incoming citations. Additionally, she is fluent in Spanish, which allows her to better assist our community. In addition to her role as a Judicial Clerk, she is a leader and member of several racial equity and social justice groups. She is a co-lead of the Latinx Community Engagement

Team, co-lead community connections of RESJI, co-lead of the Department Equity Team, civil rights coordinator, and committee member of Voice of the Customer. Her leadership and passion for equal quality service for all is helping the City move in the right direction to meet our lofty equity goals. Thank you for your hard work and for being the voice for underrepresented members of our community. Erin was nominated by Child Care Scholarship Coordinator, Romel Tijerino.

The Community Service & Support #TeamCity Award goes to Linette Rhodes. Linette is a Community Development Grants Supervisor at the Department of Planning, Community & Economic Development. Her duties include expanding affordable housing opportunities, supporting organizations serving people in Madison experiencing homelessness, and promoting entrepreneurial development.

Her work directly benefits some of the most vulnerable populations in Madison. Some of her most notable efforts include reorienting Madison’s homeless shelter system in response to COVID-19, moving the men’s shelter to Warner Park and then to the former fleet garage on North First Street. Additionally, she has worked on creating policies that will further housing and economic development goals. Although she does great work, her coworkers value not just what she does, but how she does it – with passion. Her attitude, passion, and commitment make her a great asset to the City. Linette was nominated by CDD Director, Jim O’Keefe.

The Public Health & Safety #TeamCity Award goes to Carrie Hemming-Cotter. Carrie was a Police Officer at MPD and a member of the South District Community Policing Team. She also was key in the COVID-19 task force and a medical screener throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Aside from policing and tackling the pandemic, she was in charge of training all officers – from Chief’s level all the way to patrol officers.

Her training was always relevant and engaging. While training, she always treated everyone with professionalism, dignity, and respect whether it was internally with police officers or externally with those she served. Two important trainings she introduced were Narcan and tourniquets, used to treat opioid overdoses and stop blood loss respectively. Some officers have noticed first-hand that this training saves lives, while also witnessing the hands-on Carrie utilize a tourniquet on an accident victim. Carrie recently retired from service. We miss you Carrie and wish you the best on your future endeavors. Carrie was nominated by Detective, Michael Barcheski.

This month’s Public Works & Land Use #TeamCity Award goes to Jeff Quamme. Jeff is a Public Works Development Manager at Engineering. His responsibilities consist of administering the City’s public land records program, surveying services, and schedules review, management and final approval coordination for a wide variety of privately developed and constructed public works projects as well as private development projects. Within his role, he has become the contact between the City and private developers and consultants. However, most of his work is done behind the scenes. His name may not be featured prominently in reports, but his knowledge was an asset in every planning project. He is described as someone extremely reliable and someone who fully embraces the importance of teamwork and respect. The bonds Jeff has built with all City staff and private development leaders is helping improve the quality of public and private developments for the benefit of our Madison community. We thank you for all of your efforts. Jeff was nominated by City Engineer, Rob Phillips, and Planner, Tim Parks.

Lastly, this month’s Mayor’s Choice #TeamCity Award goes to Kathy Kemmerer. Kathy is a Parking Equipment Tech at Parking Utility. She is responsible for keeping all of the parking equipment and technology working properly. Due to the nature of her job, she works during the evening and weekends when most people are gone. She is also proactive, fixing equipment problems before anyone notices that they are a problem. Taking initiative, Kathy will fix equipment or solve problems while others try to determine if the repair is her responsibility because she knows that taking that initiative is for the betterment of Parking Utility. One of her biggest contributions was when a new ramp opened up a couple years ago, there were problems with the length of time it took event customers to exit. Kathy studied the situation and possibilities within a couple of weeks and created a plan for heavy customer traffic exiting the parking ramp. This has had a great, positive impact in our residents’ experience. Your due diligence, efficiency, and work ethic makes you deserving of the Mayor’s Choice #TeamCity Award. Kathy was nominated by Customer Service Ambassador, Kimberly Suskey.

Congratulations to all award recipients and thank you all nominators for recognizing these outstanding employees. Your work does not go unnoticed. Thank you all for continuing to demonstrate why the City is a great place to work and how we are improving the City for our residents.