Newly elected Rock County Board of Supervisors Chair Kevin Leavy made history as the first Black official to be elected to the role, but he sees it as a continuing effort to fill unmet needs he notices in his community.
Following the April 2 election as part of the board’s reorganization, Leavy was voted Rock County Board chair. Leavy has been a longstanding public servant for the past 20 years. Born and raised in Beloit, Leavy found himself taking up the mantle to lead over and over again with his start initially serving on the school board for his children’s district.
Before entering the realm of politics Leavy worked in restaurants as a general manager after receiving his associate’s degree in general business management from Madison College in 1985. He moved to Illinois working in the food industry until his return to his hometown in 1989. Later, with children in his life, he found an opportunity with the Beloit School Board.
“There weren’t really a whole lot of pressing issues, but what I realized that I also was working with the PTA [parent–teacher association], I volunteered for a couple of school board committees, it piqued my interest [to join] the school board arena,” Leavy said. “But when I put my name in, the president at that time passed away so I put my name in.”
Leavy served as vice president of the school board prior to being elected to lead it. He notes that a large wave of new members were joining at the time and his proven leadership was important to getting the board up to speed.
But as Leavy started to get his foot in the door politically, he started noticing where else he could start making a difference. He joined multiple organizations in the hopes of inspiring young Black men to pursue education for a better career and life with the Black Male Role Model Group.
“I was visiting schools in the school district where there was a need for young African American males to succeed,” Leavy said. “We looked, a lot of them come from single-parent homes, and we wanted to make sure that they had contact with male individuals that were being successful, and we could coach them along the way.”
The group aimed to stand as role models and provide an overall framework on how to be successful in life. Later, again seeing a need for young Black men to succeed, Leavy went on to join Blackhawk Technical College as its first Black official to take up chair for its board of directors.
“When I got on there, one of the statements that I continually made is if we see students out of school or graduating from high school, and they’re walking around in the streets, and we need to challenge our college more to attract those students,” Leavy said.
Leavy continuously found himself in more leadership positions over the next 20 years in areas from churches, the National Black Caucus for Elected Officials, director of Food and Nutrition for Freeport Hospital, and many other positions in his attempt to meet needs he saw arise. Leavy has also served on the Beloit City Council for the past 19 years.
This past April, Leavy was elected to lead the Rock County Board where he plans to tackle issues of diversity, homelessness and affordable housing. He comes into the position fresh off of being vice chair and switching places with its previous chair Rick Bostwick.
“My goal is to see how we can move the county forward as it relates to diversity and as it relates to including everybody into the vision and the progress of the county and providing some good leadership to make sure that every city is included in the planning and that we reach as many people as we can to do some good.” Leavy said.
Leavy aims to increase outreach as it relates to ongoing housing issues, homelessness and economic growth. Housing issues in Rock County continue to be pressing after 119 families displaced in Janesville were allocated $500,000 by the city to relocate after mass eviction from the property’s landlord, the GazzetteXtra reported.
In education, he aims to continue encouraging young Black men to seek college education and bridge opportunities county-wide. But through it all, he’s just looking to fill the needs he sees in the community.
