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3-day bender mayor: Job is like therapy for me

A Wisconsin mayor who went on a three-day bender apologized Monday night but refused to resign, saying the job was like therapy for him.
Image: Bob Ryan
Mayor Bob Ryan, left, admits to having a problem with alcohol during a meeting of the Sheboygan Common Council on Oct. 6, 2009.Bruce Halmo / The Sheboygan Press via AP file
/ Source: msnbc.com staff and news service reports

A Wisconsin mayor who went on a three-day bender apologized Monday night, but refused to resign, saying the job was like therapy for him.

The Sheboygan Common Council drafted a resolution asking Bob Ryan to quit, NBC-affiliate WTMJ-TV reported, after unanimously voting for him to step down last week.

Sheboygan is a city of 50,000 located about an hour north of Milwaukee on the shores of Lake Michigan.

Ryan, 48, said everyone knew that he would "respectfully refuse" to resign, but he did write a letter saying he would quit if he was caught with alcohol again, the station reported.

"I made an a** of myself and embarrassed this city," he told a packed council chambers.

Speaking to WTMJ, Ryan said he was ready to stop drinking and said the job was like therapy.

'My family understands'"My family understands. My family are my biggest supporters. My wife and my children understand that my career is also part of me," he said.

"I can say I’m sorry. I’ve said it too many times," Ryan added.

He told WTMJ that the city was on the right track with a number of development projects under way.

A the meeting, the council voted down a measure that would have stopped Ryan from driving a blue minivan owned by the city.

However, complaints submitted to City Hall could, if approved by the city attorney, lead to a hearing to remove Ryan from office.

Ryan admitted to passing out and getting into an altercation during a weekend drinking binge in Elkhart Lake in July.

of a man it identified as Ryan slumped over a table at the bar. It cited witnesses who said Ryan had been drinking and making rude comments to some female bar patrons, leading to the scuffle with another patron.

Ryan lied about the latest bender, initially claiming it lasted only one day and did not include passing out at a bar — both statements he later admitted were untrue.

This is not the first time Ryan's use of alcohol has come under scrutiny.

Drunken advancesHe admitted drinking in July 2010, when he first publicly acknowledged being an alcoholic. A city council resolution asking him to resign at that time was voted down 11-5.

In Sept. 2009, a widely publicized YouTube video showed the mayor making sexually explicit comments about his sister-in-law while he was at a bar.

The cell phone video was released shortly after Angela Payne, the former city human resources director, accused Ryan in a letter of making drunken advances on her at a Sheboygan tavern.

Before Monday night's meeting, Sheboygan City Councilman Scott Versey told WTMJ the mayor was too big of a liability to be driving a city-owned car and an embarrassment to the community.

"It's almost textbook to what he's been doing and saying, to people that I know that have been alcoholics," Versey said.

"They all say the same thing. They almost become delusional. He says he has all of this support, yet I get phone calls daily telling me not to back down, and get rid of this guy," he added.

The mayor told WHBL-AM radio earlier that he intended to seek outpatient alcohol rehabilitation treatment while continuing to act as mayor.