Winchester Alderman Lawrence Coultas passes away
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By Carmen Ensinger
Lawrence Coultas
There was a vacant chair at the Winchester City Council meeting last Wednesday night, Sept. 6, following the passing of Alderman Lawrence Coultas the day before on Sept. 5.
While Coultas had been dealing with health issues, his passing was sudden and unexpected leaving the council in shock at his sudden passing. Before the meeting got underway, Mayor Rex McIntire paid homage to Coultas, at times choking back tears.
“I am going to have a hard time with this because it is personal to me,” McIntire said. “I have known Lawrence for almost 50 years so on top of everything that he meant to the city, he was also a great friend to me personally.”
Coultas was a few years older than McIntire and after his graduation from Winchester High School in 1966, he went to Illinois College where he received his Bachelor’s Degree in Education and later received his Master’s Degree from Western Illinois University.
Coultas spent many years teaching math in a variety of different districts in the area including Bluffs, Greenfield, North Greene, Jacksonville, Triopia and Winchester.
“I can’t remember when he came back to Winchester, I think it was sometime in the 1990’s,” McIntire said. “But after being principal for several years, he was moved up to be superintendent and I want to tell you he did an excellent job.”
McIntire likened the job of superintendent to that of mayor.
“The two jobs are kind of alike,” he said. “You have to make decisions sometimes that not everyone is proud of or happy about. But he always tried to be fair and I think he did a heck of a job and when he left office they were in really good shape financially and a lot of that was due to his ability to handle budgets.”
Upon his retirement as superintendent, Coultas found himself in even more demand.
“He was sought after by different school district to be their interim superintendent while they were perhaps training people to become superintendents or, in some cases, he assisted the people that were going to become superintendents,” McIntire said. “I know he did that at Triopia, North Greene and, in fact, just earlier this year they asked him to come back to North Greene to do it again, so apparently he was doing something right.”
On July 25 of this year, Coultas lost the one thing that meant the most to him in this world – his beloved wife of 56 years, Sherry.
“My wife and I became really good friends with Lawrence and Sherry in the last six years since Lawrence became an alderman,” McIntire said. “He liked to tell the story about how their budding romance started at Queenies. They got married right when he got out of high school so he was lost after she died.”
Coultas actually served one term as city treasurer, though no one could recall when this was.
But in 2017, McIntire approached Coultas about running for city council as Alderman in Ward I.
“He won his first term in April of 2017 and was in the middle of his second term and he has been a tremendous asset to this city during his time on this council,” McIntire said. “He was a hard worker and very knowledgable when it came to finances and math and stuff like that. He is going to be hard to replace, there is no doubt about that.”
Alderman Ron Bell said he really didn’t know Coultas until he became a member of the council, but agreed 100 percent with Mayor McIntire.
“My kids had him as a principal and a superintendent and I never heard a bad word about him,” Bell said. “I don’t think the citizens in this town know how valuable he was to this town. He did so much behind the scene. Such as helping to make sure we didn’t cheat anyone when we had the high gas bills. I know we probably really took him for granted. He did so much stuff and carried so much on his shoulder. I thnk he was so very much under appreciated. He was one who really did care. He touched generations. He has some big shoes to fill.”
Mayor McIntire said Coultas’s sister, Tina Brown has requested to fulfill the remaining two years on her brother’s term.
“As the mayor, I can recommend an appointment to replace him and his sister contacted me and she wants to replace him and she lives in his ward,” McIntire said. “Next month I am going to recommend you accept her as his replacement for the remainder of his term.”
The council then unanimously passed resolution in memory of Coultas recognizing and honoring him for his many contributions to the city and its residents.
