By Shelby Stewart
Staff Writer
Ortonville- He’s the Mayor of Lapeer and now the village manager.
Bill Sprague, who served as the village manager from November 2009 to April of 2010 started on Monday after the position had been vacant since last summer. A retired Delphi employee, he left the village position to work in the private sector after Delphi went bankrupt, resulting in loss of retirement and benefits for over 20,000 retirees.
“I really hated leaving,” said Sprague. “It’s a great community, and a great opportunity.”
The position has been vacant since July of 2017 when the village council voted to terminate David Trent, who had held that position after John Lyons stepped down in 2016. Lyons has since been acting as interim manager, mostly remotely.
“The position was open, and it was a good time for me,” said Sprague.
In addition to serving as village manager, Sprague is also the current mayor of Lapeer, and has been since 2006. He doesn’t feel this will be an issue and will be in his office at the village offices 9-5 five days a week.

“Right now I’m just getting up to speed,” he said.
“I want to work with the council to see what their vision is and work on implementing that. Accomplish things that need to be accomplished. Get the, for lack of a better word, chicken ordinance ironed out.”
Sprague resides in Lapeer with his wife, Debbie. He has two children, and one granddaughter, and is happy to have both of his children back in the state after college. His term as mayor in Lapeer goes until 2021.
“It is challenging,” said Sprague. “But I’m proud of what we’ve done in Lapeer and I hope we can do the same thing here.”