Friend of Joe Kernan discusses the former South Bend Mayor’s legacy

SOUTH BEND, Ind. - Ken Klimek, who spent 28 years at the South Bend Tribune and is now the assignment editor here at ABC57, spoke about how former South Bend Mayor Joe Kernan will be remembered.

“I met Joe in High School,” Klimek said. “We both went to St. Joe, though I was a year ahead of him."

Klimek talked about what made Kernan such a memorable person, and he says it is not his heroics during the Vietnam War or his political success.

"Joe was a normal guy,” Klimek said. “He was a neighbor, he was a friend – always there to help whenever you'd run into him. If you had a question he would solve it for you. Just an all-around good guy. Didn't have a big ego – he could have but he didn't. He was like the people we work with here, a good friend."

Klimek says that Kernan would always walk the streets of his South Bend neighborhood picking up litter.

Klimek also remarked that Kernan was always trying to make things better for South Bend residents.