National Protest Over Indiana Allowing British Petroleum To Pollute Lake Michigan: Wisconsin Curiously Uninvolved, So Far

The US House of Representatives has overwhelmingly voted a protest against Indiana's outrageous decision to let British Petroleum increase to three tons daily the amount of ammonia and polluted sludge BP dumps into Lake Michigan.

Citizens in Illinois are signing petitions by the tens of thousands against Indiana action, says The New York Times.

Mayors of shoreline communities along Lake Michigan have sent letters of opposition, including Milwaukee's Mayor Tom Barrett and Chicago's Richard Daley.

And from Wisconsin...nothing official.

Could it be that it's hard for our state to raise questions about how a Great Lakes state is using Lake Michigan when it is Wisconsin (through the DNR) that has asked the other Great Lakes states to allow New Berlin to divert Lake Michigan water before Wisconsin and the other states (except for Minnesota) have ratified the pending Great Lakes Compact?

Scott Walker Will Never Support City Rail, Move Forward Without Him: Part II

A few days ago, I posted an analysis of Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker's intransigent one-track opposition to rail transit for City of Milwaukee residents.

My point was that Walker is largely a creation of Milwaukee's loud, pro-Republican talk radio show hosts, and for them, blocking rail transportation for the state's largest urban and Democratic population is a means of keeping their suburban audience stirred up.

So Walker is their guy, and he will not, cannot cross them on their most sacred of litmus-test issues. Especially if Walker wants to be promoted some day to the seat held by the region's senior Republican office-holder, US Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner.

So the Journal Sentinel editorial board is spinning its wheels when it urges mediation between Walker, and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett - - as if mediation would bring Walker to the same middle ground on transit that Barrett is already occupying.

Barrett has already offered to basically split $91.5 million in available transit federal funds with Walker.

That would allow the County's bus system managed by Walker to receive some upgrades and also leave Barrett with some financing to begin work on one his priorities - - a three-mile, downtown trolley loop - - for the city he manages.

Walker has more than once rejected that compromise - - as recently as in a Journal Sentinel Sunday, August 29, 2007 Crossroads interview - - and in an earlier discussion in March, among many.

As far back as an April 6th, 2002 Journal Sentinel story during the race for County Executive, Walker was described this way when it came to rail transit:

"Walker is opposed to light rail, or any rail-based option."

So what's to mediate?

Walker has had years to endorse city rail, (coincidentally, just as he has years to lead on pension reform, but hasn't) yet all he's done is finally support commuter rail through Kenosha, Racine and Milwaukee Counties - - a benefit to his suburban base, but a virtual wash when it comes to measurable benefits to the downtown.

As a component to a comprehensive AMTRAK/trolley/commuter rail and bus system, linked at the city's new multi-purpose transit hub in the old AMTRAK station - - sure, commuter rail is a plus.

But as the only new rail option on the table, and in town, it's flawed and wanting.

So how do you get the rail debate on track in Milwaukee?

If you want a rail system for downtown Milwaukee, as the Journal Sentinel has editorially backed, the paper and others with a deep commitment to the city will have to support a candidate for County Executive who shares that vision.

A candidate who can approach modern transit and downtown development linkages with more than a reflexive, politically-motivated "no!"

Scott Walker, Reformer? Bring On a Real Reformer

Scott Walker has been County Executive since replacing Tom Ament in 2002 on a reform agenda driven by the first pension scandal.

So while we dissect the Journal Sentinel's great investigative reporting on a new pension system scandal, it's not too early to ask this political accountability question:

Why has the money for special deals for some employees' retirements been allowed to flow in the last five years when Walker was in charge - - a period subsequent to Ament's demise ?

Ament, his staff and the county board deserve whatever brickbats are still coming their way - - but Walker cannot say he's shown the kind of leadership the public deserves in the two areas most associated with Walker's rise to County power:

Pension system reform, and;

Fiscal responsibility to manage the pension abuses that began under Ament's regime - - but which we now know have been allowed to flourish on Walker's watch.

If that's reform, then we need another reformer.

Update: The Journal Sentinel agrees that Walker has some explaining to do. Let's hope they apply the pressure to Walker outlined in this editorial, published Tuesday,

The key sentiment, and one that needs widespread follow-up:

"Walker also has called for a review of all of the county's benefits to search for other "land mines." He's right.

"But it's also legitimate to question what Walker or his department heads knew about these buybacks and, if they didn't know, why not?

"The first buybacks predate Walker's election, but some occurred on his watch. Walker was swept into office as a result of the pension scandal that occurred when other county officials were in office. He should have found all the land mines then."

In other words, the investigative line first made famous during the Watergate hearings:

"What did you know, and when did you know about it?"

And add this: "What did you do about it?"

Detroit Paper Urges Water Compact With Eased Rules

The Detroit News, that city's second-largest newspaper, says the Great Lakes Compact will hurt job growth in Michigan, and lauds that state's highest court for a recent ruling in favor of the bottled water industry.

Environmental groups in Wisconsin and elsewhere in the eight-state Great Lakes region think the mild restrictions on exporting bottled water in the pending Great Lakes Compact are, in fact, a loophole that needs closing.

So support for a strong Compact in Michigan is not a given, as feared by some Wisconsin Compact foes, and at least one major paper in Michigan isn't looking for Michigan at all to take the lead on tough regional water conservation and diversion rules, either.

As I noted on this blog last week, anti-Compact forces are gathering in Traverse City, MI, in late August; property rights, state soverignity, water access and ownership are major sticking points for the Ohio critic who is organizing the Traverse City meeting, and Waukesha County political and business interests, sharing some of the Ohio perspective, are leading the battle in Wisconsin to weaken or derail the Compact.

The Compact faces substantial obstacles across the region.

The alternatives are diversion of Great Lakes water, and its usage, without reasonable procedures or standards.

Another contradiction:

Compact critics are fooling themselves into thinking that their perceived entitlement to Great Lakes water wouldn't be threatened and overwhelmed by greater diversions of water by dozens of far-flung communities in many other states.

Blockbuster Story About Another County Pension Ripoff A Must Read

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Dave Umhoefer has produced a package of stories - - main story here - - that should be reading in every Milwaukee County taxpayer's home, and in law and tax enforcement agencies at the state and federal levels.

Get ready to be outraged.

Umhoefer has documented a weasily and flat-out greedy fleecing of the County's pension system - - on top of the highly-publicized pension scamming that led to the removal of many top elected officials from their jobs a few years ago.

The new abuses Umhoefer revealed could cost an additional $50 million in dubious-to-unjustifiable benefits that - - at best - - skirt the law, but profoundly violate every fiber of the relationship that binds voters and taxpayers to the people entrusted to work for the public sector.

When that relationship has been broken, government fails, because it lacks the necessary trust that guarantees its success and survival.

Another political point: Scott Walker has been County Executive since replacing Tom Ament in 2002 on a reform agenda driven by the first pension scandal.

So why has the money for these special deals for some employees' retirements been allowed to keep flowing in the last five years when Walker was in charge - - subsequent to Ament's demise and the purported restoration of ethics to county pension procedures?

Ament, his staff and the board deserve whatever brickbats are still coming their way - - but Walker can't say he's shown the kind of leadership the public desperately needs in the one area most associated with his election and tenure in office: pension system reform.

Umhoefer's findings center around a group of about 500 county employees who were permitted under a willful tweaking of the rules to expand their already-generous pensions.

They were allowed to claim summer job stints or other hours worked decades earlier, thus adding thousands of dollars to their pension calculations or taxpayer-paid health care benefits upon retirement.

And the eligibility to reclaim, through so-called buybacks, those hours for pensionable credits was frequently obtained at a fraction of a fair cost, according to industry standards.

It's like insider stock trading - - being let in on the purchase of some shares of artificially low-priced stock, knowing that the bargain would inflate the value of the shares of the stock you already owned (and all the shares come with a nice publicly-subsidized purchase price, too).

In any workplace, but especially one supported with public funds in a county of modest wealth that is burdened with staggering social problems, the policy-making decisions and resulting personal windfalls that Umhoefer documented are unconscionable.

Pension systems do not have to be managed or altered this way.

I was Mayor John Norquist's chief of staff in the late 1990's, when city government coincidentally went through a systematic reform of its pension system.

At Norquist's direction, the city attorney, the common council and several city agencies agreed on procedures that were 180 degrees different from the county's pension 'processes.'

The city hired lawyers and actuaries to carefully study various alternatives that would eventually lead to changes in pension benefits, and to the distribution of part of the system's surplus - - but the solvency of the system and the protection of its reserves were always the top priorities.

Insiders didn't sit around and figure out how to scoop up every stray dollar as if they were bystanders at the scene of an over-turned armored car in a traffic accident.

The changes in the city's pension system not only had to pass political and fiscal muster - - they had to be approved by all the interested parties, right down to a costly and cumbersome election-by-postcard in which retirees' votes were gathered, tallied and certified by a circuit court judge.

There was litigation. There were settlements. There were tedious and contentious negotiations within a framework of checks and balances - - but at the county, it turns out there were only to be checks.

Time and time again, getting more money - - regardless of the consequences to the county system and taxpayers' wallets - - was the apparent object and the outcome.

Looking at the history of the county pension mess is like watching a long episode of The Sopranos, where greedy people focus on one thing: grabbing more of other people's money for themselves.

After the pension scandal broke a few years ago, hard-hitting reporting, some of it belated, some of it originating on then-relatively new websites - - along with recall elections - - swept many of the highest-profile greedmeisters out of elected offices.

One senior ex-bureaucrat, Gary Dobbert, was charged with misconduct in public office. The county's top personnel officer, Dobbert was convicted, fined and spent 60 days in jail.

Some officials were shamed or politically-astute enough to waive some of the gaudier extra benefits they couldn't justify accepting.

But some didn't, and left county employment with pensions equal to full-time salaries, years of paid-up health insurance, and in some cases, gold-plated six-figure bonus checks.

And now we know that Dobbert wasn't much more than a scapegoat, and that the grifting was worse than imagined.

Enough is enough.

County government is reducing services because it has a constant shortfall of money. The unsustainable demands of ramped-up pension and related health-care benefits are among the reasons that fees are rising, pools are closing, bus lines are ending, and county government in Milwaukee keeps devolving into a political, fiscal and ethical joke.

There needs to be a complete overturning and undoing of the decisions that led to millions in public dollars awarded to people who do not and did not deserve them.

And there needs to be a detailed, deliberate, documented and sworn investigation of all the chicanery that fleeced county taxpayers and the pension system of millions and millions of dollars.

It's not enough to say that it's all water under the bridge, or money out the door, and that nothing can be done about it.

Dave Umhoefer and the Journal Sentinel have done a great public service. This is investigative reporting at its finest - - the best story in memory - - and a solid investment of the paper's political capital on behalf of the community, too.

Now we need to know that the stories will be clipped, printed-out, underlined and summarized for the next steps: repayments requested of fair-minded recipients, efforts to win refunds through claims and lawsuits from the recalcitrant, and formal inquiries by prosecutors and tax officials to help with a long-overdue systematic review of the entire debacle.

Anything less means that county government in Milwaukee has no credibility, and that the disrespect shown to county taxpayers is unlimited.

Gov. Doyle, Michigan's Gov. Granholm Meet Privately With the EPA Administrator

A small newspaper in Michigan, the Record Eagle in Traverse City, carries a column mentioning a recent, private meeting there with Michigan's Governor Jennifer Granholm, Stephen Johnson, the US Environmental Protection Agency administrator, and Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle.

According to the report in the Traverse City (MI) Record Eagle about federal action on Great Lakes issues:

"Granholm said she and Doyle told Johnson: "You've just got to realize that on the ground here, it looks like nothing has happened.”

That's interesting - - could media in Madison get a report on the meeting for interested Wisconsin citizens, from our Governor?

Lots going on with regard to the Great Lakes, doncha know?

Federal inaction on Great Lakes restoration.

Water levels dropping in Lake Superior.

Indiana allowing an oil company to pollute Lake Michigan.

New Berlin moving towards a Lake Michigan diversion, though Wisconsin has yet to adopt the Great Lakes Compact and help establish regional standards for diversions and conservation measures across the eight-state Great Lakes region.

Last year, it was Granholm's office - - not Wisconsin officials - - that notified the public about New Berlin's diversion application. Now a Michigan newspaper carries information about an interesting, potentially significant meeting.

Minnesota blogger Dave Dempsey, a former Michigan environmental state official, also noted the Record Eagle item on his blog.

Could Wisconsin residents be kept in the loop with Wisconsin sourcing, and from state officials, so we don't have to keep relying on officials and media in Michigan, and bloggers in Minnesota?

Tommy's Iowa Bus Tour Photo Album: If A Picture Is Worth 1,000 Words...

Then an entire album doesn't have a word count.

Gingrich Has Another Headline-Grabbing, Unoriginal Idea. So Does Tommy.

Newt Gingrich predicts that Democrats will nominate a Hillary-Clinton/Barack Obama ticket.

Gee: how come no one thought of that before?

And then there was the story that Tommy Thompson alleged Mitt Romney was copying the barely-visible Thompson campaign by riding around Iowa on a bus.

Next thing you know, Tommy'll accuse Rudy Guiliani of stealing another Thompson invention - - the campaign button.

Lake Superior Warms, Level Keeps Falling

Scientists can't agree on a cause, but water levels in Lake Superior continue to decline, the water temperature rises, shippers are losing millions with lighter loads and media are paying more attention.

Including, somewhat ironically, The Freeman, Waukesha's daily newspaper that circulates right in the heart of Lake Michigan's potential water diversion zone.

Concern about management of the Great Lakes in Wisconsin is not just an issue along Lake Michigan, or in southeastern Wisconsin.

It's truly an issue of statewide concern, involving the quality and quantity of two of the Great Lakes on our borders.

That's why Wisconsin needs to adopt the pending Great Lakes Compact, firming up standards governing diversions from the Great Lakes, conservation standards and other important water management issues in the entire eight-state Great Lakes region.

The Pat Tillman Story Gets Worse

Public opinion has turned solidly against the Iraq War, but for the Bush administration, the unraveling coverup of the details of Pat Tillman's death in Afghanistan is a political and moral problem that simply cannot be fixed.

Waukesha County Drops Anti-Immigration Offensive

Should local law enforcement officers spend their time tracking illegal immigrants, which is a federal responsibility?

This bad idea originated with former Waukesha County DA Paul Bucher during his unsuccessful run for Wisconsin Attorney General.

The scheme was half political grandstanding, half overreaction.

Mercifully, Waukesha County officials have dropped the idea, allowing local law enforcement officers to do their jobs, and the feds' to do theirs.

The Federal Court Verdicts In The Frank Jude Case Are Good News

The guilty verdicts delivered in court Thursday, along with early guilty pleas, are a solid healing step for the City of Milwaukee.

The damage to Jude, Lovell Harris and the larger community were severe, but seeing justice roll from the courthouse, though a long time coming, should lift everyone's spirits.

The Journal Sentinel editorial board says it all on point, here.

And the full injustice will be finally wiped clean when the legislature repeals the special state law, lobbied successfully by the police union, that requires Milwaukee taxpayers to continue paying convicted ex-police officers until their appeals are over - - leaving two of the convicted ex-officers/felons in this case even yet on the city payroll.

Michigan Supreme Court Sides With Water Sellers, Other Corporate Interests

State Sen. Mary Lazich, Ohio State Senator Tim Grendell and others in the region believe that the State of Michigan is the anti-business, Great Lakes regulatory boogeyman.

They might be surprised to learn of the Michigan Supreme Court's pro-business ruling this week that has sharply limited the public's standing in court to try and restrain corporate abuses of natural resources.

Details here in the ever-reliable Dave Dempsey blog.

Foes Of Key Great Lakes Compact Provisions To Gather At Michigan Meeting

There could be more problems ahead for the pending Great Lakes Compact - - a water management and conservation plan that has to be adopted by the eight Great Lakes states' legislatures with identical language already agreed upon by their governors in order to go into effect.

Ohio State Senator Tim Grendell (R-Chester Township), confirmed in a telephone interview Wednesday that he is organizing a meeting later this summer where opponents of the pending Great Lakes Compact can meet with supporters "to work out a solution."

That may be easier said than done, since the pending Compact took five years to negotiate, and meeting some opponents' objections could unravel the entire agreement.

Ohio media have named Grendell as a major opponent of the Compact in that state, and he has been quoted saying it contains "un-American" language.

The areas in the Compact that Grendell and others are opposing, including State Sen. Mary Lazich, (R-New Berlin) are already spelled out in the Governors' December, 2005 agreement, so altering or deleting them negate the entire agreement.

Grendell's meeting is scheduled in Traverse City, Michigan on August 25th, and coincides with a separate regional conference for state legislators.

Grendell said his major concerns about the Compact were provisions that permitted one state to block a diversion of water in another state - - "the loss of an individual state's authority in their state," as he defined it.

"We don't want Michigan or Indiana to limit our [water] use or our economic development," Grendell said.

The Ohio legislator said he also was concerned that language in the Compact defining Great Lakes water as a resource held in the "public trust" could cause Ohioans to lose their property right to water - - a protected right that he said the Ohio Supreme Court has ruled required compensated if violated.

He also said there was other "vague" language in the Compact that needed clarification.

On the pivotal matter of public trust, the Wisconsin State Constitution includes broad public trust doctrine language that predates statehood and originates in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. That is a water protection principle that guarantees that the state's waters are owned by all the people of the state, with the state as trustee.

Lazich is a member of the Wisconsin legislature's Great Lakes Compact study committee that has been meeting for a year to draft a bill implementing the Compact, and sent Grendell's objections to the committee in January, documents show.

Lazich and Lawrie Kobza, a water law expert who works for some Wisconsin municipalities, have formally suggested stripping the "held in trust" language from Wisconsin's eventual Compact implementing bill, according to Committee records (see p. 2). And here.

Kobza is also a consultant on legal issues to the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, whose regional water supply study is about half done and is building a case for diversions as a regional policy, I have argued.

Opposition by Compact opponents stalled the Committee's work for many months; the creation of a parallel working group by Gov. Jim Doyle seems to have energized the Committee; Lazich was left off the working group and has been unhappy about it.

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources told the committee by memo after receiving Grendell's letter from Lazich that Grendell's property rights concerns were inaccurate and had no relevance to Wisconsin.

Grendell said by telephone that his objections to Compact provisions could be cleared up "in less that 20 words," would make sure Ohio's economy will continue to benefit from proximity to Lake Erie, and would continue to guarantee that Great Lakes water would not be diverted from the basin.

Lazich has also strongly objected to the so-called 'single-state veto,' and has been joined in that criticism by the Waukesha County Chamber of Commerce.

In a July 19th New Berlin blog commentary, Lazich echoed Grendell's thinking when she concluded:

"I will not endorse a Compact that puts our communities in the precarious position of having water access stripped away by the whims of a single Governor in a neighboring state. Furthermore, I will continue to speak out against the many defects in the document as long as they pose a threat to the welfare of residents in New Berlin and Waukesha."

The full blog is accessible here.

Also objecting to the 'one-state' veto provision and other Compact items including restrictions on diversions to communities in Waukesha County is Committee member Matt Monroney, executive director of the Metropolitan Builders Association, headquartered in Waukesha.

Monroney is also a member of the SEWRPC water advisory committee.

Help Make Milwaukee County Government Green

You want a greener Milwaukee County government? Votes are approaching: One Wisconsin Now tells you how and why to contact your supervisors, pronto.

Item #1 For The Incoming DNR Secretary

Would it be too much to ask that the DNR do its regulatory job and work aggressively under Matt Frank, the newly-nominated secretary, to keep mass cattle fecal runoff out of Lake Michigan?

An earlier posting about this outrage in Manitowoc County is here.

Or is shoulder-shrugging by the agency in the face of obvious pollution now part of some new, secret DNR mission statement?

Should the entire burden of environmental protection in and around Manitowoc be borne by dedicated volunteer neighbors of these offending large animal operations?

Should sampling and improving Lake Michigan water quality along the lake's eastern shoreline be the responsibility of these activists?

Isn't that why we have a Department of Natural Resources?

I'd recommend that Matt Frank make splash in his new job with a road trip to Manitowoc, then a visit to the woodshed with his new staff, followed by an announcement of action.

And follow-up.

Editorial Call For A Center For The Great Lakes

From Michigan, a plea for one coordinated center for Great Lakes' water-related study.

An excellent idea, one that UW-Milwaukee should jump on because it already runs the Great Lakes WATER Institute, has world-class experts with expertise in surface and underground water, and could easily morph into a broader research institution.

UW-M's administration should leverage its existing resources and make itself a key regional player - - in this case, the region being the Great Lakes basin - - in water policy.

Soglin Gets To The Heart of Water Planning

Paul Soglin gets to what's important in water planning with a short, must-read summary.

And correctly points to a solid source, Midwestern Environmental Advocates, whose work, he correctly points out, is essential.

MEA is a lead group in a coalition pushing for a strong Great Lakes Compact for Wisconsin, and the coalition's priorities can be found here.

Sign An Online Petition Against BP's Lake Michigan Pollution Permit

You can get in on the action to stop British Petroleum's fouling of Lake Michigan with sludge and ammonia - - three tons daily - - at its northern Indiana lakefront refinery by signing an online petition.

Details here.

SEWRPC Lays The Foundation For Lake Michigan Diversions

The Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (SEWRPC), signalled last week that it's likely to recommend that Lake Michigan water be diverted to Waukesha County suburbs, and perhaps elsewhere in its seven-county territory, as a preferred solution to regional water supply demands.

This should come as no surprise.

The suburban-leaning SEWRPC green-lighted regional freeway expansion and has declined to write a regional housing plan since 1975 - - both decisions assisting growth in water-demanding areas.

Draft data was presented on July 17th to the SEWRPC water supply advisory committee projecting an increase in water demand in the SEWRPC seven-county region of 30% by 2035.

In annexation-crazy Waukesha County, ground zero in the effort to pipe water to thirsty communities west of the subcontinental divide at Sunny Slope Rd. (the geographic barrier that also makes up the current legal barrier preventing Lake Michigan diversions), the projected water demand is much higher, said SEWRPC's documentation.

The key numbers comparing 2000 to 2035 water needs in Waukesha County that will be used I predict to underpin eventual recommendations from SEWRPC supporting diversions from Lake Michigan are:

* Square miles in Waukesha County served by municipal water systems would increase to 171 square miles from 82 - - a boost of more than 100%.

*Municipal water systems in the county would increase to 24 from 16, or a 50% expansion.

* The average water pumpage each day by the anticipated number of county municipal water systems would jump to 49 million gallons from 26 million gallons - - an increase of 88%.

* Waukesha County's population of 360,000 in 2000 is projected to rise to 446,000 by 2035, according to data presented by SEWRPC earlier.

But County officials believe their eventual population could hit an even higher number - - 520,000 - - in what they call "build-out" scenarios.

That's a lot of new residents - - an increase approaching 50% from 2000 levels - - which would make the Waukesha County demand for water even greater than what SEWRPC is suggesting.

The inconsistency in the numbers raise a number of questions, but in no way suggest that demand for water will go anywhere but up, as will the political pressure from Waukesha for diversions, too.

Let's also examine the framework that SEWRPC is using to turn numbers into policy recommendations, especially the kind of "costs" the committee and SEWRPC staff and consultants have decided are important considerations when writing a regional water supply plan

Its approach is why I'd argue that the die is cast for the Lake Michigan option over, say, water re-use and recycling technologies to create supplies as an alternative to tapping into an already stressed lake and Great Lakes system.

From its 2005 beginning, the water advisory committee, heavy on water utility managers and other municipal officials, defined the study primarily with supply-and-demand parameters - - into which dollars-and-cents cost/benefit analyses fit nicely.

And avoid big-picture, inter-basin perspectives that argue it's poor water management practice to solve the problems in a watershed - - in this case, in Waukesha communities in the Mississippi River basin - - by transferring water from another - - the Lake Michigan/Great Lakes basin that is east of the sub-continental divide.

The SEWRPC approach, boiled down to essentials, is this:

Q: Where in the SEWRPC seven-county region would there be a pressing need for water?

A. Waukesha County, and also in lesser volumes, the other counties, such as Kenosha. (The Journal Sentinel reported this, with a chart, here.)

Q. Where is water in short, inaccessible, unacceptable supply.

A. Waukesha County.

Q. Where is there a big supply of fresh water?

A. Lake Michigan.

Q. Where is there an excess of existing pumping capacity?

A. The City of Milwaukee, which has two big water treatment facilities right on Lake Michigan.

Some members of SEWRPC's water supply advisory committee wanted to add "none-monetary" costs to the study scope, going beyond piping, pumping, buildings, and other engineering, operating and capital expenses.

At its second meeting in November, 2005 (minutes here in pdf, see pages 5-7, especially), the advisory committee debated that issue.

It turned back a proposal to specifically list potential legal costs as a factor in considering recommendations, because litigation could result if communities in the SEWRPC region won diversions from Lake Michigan water.

Diversions might be seen as communities solving one watershed's problems by subtracting water from another watershed, thus basically transferring the problem but disguising it as a solution.

The committee instead accepted the SEWRPC staff's opinion that potential legal costs were routinely factored into administrative budgets on engineering projects, and could also occur in non-diversion supply planning, so it was not necessary to have SEWRPC list potential legal costs when referencing potential Lake Michigan diversion plans

There was also a long discussion about whether to expand the scope of this regional water study objectives to include "all costs," including environmental. It was a sharp debate, not reflected in SEWRPC's dry minutes.

The committee was told by SEWRPC staff that environmental considerations would be included as a matter of routine, but some members balked at expanding monetary considerations in the study objectives to non-monetary.

The committee could not reach a decision by consensus, its preferred method of collegial committee decision-making.

So it voted on the "all cost including environmental" issue as a formal motion - - and declined to add the non-monetary parameter by a vote of 24-3- - locking in a more restricted, nuts-and-bolts study scope.

The final objective in question reads:

"The development of water supply facilities, operational improvements, and policies that are both economical and efficient, best meeting all other objectives at the lowest practical cost consistent both with long-term capital and operational and maintenance costs."

The only addition to the language was the insertion of the word "best."

With the study scope narrowed - - call it a victory for the engineers and the water utility managers - - fast forward a year-and-a-half to last week.

With population, pumping, and other data provided to the committee, I'm predicting that SEWRPC will focus its conclusions, as problem solvers, on meeting the demand side of the supply equation.

A proper noun comes to mind that defines the solution:
Lake Michigan.

And a verb: Divert.

What's coming next?

The water supply advisory committee, led by staff and consultants, will finish their work in six months to a year.

And don't get me wrong: it's a hard-working bunch. It's just that they could have made their project a ground-breaking effort.

Swung for the fences.

But that's not what is happening, and given SEWRPC's institutional track record - - not a surprise.

Ideally, the committee's work will wind up after, or concurrent with, the state's adoption of the Great Lakes Compact.

That would put a diversion application and review procedure of some sort, and other conservation standards into place for Wisconsin by inserting them in state law.

How strongly-written are those procedures and standards will greatly effect how often Lake Michigan water is sought or diverted out of the Great Lakes basin to communities like Waukesha and New Berlin, and perhaps to others.

The committee's recommendations probably won't be unanimous, but the final tally won't be close.

SEWRPC will then conduct public hearings on its water advisory committee recommendations, and if history is a reliable guide, the meetings will be a formality, followed by approval at the full, 21-member Commission.

That vote will be close to unanimous, with perhaps one, maybe two "no" votes, if that.

SEWRPC likes creating policy and drafting studies through its advisory committees, and is spending about a million dollars on this one. It's out-of-the-question to think it would set aside all that spending with substantive amendments, or to ask another group to start over.

It's a long pantomime, and while SEWRPC will say that it's only issuing recommendations, government officials, subdivision-builders, mall planners and editorial writers will call the findings valuable and timely - - and the recommendations will come with SEWRPC's imprimatur.

Sure this is all speculative on my part. I'd love to be wrong, but again, this is what I predict:

SEWRPC's final report will recommend Lake Michigan diversions along with relatively modest, "economically-feasible" water conservation as the keys to a regional solution, and where possible, will recommend regional management of water, too.

It will not recommend controls over farmland conversion or sprawl-producing annexations that help fuel the growing demand for water.

The report will not acknowledge the role of government, including SEWRPC's, in helping to create some of the escalating demand for water by having pushed development far from Lake Michigan, where existing infrastructure and easy-to-access water should have been recommended as catalysts for regional economic growth through in-basin development.

One of the committee's approved objectives is that the water recommendations support the existing SEWRPC land use plan - - the one that has not been supplemented for 32 years with a housing plan, that has not aggressively supported transit with the same gusto reserved for freeway expansion, and that has paved the way, so to speak for the very sprawl and water demand driving the water study.

A more environmentally-focused and cooordinated land-use, water, transportation and housing plan would have prioritized in-basin growth and led the region away from sprawl, and away from diversions and their costs - - all costs - - engineering, social, legal - - that will accompany the movement of water from Lake Michigan over the subcontinental divide.

Yet Milwaukee will be identified as a 'best' solution to resolve what will called a regional water supply and demand imbalance.

That geographic solution will pressure politically Milwaukee to participate as a water seller to the suburbs, instead of being the focus of a regional approach that could have recommended using Milwaukee water to boost the economies in all the lakefront communities.

But to do that, you would had to have much broader objectives, and looked at the positive costs of highlight that kind of in-basin, lakefront-community centered water use, or the negative costs of omitting it.

And what about the other imbalances (you could call them "costs" if you had been so-inclined) in the region - - access to jobs and housing, for instance, or public spending on freeways instead of transit - - that distort development along city (read: Milwaukee)/suburban/exurban/income and racial lines?

Those won't be be given real if any weight in the recommended water policy solutions - - because they were not identified at the beginning as SEWRPC study objectives.

Remember: That opportunity went away when the "all costs" motion lost 24-3, without even the support of Carrie Lewis, Milwaukee's Water Works Manager and the City of Milwaukee's lone representative on the committee.

And don't expect the City of Milwaukee's representatives on the full SEWRPC commission to refocus or amend the final report, or vote against it.

That's because Milwaukee, by state law, isn't permitted even a single one of those 21 Commission seats.

Some call this regional planning.

Others have a different label: A stacked deck.

Good National Roundup of Environmental Blogs Linked Below

Lots of good things about environmental issues are linked at this web consolidator's site.

Barrett, Other Lakeshore Mayors, Rip Oil Company Permit To Pollute Lake Michigan

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett got several other lakeshore Mayors to sign a letter to Indiana officials who earlier granted British Petroleum permission to dump tons of sludge and ammonia daily into the lake at a northern Indiana refinery.

Good for Barrett. Let's hope this is the beginning of the end of a stupid decision by Indiana and a reprehensible plan by BP.

SEWRPC Task Force On Environmental Justice To Begin Meetings

To meet objections from critics who argue that regional planning has ignored the participation and needs of low-income and minority residents, the Southeastern Regional Planning Commission, SEWRPC, is announcing the first meeting of an Environmental Justice Task Force.

The meeting will be held on Tuesday Aug. 7 at 4 p.m. at Heartlove Place, 3229 N. Martin Luther King Jr Dr., in Milwaukee.

The public is encouraged to attend; more information about the goals of environmental justice is here.

Paul Soglin Doesn't See Much Value In Waukesha's Water Conservation Rate Plan

Certainly not for Madison, as he points out on his blog, or to achieve much savings in Waukesha, either.

When Words Have Consequences

A few weeks ago, a former Waukesha Freeman editor named Pete Kennedy wrote a diatribe against Milwaukee that, by any standards, was the cheapest of shots.

His theme: "Milwaukee Sucks."

There were immediate reverberations. Bill Christofferson wrote a pointed blog response, which, in fairness I will point out, the Freeman also published.

I weighed in, too (here), and one of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's community columnists has added a thoughtful op-ed piece.

Those were some of the more public responses.

Privately, I spoke to several officials or movers-and-shakers, and separately, their reactions and political analyses were relatively similar:

'Don't those people out in Waukesha understand it's Milwaukee that they want to get water from?'

Granted that Pete Kennedy is not a Waukesha city or county official, or a policy-maker.

But he is an opinion-maker, and outside of Waukesha, would be seen a credible spokesman because he has a media history and platform in that city and county's leading local daily paper.

It'll be interesting to see how long the Kennedy column continues to stir things up.

Christofferson has already referenced the original Kennedy piece again.

I wouldn't be surprised if Kennedy's slur replaced Tommy Thompson's "stick it to Milwaukee" line as permanent fighting words for Milwaukeans, which could mean political problems for Waukesha.

Getting The Language Right: When Is a Ban On Great Lakes Water Diversions A Ban?

Michigan's Governor Jennifer Granholm reportedly described the proposed prohibition on Great Lakes diversions as an outright ban, according to a media report from the just-concluded National Governors Association annual meeting

As we know in these here parts, such is not the outright case.

New Berlin and Waukesha have already applied for Great Lakes water diversions, either through exceptions spelled out in the proposed Compact (New Berlin, 2006 and 2007), or through direct appeals to Governor Jim Doyle in confidential pleas (2006, twice rebuffed).

Former Michigan water policy expert and now-Minnesota blogger Dave Dempsey works his way through the terminology, parsing and other linguistic thickets regarding possible Great Lakes diversions, here.

And a second Great Lakes blogger turns Granholm's remarks into an essay about water and economic policy, here, raising broad policy questions about water seldom articulated in Wisconsin.

Of course, much of this uncertainty could be resolved if Wisconsin would pass the Great Lakes Compact, a process stalled in a state legislative council committee over objections from some Waukesha County politicians, and business interests, who want few, if any, diversion restrictions.

SEWRPC Takes A Pass On Assertive Climate Change Plan

The Southeastern Regional Planning Commission is midway through an historic water supply study for the seven counties in its domain, and has said it would fold climate change into the study.

Makes sense: there are few more pressing scientific and social issues facing planners and experts today because of measurable increases in world temperatures.

But a draft document that makes up a portion of the water supply study handed out at last week's water supply advisory committee meeting suggests that SEWRPC isn't aggressively focused on climate change and its impact on the region's water supplies.

At the end of what SEWRPC labels "Chapter VII: Water Supply Problem Identification And Issues To Be Resolved," the agency concludes that there's too much uncertainty in climate change data and its interpretations for conclusions, let alone a bold, pro-active plan.

"...it was concluded," say the drafters," that there is practical (sic) no way to make the effects of climate change quantitatively operational in the development of the regional water supply plan. Rather, it was determined to consider the issue by developing a recommended water supply plan which is flexible and adaptable to change."

In other words: change is happening, but it's a big, murky subject.

So let's plan for climate changes - - with a plan that can change.

Is that the best that SEWRPC can offer us?

Aren't all plans subject to change, unless they're issued by some sort of dictatorial Planners Star Chamber?

Are we getting a predictive, useful regional water supply plan - - or a planning tautology?

Big Business Opposes Health Care Reform - - With Big $$

Interesting that corporate interests opposing universal health care coverage for Wisconsin citizens find it necessary to throw big money at Gov. Doyle, and an even greater percentage of donations to GOP health care coverage reform opponents in the State Assembly, a report finds.

And you wonder why it's so hard to shift government policy, or why we remain a major industrial power - - a collection of states within that rich but inequitable nation - - without health care coverage that gives everyone an equal shot at long, health life.

For $25, Iowa Gives Ethanol Plants A Permit For Ten Years Of Water

There's short-sighted, there's really short-sighted - - and then there's Iowa's protectionist giveaway of its underground water to business that turn Iowa corn into ethanol.

It takes four gallons of water to turn out a gallon ethanol, so Iowa lets ethanol producers take as much groundwater as they want for a $25 permit.

That's good for ten years.

Ethanol does help reduce dependence on foreign oil, but corn is the most expensive, water-dependent vegetative source for ethanol, so there should be focus and incentives to turn to more sustainable and less water-reliant sources.

And Wisconsin, which is pushing corn-based ethanol, too, also needs to look to alternatives, a subject dealt with on this blog earlier, here.

Will Saukville Take The Fluoride Out Of Its Drinking Water?

It was odd to read the other day that the Northern Ozaukee County Village of Saukville was considering ending its fluoridation of the municipal water system.

You'd have thought that debates over the wisdon water fluoridation was a closed issue, since it's known to reduce tooth decay and help children and adults avoid other related diseases, too.

It does cost a few thousand bucks a year to put fluoride in the water, but the Village of more than 4,000 people is a growing community with family incomes that exceed Wisconsin averages.

And the Village seems to be able to provide other municipal services, and amenities. The annual cost of $5,300 to fluoridate the drinking water doesn't look like a budget-buster.

Fluoridation was a contentious issue in America in the 50's, when some claimed it was an insidious Communist plot to weaken Americans through contaminated drinking water supplies.

Saukville has been adding fluoride to its drinking water since 1964, and with the Cold War over, it's hard to imagine that Saukville's possible fluoride removal is part of some throwback, 'better-dead-than-Red' resurgence.

Let's hope that the idea gets set aside, and the region can focus its interest in water policy on getting a strong Great Lakes Compact, with solid conservation and diversion restrictions, adopted in the legislature.

Manitowoc Farms Flush Feces Into Lake Michigan: The DNR Does Nothing

Activists have for years been raising a stink - - pardon the bad turn of a phrase - - about the knowing cow manure pollution of Lake Michigan that runs daily from super-farming operations north of Milwaukee.

The Journal Sentinel lays out some of the facts here, and among the most galling of all is the admission by Department of Natural Resources regulators that they intend to do nothing with the proof.

Journal Sentinel Community Columnist Opines On The Approaching Water Wars

More and more people are talking about it.

Sample quote:

"In a future in which the price of water may supersede that of gasoline, we need to put the price of our most precious resource out of reach. By waiting for the opportune moment, we'll preserve the natural beauty of the area while setting ourselves up to become one of the United States' most prosperous communities."

Water Demand, Not Conservation, Is The Real Regional Water Story

It is true that there are some water conservation measures underway in Waukesha communities, most notably in the City of Waukesha, which will charge some large users a new premium rate.

But data released last week by SEWRPC, the regional planning commission, predicts a big jump in water demand throughout its seven-county region, especially in Waukesha County.

You don't have to be a hydrologist or a statistician to know which direction that water planning will flow in the region: just drive around and look at the subdivisions, malls, and office parks that are replacing area farms and woodlands.

All that development needs water. New supplies will help it happen, and water conservation, which is certainly a good thing, will be a footnote, even a fig-leaf, for some developers and planners.

More about this later.

Journal Sentinel Digs Deeper Into The Health Care Reform Issue

After the predictable GOP/talk radio hysteria over consideration of a health care reform package by Wisconsin legislators, a Journal Sentinel Sunday piece goes beyond the rhetoric.

NY Times Doesn't Include Tommy In Long-Shots' Review

Our favorite cheesehead Tommy Thompson can't even catch a break when The New York Times pays some attention to the oft-ignored long-shot presidential candidates.

The paper of record features Republican Libertarian Ron Paul.

Along with some ink, bytes and links about the other Thompson - - Fred - - and Joe Biden.

Tommy did score some publicity in the local media last week, but again, nothing that's going to win him the Iowa caucuses.

The Journal Sentinel's Katherine Skiba noted that Tommy has raised just $890,000, far less than his goal of $2.5 million.

That's what Obama or Clinton or Romney or Guiliani can raise in a good three-day weekend.

Plus, Tommy has put $100,000 of his own dough in the campaign, Skiba says. That's more than 10% of the total, which means Tommy is basically paying a lot of campaign expenses out of his own pocket.

Tommy made quite the stir in April when he told a Jewish gathering in Washington, DC that he admired Judaism because the religion understood how to make money, and he was finally out in the private sector to get some.

But to so heavily-subsidize his - - what shall we call it - - Quixotic campaign?

He must not have been blowing smoke when he said he was finally making serious money if he's got 100k to dump into staff salaries and fuel for the campaign's RV - - but blowing it on a sure-to-fail run for the presidency suggests Tommy doesn't know how to invest it.

Daley, Other Key Mayors Protest Oil Company's Lake Michigan Pollution

Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley, Racine's Gary Becker and Toronto's David Miller signed a letter published in The Chicago Tribune slamming Indiana's approval for vastly permitted ammonia and sludge dumping by British Petroleum into Lake Michigan.

This blog posted information about the decision to expand the dumping here.

Lake Michigan doesn't benefit from a willful daily dose of three tons of these dangerous pollutants; these mayors, whose communities and many others that draw drinking water from the lake, have every right to be upset.

Furthermore, Indiana's decision to allow BP's refinery this contemptible action illustrates why Great Lakes states have the commonsense duty to monitor each other's usage of Great Lakes waters.

When abuses or poor management occur, joint attention and solutions are required.

Said the Mayors, in part:

"...it is not in anyone's interest to facilitate expansion at the expense of our region's greatest natural resource and economic engine -- the Great Lakes."

That concept is at the foundation of the pending Great Lakes Compact, an eight- state agreement, with two Canadian provinces in an advisory role, to supervise large withdrawals of water from what is the world's largest supply of fresh surface waters.

Some legislators and business leaders in Waukesha County miss this point entirely, opposing Wisconsin's approval of the Compact - - even though it will protect Wisconsin's fair access to Great Lakes water and allow Wisconsin also to monitor and approve new large uses in the other states, too.

Without a working Compact, communities from New York state to Minnesota could divert Great Lakes water without scientific and legal standards - - imagine a thousands straws pulling water from the Great Lakes, only those straws are intake pipes, moving hundreds of millions of gallons of water daily out of the lakes - - disregarding its reasonable use, or mandated return to preserve the levels of the source.

Wisconsin's public officials need to join Mayor Daley's effort to stop British Petroleum's outrageous plan to knowingly pollute Lake Michigan.

But that's only protecting the waters, as they are. It's important, but covers half the equation.

Wisconsin residents need to pressure legislators and editorial boards, urging our state to adopt a strong Great Lakes Compact that manages the waters usage.

That means a program for Wisconsin requiring conservation of all the waters in the Great Lakes ecosystem - - and requiring region-wide high standards for the waters' use, along with guarantees that as much diverted water is returned to its source.

That will protect and preserve the Great Lakes - - precisely the opposite of what BP will be allowed to do with its refinery's discharge into Lake Michigan in northern Indiana.

Mary Lazich Says Chinese Trade Surplus Rules Out Health Care Reform In Wisconsin

State Sen. Mary Lazich, (R-New Berlin), has published an op-ed in a Monroe, WI newspaper that takes opposition to a Wisconsin health insurance plan global.

Expanding the standard, anti-government GOP line against the "Healthy Wisconsin" plan adopted by the State Senate, Lazich says the booming Chinese economy means we can't afford health insurance in Wisconsin.

So...buying all those Made in China sweaters and electronic gadgets means Wisconsin kids can't have the same kind of great health insurance that is, say, available to state legislators?

And while you're grappling with the foreign trade/Wisconsin health care connection, diagram her concluding sentence:

"However, now is clearly not the time for the Senate Democrats' plan fraught with politics controlling health care, and Wisconsin current economic indicators ranking Wisconsin as one of the highest-taxed states, with the lowest income growth, and a forecast of less jobs and less income due to the largest housing slump in 16 years."

But the best part of her op-ed?

Lazich has attacked this blog - - The Political Environment - - for its criticism of her staunch opposition to Wisconsin's adopting the Great Lakes Compact - - a hypocritical and self-defeating stance because she also wants a water diversion from Lake Michigan to New Berlin approved before the Compact's diversion procedures are in place.

But I did enjoy the following phrase in her op-ed, because it tells me this blog is having a subliminal effect in her thinking:

"I noted that the Senate Democrats' [health insurance] plan would be administered." Lazich wrote, "in a political environment."

First Impressions On The Shakeup At The Wisconsin DNR

What are the implications of Gov. Jim Doyle replacing Scott Hassett as DNR Secretary with Corrections Secretary Matt Frank?

1. Frank is a smart guy, and a professional manager, but will have to hustle to get up to speed on large pending issues, including mercury emission controls and the Great Lakes Compact. Both are technical and political issues of the highest magnitude.

2. Frank's appointment further solidifies Doyle's control of the DNR, formerly an independent agency, but a political cabinet appointment thanks to former Gov. Tommy Thompson's aggressive politicization and control of state government.

In January, Doyle named another loyalist, Randy Romanski, as DNR executive secretary. Romanski has held several positions in the Doyle administration, including that of deputy chief of staff in the Governor's office.

Bottom line: Frank's appointment cements lines of communication, policy-making, and other connections between Doyle and the DNR, so when the DNR acts, it is absolutely clear that the position has been cleared, vetted, approved by the Governor and his staff for implementation.

Scientist Says Lead Poisoning, Crime Linked

It wasn't too long ago that the City of Milwaukee lost its lawsuit against lead paint manufacturers.

The scientific research referenced in this Washington Post story strongly correlating lead contamination to criminal behavior could have made a good exhibit for the city. Or in an appeal?

New Berlin Should Lead On Great Lakes Compact Approval

Now that the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has moved New Berlin's application for a Lake Michigan diversion to the discussion phase- - with final approval contingent on many factors that could take months or a year or more to iron out - - New Berlin should be taking the lead in the legislature and throughout Southeastern Wisconsin in advocacy for the Compact's adoption.

New Berlin's Mayor, Jack Chiovatero, seems to understand that, given his remarks to the business publication Daily Reporter.

With a Compact in place, New Berlin's application and further approvals from the DNR will have the Compact's legal and procedural rules governing Wisconsin's review of New Berlin's diversion request.

The other seven states in the Great Lakes region, then, are more likely to consider the DNR and New Berlin approach to a diversion as acceptable - - because the Compact provides a fair and consistent framework that all the Great Lakes states can follow.

Plus: a working Compact protects Wisconsin from water grabs by other states and communities faraway - - something that New Berlin's very own state senator, Mary Lazich, just can't seem to grasp.

She mistakes protections for a true, two-nation, eight-state regional resource - - and also one of the planet's most precious sources of fresh water - - as somehow bad for New Berlin and Waukesha County, though they are surely part of the Great Lakes region, and the planet, too.

Lazich is among those in the legislature slowing up Wisconsin's approval of the Compact, even though her city wants to be the first to receive diverted water since the Compact was approved by the eight Great Lakes governors in 2005 and moved to their legislatures for ratification and state-by-state implementation.

How odd and contradictory is that?

Chiovatero told the Shepherd-Express that Lazich's obstructionism was a problem for New Berlin.

Wrote the Milwaukee weekly paper's Dennis Shook, a long-time reporter in Waukesha County and an expert on politics there:

"Chiovatero, who has meetings this week with Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett to discuss water access details, said he sees Lazich as the major obstacle to solving the city's water woes.

"These are her people ... she lives here," Chiovatero said of Lazich, who could not be reached for comment.

"She has Lake Michigan water herself and she's enjoying it. So let everybody else [enjoy] it. This is just a political thing going on that has me upset," he said of her opposition to the compact."

Chiovatero seems also to understand that the sequence to win Great Lakes water for a Waukesha Count community should be: Compact first, then final diversion application review, and if everything is OK in those processes, then a negotiation and deal with a water seller and treatment system to handle the logistics and finances of both a water sale and a safe and feasible return flow.

That's what the Compact is all about - - on behalf of the entire Great Lakes ecosystem - - rules, standards, procedures, whether you're in New Berlin or New York.

On the other hand, if it looks like the DNR and Wisconsin are jumping the procedural gun on behalf of a Wisconsin community - - New Berlin or any other city - - another Great Lakes state could sue Wisconsin. Chiovatero gets that, too, and he, unlike Lazich, grasps that'd be a bad thing.

As the Daily Reporter said:

"Chiovatero is also pulling for the compact to be approved soon, as it is his belief that New Berlin would qualify for the diversion either way as a straddling community.

“I think the governor’s office feels for us,” Chiovatero said.

“They know we should get the water, but they don’t want to break the rules and upset other states, and I don’t want them to either. The last thing I want is to get approval and then have to fight lawsuits, because that will only delay us getting the water. The DNR is being sensitive to that.”

Conclusion: Give Chiovatero credit for clarity, and for supporting the Compact.

And let's see more leadership from the very part of the state that seems to want Lake Michigan water, but has done little to approve and implement the reasonable rules and standards that took negotiators five years to write in the proposed Compact.

State Rep. Cory Mason (D-Racine) On Great Lakes Fact-Finding Tour

Here's something revolutionary: A Wisconsin legislator touring the Great Lakes to learn more about the Great Lakes Compact and exchange information with counterparts.

Good for freshman legislative Rep. Cory Mason, (D-Racine). I can think of half a dozen Waukesha County legislators that could benefit from such an open-minded, refreshing approach to legislating.

He's even bringing along a video camera to produce a presentation for use on his return.

Xoff Speaks Truth To The Waukesha Freeman In Its Own Pages

Former Freeman editor Pete Kennedy played the fear card on the pages of The Freeman, and Bill Christofferson responded with an op-ed that put Kennedy in his place.

You can read Kennedy's screed, and another response to it, here.

Scott Walker's Administration Continues To Fail

Scott Walker's smoke-and-mirrors budgets that he creates and manages as Milwaukee County Executive have become an administrative joke in local government circles, but Thursday's news that the red ink is flowing early and deeply highlight again what a failed tenure he has had in office.

True enough that he inherited a mess from the disgraced and recalled F. Thomas Ament, but that was years ago, and Walker's inadequacies are his to own - - though note in his comments below, it's all someone or something else's fault.

Details below, from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newswatch blog:

"THURSDAY, July 19, 2007, 2:39 p.m.

By Steve Schultze

County agencies report potential deficits

More bad budget news for Milwaukee County was served up today, with more departments reporting potential year-end deficits.The bottom line, for now, is a year-end shortfall of $4.2 million, which County Executive Scott Walker wants to erase by another round of belt tightening.

"While I am very concerned about the mid-year projections, I am optimistic that by working together we can make corrections now... without jeopardizing essential county services," Walker wrote in a memo given to supervisors today.

The latest tally includes projected shortfalls of $3 million in the Behavioral Health Division, $950,000 for the Economic Development Division, $1.8 million for transit and $239,000 for the Department of Child Support Enforcement.

Walker said all county departments should immediately halt any non-essential spending, including travel and to hold off hiring whenever possible.

He also asked other elected officials to take action to save money.

He blamed the worsening budget picture on unexpected increases in juvenile corrections placements, needed hiring of additional staff at the county's mental health complex and a decline in revenue from real estate fees."

More Support For Milwaukee Rail, Criticism Of Scott Walker

The blogger Mobile's Take supplies more data about the benefits of rail than I have posted. Check it out.

Assembly Budget Cuts Key Public Land Program To 1990 Levels

The GOP-dominated State Assembly, showing its hostility to the common interest, adopted a 2007-'09 state budget proposal that rolls back a popular, bi-partisan land acquisition budget to 1990 levels, according to Gathering Waters, a Wisconsin conservation organization.

The Assembly budget would cut financing proposed by Gov. Jim Doyle for the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Fund by nearly 60%, vastly limiting acreage left undisturbed, or available statewide for hunting, fishing, and hiking, in the years to come, according to Gathering Waters.

Doyle's proposal was endorsed by the Democratically-controlled State Senate, so a conference committee will attempt to reach a compromise. Details about that process, and how to influence it, are at a Gathering Waters website.

Scott Walker Will Never Support City Rail: Move On Without Him

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editorial board lays the blame at the doorstep of County Executive Scott Walker for preventing downtown Milwaukee from getting a downtown rail system.

That is fair criticism: even flying Walker by private jet to see the transportation and investment benefits of rail systems elsewhere in the US has failed to move Walker into a partnership with Mayor Tom Barrett, leading Barrett to consider moving on rail without the county executive's participation.

The paper says that's a bad idea.

I disagree.

If Walker remains county exec, continuing efforts to persuade, cajole, or reason with him on this issue are a fruitless waste of time.

And the more time that elapses due to Walker's intransigence, the higher the price tag on the rail system that will eventually be built because fuel prices and a growing number of downtown residents will mandate it.

The politics surrounding the issue make clear that Walker can't and won't bend, as the paper hopes he will, to support city rail because:

A) Walker is a Republican and Barrett is a Democrat, and Walker will not do much to help the Democratic mayor of the largest city and the Democratic voter base in the state.

B) Walker owes much of his successful campaigns to AM talk radio, on which "light rail" is a cheap, easy and potent ratings ploy.

Any candidate or official for light rail is immediately attacked, demonized, pilloried by the talkers, who use light rail to stir up their suburban listeners fears of big government and urbanites' easier access to towns, villages and subdivisions.

C) For Walker, supporting a rail system would be defined as a fatal flip-flop, so surviving in office and perhaps running for a higher position, such as Cong. Jim Sensenbrenner's seat, means treating trolley cars as if they were toxic.

It's also worth noting that the politics of transportation in the Milwaukee area mirror the politics of water.

(The same people and interests that support easy access by Waukesha County suburbs to Milwaukee water also support freeway expansion over transit extensions. It's a generalization, but the underpining is the same: Resources are to be pulled out of the city for the benefit of growth in the suburbs, but the reverse is never the case.)

Walker is in such an irrational box on transit of his own making that it leaves him opposed to more modern connections to county-run facilities, such as the zoo, the airport, and the research park.

And also stunting economic development - - jobs, tax base, commerce, residents - - along rail corridors and at stations - - the very thing that governments and businesses interests agree is the life-blood of a growing community.

Walker's inconsistenciese and failures are the penalties paid by narrow-minded ideologues when their reflexive politics collide with commonsense, but that's Scott Walker, and he's standing as an obstacle blocking modern transportation and economic development in Milwaukee.

Update: Another blogger, Mobile's Take, offers good data on rail and development, here.

New Berlin Legislator's Opposition to Great Lakes Agreement Lands On Minnesota Blog

Great Lakes water expert Dave Dempsey discovers Wisconsin State Senator Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin), and says on his blog that her obstruction to a key element of the Great Lakes Compact could kill the whole agreement.

More good publicity for Wisconsin policy-making!

Lazich has been outspoken against the Compact, and was left off a Governor's new working group that is trying to resolve political differences between Compact supporters and detractors.

Belling's TV Departure Is No Big Loss

The disappearance of Mark Belling's Sunday Morning rightwing jabberfest is no big loss.

His numbers were small, the show was boringly formulaic, the lighting and the set were odd and tired, like much of the opinion aired there.

Belling's TV downfall began when the show moved to Channel 58 from 12, and some of his more entertaining panelists, like Todd Robert Murphy and Walter Farrell, had moved on.

And when Belling had to serve a suspension for using a slur to describe Mexican immigrant residents of Milwaukee, you knew his days were numbered.

He's still got his powerful drive-time afternoon radio program on WISN-AM 1130, and a weekly column in The Waukesha Freeman, but it's a sign that better days are ahead in our market when rightwing squawk TV loses appeal and commercial sustainability.

Bush To Veto Increase In Poor Children's Health Insurance; Proves Michael Moore Correct

Pres. Bush doesn't want too many more poor kids using a government-funded health care plan instead of private insurers, The Washington Post reports.

Is Michael Moore writing Bush administration strategy on health care, turning "Sicko" into Republican talking points?

In threatening to veto an already-compromised funding increase, Bush even has turned a deaf ear to key Republican Senators, including Utah's Orrin Hatch, who know that Bush's stubbornness on foreign and domestic agendas will lead the GOP to ruin in the '08 elections.

Rick Esenberg And Some Of His Readers Discuss Regional Segregation

Though I've been absent for the last few weeks, I try and spend Thursday afternoon's on Eric Von's "Backstory" media roundtable on WMCS-AM 1290 with other guests, including conservative blogger Rick Esenberg.

Rick's got a residue of some liberal tendencies (maybe he'd find "moderate" less of a slur), and is usually a thoughtful, lawyerly-logical guy, which is why I'm putting up this link to a discussion that began on my blog (here) about race in the Milwaukee region, and mutated to his blog.

Some of the comments, though long-winded, and worth reading, too.

Water Compact Critic Lazich Not Invited To Another Committee She Can Criticize

State Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin), has been blasting the Great Lakes Compact from her position on the state's legislative study committee that is trying to draft a Compact ratification bill.

The Compact would establish rules and standards governing diversions from the Great Lakes - - rules and standards that Lazich and her allies on the pro-development, laissez-faire Waukesha County Chamber of Commerce do not like.

Now she's blasting a new state task force designed to try and break that logjam at the legislative study committee. Her complaint: she wasn't invited to the task force meeting.

Why wasn't Lazich invited?

Probably because the task force's goal is to work through the impasse Lazich is partially responsible for creating.

Some of that history is here.

Barrett Should Leave Walker At The Curb

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett is exploring if the city, blocked from spending federal transit funds on a downtown streetcar system by noted rail phobic and naysayer Scott Walker - - a/k/a/ the Milwaukee County Executive - - can invest the funds in the system without Walker's approval.

It's a long-overdue move.

Walker has for years vetoed modernizing transit in the downtown, diminishing development in the city.

This is the same tactic used by former Waukesha County Executive Daniel Finley, whose anti-rail politics served as a model for Walker's.

Barrett is on the right track. Walker is off the track - - by choice - - and that's where he should left.

Ed Garvey Weighs In On Great Lakes Issues

Nice to see activists statewide - - in this case, Ed Garvey - - beginning to take note of efforts to move water out of Lake Michigan while important legislation to preserve and administer Great Lakes water remains blocked by Waukesha County business interests and legislators.

Wisconsin media have tended to define the Great Lakes Compact, and diversion applications from Lake Michigan, as southeastern Wisconsin issues only.

But the Great Lakes are central to the entire state's economy, and questions addressed by the compact, including bottled water export and conservation programs, are state and regional issues.

So thanks to Ed: more coverage is welcome.

Organizations Amplify Their Support For A Strong Great Lakes Compact

Nine Wisconsin environmental, health and conservation organizations said today that the Department of Natural Resources' encouragement to New Berlin to seek a sale of diverted Lake Michigan water from Milwaukee underscored the need for Wisconsin to adopt a strengthened Great Lakes Compact agreement.

The Compact, if ratified in similar versions by the eight Great Lakes states, would establish first-ever rules and standards governing diversions from the Great Lakes, guarantee conservation and establish other public policy goals.

Minnesota has adopted the Compact; New York is close, leaving six states, including Wisconsin, without ratification.

New Berlin applied for a diversion of Lake Michigan water last year and submitted a revised application earlier this year.

The DNR said last week that New Berlin's application was in order, and also was in the spirit of Compact, but the DNR is helping New Berlin jump the gun because the Compact has yet to be approved by the Wisconsin legislature.

And the DNR is also jamming the City of Milwaukee by pushing on to the city the political responsibility for transferring water to New Berlin, while also exaggerating the DNR's role in getting New Berlin and Milwaukee talking about someday agreeing on a water deal.

The nine statewide organizations are bringing some perspective to the table.

In their joint statement, the groups argue that a strong Compact is in the interest of New Berlin, the state and the region because it will help preserve a shared resource.

More than 40 million people utilize the Great Lakes for drinking water, and the Great Lakes anchor the economies of the eight states and two Canadian provinces.

Only 1% of the Great Lakes' volume is renewed by rain and snowfall every year; the Great Lakes make up 20% of the world's fresh surface waters.

Update: Gov. Doyle has convened a bi-partisan, public-private working group to help a deadlocked legislative council study committee draft a bill to approve and implement the Compact in Wisconsin.

The working group met Tuesday. State Sen. Mary Lazich, a persistent critic of the Compact, tells The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel she is mad that she was left off the working group.

Lazich has gone so far as to suggest there's merit in setting aside the five years of negotiations that led to the December, 2005 Compact proposal.

She also favors gutting the Compact of a key diversion approval procedure - - the unanimous vote of all eight Great Lakes governors if water is to be shipped to a community like the City of Waukesha that is completely outside the Great Lakes basin boundaries.

So leaving Lazich off the working group is hardly a surprise.

About Those New Berlin - - Milwaukee Water 'Negotiations'

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel applauds the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources grant of negotiation permission to New Berlin and Milwaukee over a possible water sale from Lake Michigan.

Actually, the DNR doesn't need to authorize these negotiations, or what they really are - - discussions - - because the cities are free to discuss this matter anytime they choose, and were exchanging information anyway.

New Berlin already knew that Milwaukee's Water Works pipes and pumps were insufficient to handle moving water across the subcontinental divide, so the DNR was doing a little theater - - pronouncing that something of substance was happening to begin to get water to New Berlin.

What the DNR really did with New Berlin's revised application was to say it met a DNR technical assessment.

If New Berlin and Milwaukee or another city were to reach an agreement to sell water, then the DNR will determine if the agreement, technically and legally, is in line with the revised application.

That could happen this year, or the next year - - and would move more quickly or rationally if Wisconsin legislatively approved and adopted the pending Great Lakes Compact.

This is something that Waukesha County business and legislative leaders have been obstructing.

So it's been a backwards process by the DNR - - approving New Berlin's application, even technically, prior to the Compact's adoption.

The City of Milwaukee's long-standing position was - - Compact approval first, then diversion application review under the terms of the Compact - - a process that would allow time to figure out who's going to pay for all the new water piping and pumping infrastructure, too.

Maybe if the state is fast-tracking New Berlin's application it should pay for the improvements.

All in all, not much of process by the DNR.

Not a great moment for Wisconsin.

Gretchen Schuldt Continues To Expose SEWRPC Spending

Transportation activist Gretchen Schuldt has the goods on SEWRPC, finding through Open Records requests that the regional planning agency has recently spent or agreed to pony up $130,000 on image-building, while failing to find the resources to update its 32-year-old regional housing plan.

The agency is going to need more than image burnishing if it wants to save its credibility, as supervisors in both Milwaukee and Waukesha Counties, complaining about separate issues, are saying publicly that SEWRPC is increasingly out-of-touch with the counties that supply most of SEWRPC's funding.

BP Allowed To Add More Pollution To Lake Michigan

The next time you see those ads for British Petroleum touting the company as "BP - - Beyond Petroleum," a phony rebranding of the oil giant as a green company, remember that BP has been awarded a new permit for its northern Indiana refinery to vastly increase daily dumping of ammonia and sludge into Lake Michigan.

Altogether, BP will be allowed to drop about 3 tons of these contaminants into Lake Michigan everyday, constituting an increase in pollution that is already tolerated.

A more complete story from The Chicago Tribune is here.

The permission for more willful contamination of Lake Michigan allowed by the State of Indiana is a telling example of the mounting stresses placed on the Great Lakes, including invasive fish species carried in by ocean-going freighters, and runoff from municipal, industrial, construction, highway and agricultural sources.

It is in this context that the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources' encouragement of a diversion of water from Lake Michigan to New Berlin should be considered.

Instead of focusing on protecting the Great Lakes, the DNR is adding additional pressure to an already-stressed ecosystem.

Grant permission to New Berlin for its diversion, and it will be harder to say "no" to Waukesha, or other communities sure to line up in Waukesha County, Northern Illinois, Ohio and in other Great Lakes states, too.

And the more that the DNR enables diverters, or politically off-loads the decision-making nitty-gritty to potential water-supplying communities, like the City of Milwaukee, the more regulatory and conservationist high-ground Wisconsin sacrifices.

It would be hard for Wisconsin to muster up much outrage about bad process and insensitivity elsewhere in the Great Lakes region on water issues, or to criticize Indiana about its retreat on water quality near the BP refinery, when Wisconsin has been working behind the scenes to speed up diversions from Lake Michigan for Wisconsin communities.

Wisconsin and the other Great Lakes states need a coordinated approach to managing and protecting Great Lakes water.

And that consistency begins with adopting the Great Lakes Compact, and its conservation standards and processes.

When Wisconsin Lead On The Environment, Eagles Were Saved

The Madison Capital Times has published a wonderful account of the grassroots and governmental teamwork that took place in the state to save the bald eagle.

That same energy sometimes flashes across the political landscape these days - - expanding the Stewardship Fund's purchase of open lands is one current example - - but more often than not, the false dichotomy of jobs vs. the environment is successfully argued by so-called development interests to the detriment of the public interest, and that diminishes the state's rivers, lakes, streams and farmlands.

A "Friends-of" Group Organizes To Protect Waukesha's Vernon Marsh

Developers and water suppliers continue to lick their chops over the beauty and resources of Waukesha County's signature Vernon Marsh, so Wednesday, July 18th's initial meeting of "Friends of The Vernon Marsh" is right on time.


Here are the details:

Please Join Us
Friends of the Vernon Marsh
An Organizational Meeting of a New Group

Wednesday, July 18 7 pm – 8 pm Waukesha Town Hall
W250 S3567 Center Road
Waukesha, Wisconsin

The Town Hall is on Center Rd. one-half mile north of Hwy 59.

The Vernon Marsh is a unique ecosystem, consisting of 4,596 acres of
marshland, flowages, river and lowland forest. It supports abundant
wildlife and is available for hiking, hunting, bird watching, canoeing,
and fishing.

The marsh's wildlife includes pheasants, waterfowl, fur-
bearers, deer, rabbits, woodcock, and sandhill cranes. The Fox River
runs through the marsh, making it an important connection between
the Fox, Mukwonago River, and Pebble Creek watersheds.

Contact Allen Stasiewski: 262-896-0070 astasiewsk@aol.com
or Laurie Longtine: 262-542-7929

Political Will, Costs Stymie Manageable Climate Change Problems

The Washington Post publishes a Sunday package of stories suggesting that there are available approaches to many climate change dilemmas - - but a lack of political will to confront the costs.

Like other big-picture, big-dollar fixes - - whether it's for Social Security, Medicare or other national issues facing the country today - - the decision-making and tab is being postponed for future generations to deal with.

The Road To Sprawlville

I might make The Road to Sprawlville a series. This would be Part I, from a recent Capital Times column.

New Berlin Water Diversion May Conflict With City Of Milwaukee Adopted Policies

Among the things that the City of Milwaukee will bring to the negotiating table if and when it meets with New Berlin officials over a possible diversion of Lake Michigan water is an existing city policy that says water sales to suburbs across the subcontinental divide must meet many criteria beyond a negotiated per-gallon water price.

When DNR-sponsored hearings took place in 2004 about diversion language to be included in the proposed Great Lakes Compact, a unanimous Common Council resolution #040646, signed by Mayor Tom Barrett, was presented by Council President Willie Hines and Ald. Michael Murphy, now chairman of the Council's powerful finance committee.

The resolution says that any suburb beyond the divide - - and this would cover the possible diversion to western New Berlin - - would be required to adopt plans that promote affordable housing, water conservation, sprawl limitations and other socio-economic goals.

The thinking behind the Council resolution was obvious: without such agreements in advance, Milwaukee would be promoting development far from its borders that would exacerbate the constellation of inequities that already have placed the land-locked City of Milwaukee at a disadvantage in comparison with more exclusionary, but faster-growing suburbs.

The Council could rescind its policy, but that is unlikely, especially since the state has essentially off-loaded the political problems associated with a diversion to Milwaukee and told it to go solve these problems with New Berlin.

The same dynamic is at work with regard to the return of diverted water for treatment by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District: the state is creating a financial and policy problem for another unit of government while saying, 'you all get together and hammer this out.'

And New Berlin has added to these tensions by saying that it would only pay an unstated portion of the cost of upgrading Milwaukee's water works' pipes and pumps to get the water that New Berlin wants.

Selling Milwaukee water to New Berlin is not a done deal because it is an uphill struggle, and it's not just because the water has to get up and over Sunny Slope Rd. for delivery and return.

It's because the state has basically assigned the problem-solving to Milwaukee, New Berlin and the MMSD without much, if any, prior consultation.

I posted the DNR's decisions about the potential diversion on this blog yesterday, the first airing of the documents.

The DNR also demonstrated a lack of awareness of, or indifference to, the millions in infrastructure improvements that are needed, along with the existence of the city policy statement about criteria that have to be before the city would agree to the water sale.

What the DNR and the state have done is set a process in motion with disorganization and prematurity.

However...however...the fact that water cannot flow promptly, for a host of legal, physical, fiscal, political and other reasons means one good thing: that attention now can be focused on getting a strong Great Lakes Compact adopted so Wisconsin has a coherent process that will make the entire New Berlin experience, regardless of its outcome, a one-time event.

All in all, not a great process, and one that is bound to spin-off more problems, and one that is sure to aggravate those who think that now it's simply a matter of turning a few valves so the water can flow.

Scott Walker Cluelessness Reaches Embarrassing New Height

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that Scott Walker returned from a tour of cities with urban rail systems still opposed to a system for Milwaukee because the other cities have traffic congestion that is mitigated by the rail option.

Oh: so we don't have bad traffic congestion? So why was Walker such a big backer of spending $6.5 billion to upgrade and widen the region's freeways, including pushing new lanes through Milwaukee?

Wasn't the expansion to deal with our oh-so-horrendous traffic congestion?

DNR Urges Progress on Great Lakes Compact, Discussions About New Berlin's Great Lakes Water Plan

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has completed its review of an application by New Berlin for diverted Lake Michigan water, and has sent letters to New Berlin officials making several points about New Berlin and the bigger picture - - adoption of the pending Great Lakes Compact.

The letters, reproduced below as text, highlight that:

a) The New Berlin application is acceptable, but more DNR and other approvals are still required.

b) The Great Lakes compact needs adoption by Wisconsin to rationalize future application procedures;

c) Discussions should begin with entities that may ultimately supply New Berlin with Lake Michigan water and treat the returned wastewater.

The Compact would establish first-time rules, procedures, conservation expectations and other standards for eight Great Lakes states as applicants in their boundaries seek diversions of water from the Great Lakes.

Here are the texts of the DNR letters, with the bigger picture letter first:

101 S. Webster St. Box 7921 Madison, Wisconsin

53707-7921 Telephone 608-266-2621 FAX 608-267-3579 TTY Access via relay - 711

Jim Doyle, Governor Scott Hassett, Secretary
July 13, 2007

Mayor Jack Chiovatero
City of New Berlin
3805 S Casper Drive
New Berlin WI 53151

Dear Mayor Chiovatero:

The Department of Natural Resources, on behalf of Governor Jim Doyle, is authorizing the City of New Berlin to immediately begin discussions with potential water suppliers to determine the feasibility of securing Lake Michigan water for use by those residents of New Berlin in the west side of the city who are currently served by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewer District (MMSD).

The Department is also instructing New Berlin to bring any agreement reached with a jurisdiction to provide water to New Berlin back to the Wisconsin DNR so that we can ensure that any such agreement complies with all aspects of New Berlin’s application for Great Lakes water.

The review step will be required before any water could flow from Lake Michigan to the west side of New Berlin. We have also informed other jurisdictions in the Great Lakes Basin that we will be happy to share that water provider agreement with them at that time prior to completing our review.

This authorization enables your community to move forward with technical discussions to determine if a Lake Michigan water source can be secured to address radium contamination, as you know, a serious public health concern with your water supply.

This authorization is limited to the service area within the City of New Berlin.

We strongly believe that these discussions must move forward now. If a Lake Michigan source can be secured your application clearly demonstrates that there will be NO adverse impact whatsoever on the water quantity in Lake Michigan and the water quality of Lake Michigan water will be improved.

We also firmly believe that this application meets the standards of the Great Lakes Compact – even though those standards are not yet law. In fact, the application and process went well beyond what is envisioned for communities like New Berlin under the Compact. You are to be commended for your excellent effort.

Again, we wish to stress that a final decision can only be made once we are satisfied that any water supply agreement that you negotiate clearly complies with all aspects of New Berlin’s application.

The final review and how it will be conducted will be heavily influenced by the status of the state legislation here in Wisconsin to ratify the Great Lakes Compact.

In short, we need to pass the Compact in Wisconsin.

If the Compact is law in Wisconsin by the time New Berlin reaches an agreement with a water provider, the path to the completion of the final review will be much easier to walk.

Thank you for your cooperation in this matter.

Sincerely,

Scott Hassett, Secretary

cc: Steven Schultz – Ruekert Mielke
Rick Johnson – New Berlin
Jill Jonas – DG/2
Todd Ambs – AD/5
Chuck Ledin
Rhonda Volz – SER

Second letter:

101 S. Webster St. Box 7921 Madison, Wisconsin 53707-7921 Telephone 608-266-2621 FAX 608-267-3579 TTY Access via relay - 711

Jim Doyle, Governor Scott Hassett, Secretary

July 13, 2007

Mayor Jack Chiovatero
City of New Berlin
3805 S Casper Drive
New Berlin WI 53151

Dear Mayor Chiovatero:

The Department of Natural Resources Division of Water has completed its review of the Amended Sample Application For Straddling Community Water Diversion for the City of New Berlin, Wisconsin, submitted by Steven H. Schultz, P.E., Ruekert Mielke, and received on March 9, 2007.

As part of the review the proposal was evaluated in comparison to the basic principles of the Great Lakes Compact and current State Administrative Rules.

Based on this evaluation the proposal does not require a water loss approval under ch. NR 142 Wis. Adm. Code. Approvals are required from the Department for the construction of any new water supply facilities under chs. NR 108 and NR 811 Wis. Adm. Codes.

At this time no other additional information is necessary for evaluation in comparison to the Compact.

Thank you for your cooperation and assistance in the Department’s evaluation and information efforts related to the Great Lakes Compact.

Sincerely,

Todd Ambs, Administrator
Division of Water

cc: Steven Schultz – Ruekert Mielke
Rick Johnson – New Berlin
Jill Jonas – DG/2
Todd Ambs – AD/5
Chuck Ledin
Rhonda Volz – SER

Government's Top Doctor Told To Ignore Science

The New York Times reveals the reported muzzling of former US Surgeon General Richard Carmona, who explains how the Bush administration repeatedly made him put politics above science.

It's a little like finding out that White House operatives made NASA deny astronomy, or told the CIA to shelve electronic espionage in favor of Tarot cards.

There is a clear Wisconsin connection to this story, and to presidential campaigning, because Carmona worked under then-Health and Human Services secretary Tommy Thompson.

As Bill Christofferson asks in the comment section below - - did Tommy play a role in censoring and stifling the nation's top doctor?

Carmona served as Surgeon General from 2002-2006, and told congressional investigators in sworn testimony that the White House removed science from policy-making and speeches on issues ranging from stem cells to global warming to disease transmission.

For those who assume Dr. Carmona was some sort of renegade, tree-hugging healthinista, here's how the Times described his background:

"Before becoming surgeon general, he was in the Army Special Forces, earned two purple hearts in the Vietnam War, was a trauma surgeon and a leader of the Pima County, Ariz., SWAT team."

New World Map May Show Sun Revolving Around Waukesha County

Still fuming over some transit funding shifted by the often pro-suburban regional planning commission to Milwaukee - - which runs the largest bus system in the state - - a few Waukesha County supervisors think the commission misrepresents Waukesha.

Mind you - - this is the same regional planning commission that has recommended tearing out scores of homes and businesses, and millions in tax base, from Milwaukee for the commuting convenience of Waukesha County residents.

And that grabbed $260,000 in Milwaukee County property transfer fees to fund the water supply study that Waukesha County asked the commission to conduct, and that is busy studying all sorts of regional water supply schemes to get Milwaukee water from New Berlin to Western Waukesha County, where groundwater has been depleted by chaotic annexations and other sprawl development.

There is a pervasive sense of entitlement to regional and Milwaukee land, water and dollars on the part of some Waukesha County leaders.

In land-locked Milwaukee, this perverse, anti-regionalism exceptionalism, where regional cooperation usually means "Waukesha-Should-Always-Get-What-It-Wants" is nothing short of comedic.

So let's be honest:

Despite the bluster, Waukesha County isn't pulling out of the regional planning commission.

The county gets far more than a dollar in value and outcome for every dollar it sends the commission's way.

And Milwaukee County still is the commission's largest annual funder, not Waukesha County.

And let's continue to be honest: the commission is deeply connected to Waukesha County for a divorce to take place.

Remember that the commission a few years ago bought its current, $4 million headquarters on a no-bid basis from Ruekert & Mielke, one of its favored consulting contractors, so the commission could move from downtown Waukesha to more suburban Pewaukee.

And the commission had all seven county partners, with Milwaukee again bearing the largest share, pick up the remaining costs on the commission's lease with the downtown Waukesha building that became the Les Paul museum.

In a sense, regional expenditures helped Waukesha get a museum.

And Pewaukee got the commission's jobs and the prestige of housing the regional effort - - far from more urban Milwaukee, Racine and Kenosha, where the commission apparently feels comfortable.

The Pewaukee offices are so far from Milwaukee that it isn't even connected to the bus system that Waukesha County is now complaining about because the Milwaukee bus system is finally getting its fair-and-rational transit aid.

Maybe they should take another gob of Waukesha transit subsidy and use it to run an express line from Milwaukee to Pewaukee so the public can get a better look at the commission's offices and its many committee meetings?

Nardelli Appointment a Step Backward

Naming former city alderman Tom Nardelli his chief of staff was a step backward for county exec Scott Walker and the region, too.

Already cut off from many supervisors, it's hard to see how the sharp-tounged and elbowed Nardelli can win Walker more support on the board, and in county departments already feeling besieged by budget cuts and soaring service demands.

The Road To Sprawlville, Chapter II

In another in the continuing series "The Road To Sprawville," a huge housing project in the rural Waukesha County community of Dousman continues to generate controversy over land and water resources.

Information is provided not by an environmental organization, but by a local Waukesha County newspaper, the Kettle Moraine Index, which has the story.

New Environmental Blog a Welcome Addition

Longtime activist Rosemary Wehnes begins blogging. Welcome!

Some Media Damage Perception of Milwaukee

Milwaukee Police Chief Nan Hegerty is correct when she says that media does exaggerate crime in Milwaukee, creating an unrealistic perception of public safety in the city.

She made the remark in the context of a decrease in violent crime in Milwaukee during a summer anti-crime initiative, noting that Boston has crime statistics similar to Milwaukee's, but Boston isn't seen as unsafe.

This is not to minimize Milwaukee crime, but you only need to look at The Waukesha Freeman's alarmist and demagogic editorial copy to understand what Hegerty is referencing.

Exhibit A: former Freeman editor Pete Kennedy's "Milwaukee sucks" screed.

Hear a Simple Four Minutes of Radio To Understand The Great Lakes Compact

The Great Lakes Radio Consortium has produced a short audio explanation of the Great Lakes Compact that hits all the relevant historical, geographical, regional and political issues in just four minutes, ten seconds, here.

Another Scientific Conclusion Sure To Be Dismissed By The Right's Flat-Earthers

Another day, another peer-reviewed scientific study warning against "business-as-usual" in the climate change debate.

Look to political and talk-radio science-deniers on the Right to dismiss the findings.

Race and Regionalism, Inertia and Opportunity

Again, southeastern Wisconsin is roiled by race.

While riveted by individual events, let's not lose sight of the bigger picture.

First, some of the events:

The beating of Frank Jude Jr., a bi-racial man, by current and former white Milwaukee cops, has moved to trial in Federal court.

Separately, Ald. Michael McGee, an African-American, has been charged with state and federal offenses, and sits jailed since Memorial Day with bail restrictions his supporters say are racist.

(Looked at objectively, if that is possible given the way race distorts so many things, the no-bail restrictions seem prudent, given the allegations against McGee of violent plotting and intimidation that extend beyond bad-enough financial extortion.

On the other hand, the people who are charged with the actual beating of Frank Jude Jr. were allowed bail.)

Nonetheless, juries will determine if McGee, and those charged with beating Jude and violating his civil rights, and those of a second victim, are innocent or guilty.

McGee led protests against the officers who evaded convictions on earlier state charges, in part through now-admitted perjured testimony.

Though the trials of McGee and the cops are unfolding in different courtrooms, the connections between them - - he led street protests in favor of justice for Jude - - are, if nothing else, deeply ironic.

Then there is the recent Supreme Court case restricting the use of race as a factor in school assignments, jeopardizing the Milwaukee school desegregation program, known as Chapter 220.

Assembly Republicans, eager to stir the racial pot to appease the base in heavily-white and segregated suburbs (more about that in a minute), immediately proposed a budget cutting Chapter 220 funding, confusing governing with pandering.

Some leadership.

And there was the revelation through Open Records by transportation activist Gretchen Schuldt that, when faced with criticism of its minority hiring record, the regional planning commission created a $50,000, no-bid planning contract for a Milwaukee central city neighborhood - - in part to appease some of its minority critics.

More pandering; less leadership.

And the bigger picture?

Race is a stultifying blockade to economic progress for the region - - a fact emphasized by the Brookings Institution, a prestigious Washington, DC think tank.

The institution is trying to focus attention on the opportunities awaiting a more vibrant - - and equitable - - Great Lakes region, and has released The Vital Center, a blockbuster report on the issue.

The Vital Center argues that with a new attitude, and innovative solutions, the Great Lakes region, including Wisconsin, is poised to prosper, and to lead on a global scale.

But one of several things holding back the region, say the report's authors, is racial segregation.

The Great Lakes city-suburbs' residential segregation ranking follows.

1
Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI
2
Detroit, MI
3
Cleveland-Lorain-Elyria, OH
4
St. Louis, MO-IL
5
Cincinnati, OH-KY-IN
6
Buffalo-Niagara Falls, NY
7
Chicago, IL
8
Indianapolis, IN
9
Rochester, NY
10
Pittsburgh, PA
11
Columbus, OH
12
Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN-WI

(Note: The report says that residential segregation is measured across five dimensions: evenness, exposure, concentration, centralization, and clustering. The Census Bureau uses non-Hispanic whites as the reference group, and metropolitan areas as reasonable approximations of housing markets. There are 43 large metropolitan areas.

Source: John Iceland, Daniel H. Weinberg, and Erika Steinmetz, U.S. Census Bureau, Series CENSR-3, Racial and Ethnic Residential Segregation in the United States: 1980-2000, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2002.)

And though this is merely the latest in a string of analyses that reached similar conclusions - - including some earlier Brookings date I included in a Journal Sentinel op-ed about Milwaukee's suburban segregation - - let's end with two questions:

Wouldn't you think that our regional planning commission, even if it is ensconced in Pewaukee, deep in the heart of virtually all-white Western Waukesha County, could address the racial realities of our surroundings with more intention than a $50,000 palliative (which, by the way, was awarded ultimately to two white consultants)?

And more to the point: shouldn't the planning commission have long ago faced the segregation issue head-on, fearlessly, by issuing a recommended housing plan for the region - - a plan it has not updated since 1975?

The commission says it doesn't have the money for such a study, but given its many subsequent studies on a variety of basic issues, that excuse is just that: an excuse, and given the findings of Brookings and other authorities, an embarrassment.

Doyle's Global Warming Task Force Hears Expert

Building codes, hybrid vehicles, ethanol from sources other than corn - - these good, but pretty conventional ideas, were brought before the Governor's Global Warming Task Force.

New Jersey and California are the national leaders, to date.

Wisconsin needs to step it up; some effects of a warming planet are already being felt here, as a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel report recently summarized.

Discussions I had this past weekend with people living north of Tomahawk were filled with their anecdotes of shorter, warmer winters that have led to leaner income from traditional winter tourist activities.

Anecdotal information, to be sure, but anecdotes that back up broader, scientific findings.

Minnesota, Great Lakes Investigative Blog Noted

Check out Sky Blue Waters, an interesting blog from Minnesota, also heavily about Lake Superior and Great Lakes water issues.

Major Chicago Water Conservation Plan Would End Its Diversion

At least some in Chicago - - details and Power Point of the 'Growing Water' project here - - are thinking about how to end its huge daily diversion of Lake Michigan water through revolutionary storm and wastewater treatment.

Iraq, Afghan Wars Now Cost $400 Million Daily

New figures from non-partisan Congressional staffers put the daily cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at $12 billion a month, or $400 million a day.

Imagine what just a few weeks of that spending could do if applied to Great Lakes cleanup, better schools, comprehensive medical insurance, transportation upgrades and a host of domestic programs.

Sierra Club, Film Producer, Coordinate National Expose of Fox News

Fox News repeatedly distorts news about global warming, according to a coalition of organizations led by the Sierra Club and Brave New Films.

"Fox consistently spreads misinformation about global warming and denies the problem exists," said Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope, in a July 10 news release.

"We have a very real, urgent problem that scientists tell us we need to respond to immediately. The fact that Fox is ignoring widely accepted science on global warming is irresponsible and dangerous.

"Fox is effectively accelerating global warming by delaying efforts to solve the problem."

The anti-Fox coalition, including environmental, religious and activist organizations, is calling on advertisers, such as Home Depot, to back up corporate environmental claims by pulling their Fox advertising.

Details are here from the Sierra Club, and additional information and a video produced by Brave New Films here.

Mercury Levels Rising In Southern Wisconsin Walleye

Walleye in southern Wisconsin are carrying more toxic mercury these days, the DNR says.

So the agency has issued advisories about walleye and other contaminated fish, and urge limits and even total advoidance of their ingestion in some cases.

Coal-fired power plants are a suspected source of airborne mercury that lands in waterways and is absorbed by fish.

Toxic Warning Labels On Everyday Products

I must be the last person to have seen these, because the Internet is filled with discussions about them, but the following warning label on a metal vegetable garden sprinkler at a True Value Hardware store in Milwaukee caught my eye:

THIS PRODUCT MAY CONTAIN CHEMICALS KNOWN TO THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA TO CAUSE CANCER, BIRTH DEFECTS OR OTHER REPRODUCTIVE HARM. WASH HANDS AFTER USE.

OK. I can read. It says "may."

It also says "chemicals known."

California has more stringent environmental regulations than does other states, but why would Wisconsinites want to even risk putting known dangerous chemicals on their hands, or the yards on which their kids and pets play, or spray them on their vegetables?

Documents Suggest Political, PR Goals In No-Bid SEWRPC Study

Documents unearthed by transportation critic Gretchen Schuldt - - details here - - reveal the political and public relations goals contained in a no-bid contract awarded by the regional planning commission (SEWRPC).

The documents shed light on SEWRPC's inner workings, as the contract was awarded by SEWRPC staffers without competitive bidding and was not approved by the full SEWRPC body - - a publicly-funded, seven-county organization - - or any of its committees.

The contract was proposed to SEWRPC by Mueller Communications, Inc., a Milwaukee public relations firm, according to documents obtained by Schuldt through an Open Records request to SEWRPC.

Documents describing the proposed study suggest a "minority-led" effort in the 30th St. Industrial Corridor, an economically-depressed Milwaukee central city neighborhood, but the eventual study contract was awarded to two white contractors, the documents show.

Mueller Communications Inc. proposed the study, the documents show, in part to win support for SEWRPC from minority members of the Milwaukee County Board who had criticized SEWRPC's minority hiring.

Schuldt is co-chair of Citizens Allied for Sane Highways (CASH).

CASH is a coalition of organizations opposed to a plan created by SEWRPC to rebuild and widen $6.5 billion worth of regional freeway lanes, many of which will take land and housing in Milwaukee County neighborhoods along interstate highway corridors.

New Jersey Takes The Lead On Controlling Dangerous Emissions

First, it was Michigan taking the lead on Great Lakes protections.

Now New Jersey vaults ahead of the other states, even California, to act against greenhouse gas emissions in the wake of the Bush administration's failure to act.

On these issues, Wisconsin has some laudable, but more modest goals and initiatives.

The linked story explains the difference between the California approach, and New Jersey's:

Imagine the reaction from the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce if our state was willing to take bold steps like these:

"California, the world's eighth largest economy, recently enacted a tough greenhouse gas law. Like New Jersey's, it also mandates an emissions cut by 2020.

"But its long term goal of cutting emissions 80 percent by 2050 is a target, not a hard mandate.

Environmentalists said the New Jersey law is tougher than California's because its 2050 target is enforceable."

More Florida Water Woes, More Lessons For The Great Lakes

This blog has noted the devastating drought in once-water rich Florida, a situation made worse by decades of over-building, water waste and overall poor management of water and land resources.

Another update on this woeful situation is here.

Florida's troubles should be a red flag to planners and others in Wisconsin and across the Great Lakes region.

The eight Great Lakes states are studying proposed amendments to the Great Lakes Compact, a water management agreement, that place conservation and careful planning as the highest priorities when it comes to withdrawing water from the Great Lakes.

Legislators need to be prompted to pass a strong state bill to implement the Compact for Wisconsin - - and they should do so with Florida in mind as the consequence of being passive, even careless, when dealing with water resources that are mistakenly believed to be infinite.

Easy Way To Get A Letter To The Editor Distributed About "Healthy Wisconsin"

This is a good time to take a few minutes to write a letter to the editor in support of the State Senate's adoption of the "Healthy Wisconsin" health insurance and financing plan.

Click on this link and help spread the word. (The site can direct you to a legislator's address, too).

Having working for several elected officials, I can say absolutely that letters to the editor are read, distributed, and either cheered or worried about because every letter easily represents the unspoken opinion of many other voters.

Personalized letters to officials have the same impact, too; if half-a-dozen land on an elected's desk, and they are clearly not form letters, the results can be dramatic.

Beyond The Rhetoric, Some "Healthy Wisconsin" Dollars And Common Sense

If you can get past the WMC's chaff thrown into the health care debate, "Healthy Wisconsin" - - the first comprehensive health care financing reform plan to get even a partial, preliminary hearing by Wisconsin officials - - looks pretty good compared to the chaos we have now.

The Shepherd's Dennis Shook, professional reporter, does an excellent job looking at data and interviewing real people.

New Berlin Water Bandwagon Rolls Along

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel calls for the Wisconsin DNR to approve New Berlin's application for Great Lakes water.

It would have been nice if the paper at least acknowledged that the Wisconsin Attorney General said in December that such an approval was not solely within the DNR's power - - that the Great Lakes Compact and a federal statute required all eight Great Lakes states' Governors to approve any such diversion.

The editorial also says the City of Milwaukee and the State of Michigan were the objectors.

Again, that's just part of the story.

Also raising objections were the state of Illinois, and, in an advisory capacity, the Canadian province of Ontario, plus a long list of environmental and conservation organizations that raised significant questions of New Berlin and the DNR about the application's adequacy, accuracy, and completeness.

The State of New York's criticisms were brutal: I summarized them this way in a Capital Times column last year, quoting from the New York document provided through Open Records from the DNR:

"New York officials said the application was without key studies, complete data, adequate water supply descriptions, enough system and geological maps and "descriptions of the situation and feasible options."

"New York," I wrote, "opined that there was "no evidence that the applicant is aware of or familiar with the full range of applicable state and national regulations, laws, agreements or treaties," and cited other deficiencies or possible inaccuracies.

"Additionally, New York observed that "the statement of no cumulative impacts is unsupported by any data in the document and does not address potential cumulative impacts to Lake Michigan water levels, shoreline, other users, water-dependent natural resources, etc.'"

Pretty tough stuff for a document the DNR labeled at the time complete and comprehensive.

Have those objections been met in the revised application?

Is this how a state, our state, should act as a member of an eight-state Compact - - disregarding its basic rules and past practices - - when management of the Great Lakes is at issue?

The solution?

The DNR should, at a minimum, hold a hearing on the revised application, and release summaries of the other states and provinces reviews.

And the DNR should not move the application to the other states a) before it has met the letter of the Attorney General opinion, and b) before the City of Milwaukee finds out just how much money it might have to pay to supply New Berlin with more water - - if the application is OK-ed by the other jurisdictions bordering the Great Lakes.

You are either in a Compact, or you are not, and the state should not off-load the monetary consequences on a city like Milwaukee, which is not an applicant for water and should not be forced to be an unwilling seller.

Would New Berlin willingly supply a resource to Milwaukee if the cost were between $4-8 million to handle the transfer, and if Milwaukee said it would pay an unspecified portion of the cost?

(June 10, 2007 UPDATE: Milwaukee says it cannot provide water to New Berlin, should the application be approved, until 2008, city officials say.)

And here's the kicker to the DNR's lack of process in this entire episode:

Under the Open Records statute, I asked the DNR for copies of the other states and provinces' reviews of the revised application, so I could see if the others were satisfied that their concerns about the original application had been addressed.

This was my request, on June 28th:

"Can you kindly provide copies of any reviews, critiques or additional responses to New Berlin's revised application for Lake Michigan water for its out-of-basin territory from the other Great Lakes states and Canadian provinces?"

The DNR said this time everything was handled by phone, so there were no records.

Negating the Open Records statute and discussion of public policy is not the Wisconsin way.

For the record, here are the email responses from the three DNR officials to whom I sent my request for records about the revised New Berlin application - - Todd Ambs, Lee Boushon and Bruce Baker.

Their responses are listed in reverse chronological order, beginning with Ambs, the Water Division chief:

"Subject:
RE: Records request
Date:Thu, 28 Jun 2007 11:13:36 -0500
From:"Ambs, Todd L - DNR" Todd.Ambs@Wisconsin.gov

To:"Boushon, Lee H - DNR" , "Baker, Bruce J - DNR" br

Jim:

Here is a copy of the only written comments [My note added: the comments were in a letter from environmental groups] that we have received to date on the revised application.

Todd

Todd L. Ambs Administrator Water Division Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources."

"From: Boushon, Lee H - DNR Sent: Thursday, June 28, 2007 10:57 AM To: Baker, Bruce J - DNR; 'James Rowen'; Ambs, Todd L - DNRSubject: RE: Records request

I have not received any correspondence on the revised application.

Lee."

"From: Baker, Bruce J - DNR Sent: Thursday, June 28, 2007 10:38 AMTo: James Rowen; Ambs, Todd L - DNR; Boushon, Lee H - DNRSubject: RE: Records request

Communications with outside parties have been by phone only. Lee please provide a copy of any correspondence we have received commenting on the revised application."

Tommy Thompson Woos Junk Food Voters In Iowa

Aw, Tommy: You're lettin' us down!

He's apparently eatin' his way through Iowa.

What happened to Mr. Nutrition, the former Secretary of Health and Human Services, the guy praised by Time magazine for gettin' America on a good diet?

Coal Operators, Cattle Ranchers Gut New Federal Wetlands Rules

So the US Supreme Court told the administration to start protecting wetlands.

Lobbyists told the administration to figure out a way to skirt the Court's ruling, parsing and refining language and opening more wetlands to commercial usage.

The New York Times has the story.

Surprised?

This is the administration where anything and everything can and will be privatized, with industry insiders calling the shots.

The Road To Sprawlville

Some musings about sprawl on the backroad to Fort Atkinson in my monthly op-ed piece in the Capital Times.

Hurricane Season Looms: Bush Administration Delays Forecasting Spending

The Bush administration can spend a billion dollars every four days in Iraq, but has delayed replacing an aging weather forecasting satellite that helps get people out of the way of approaching hurricanes.

Could there be any better example of the twisted priorities that govern the people who govern the public?

Have our leaders such short memories that they don't remember Katrina?

Greening Summerfest Long Overdue; Greater Lakeshore Access Still Needed

Whitney Gould at The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel finds the new leadership at Summerfest more than open to greening up the festival's dreadful, over-paved grounds.

That's good news. With the new Lakeshore State Park, the Calatrava museum addition and Pier Wisconsin all gracefully honoring Lake Michigan, Summerfest's carnival tackiness is like a broken tooth in need of porcelain cap.

Gould points out that Summerfest has made improvements, so her timely column is a helpful nudge in the right direction.

Now if the lakefront pedestrian walk were truly open where Summerfest shuts it off in violation of the Public Trust Doctrine - - something Summerfest does in violation of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 and Wisconsin Constitution of 1848 - - then the public, anglers and the growing number of downtown residents could have seamless access to Lake Michigan year-round.

Summerfest needs to go "green" with a better physical plan, and a more open and welcoming spirit that its lakefront neighbors saw as a requirement, not an option

Assembly GOP To Shovel State Money To The Road-Builders

GOP assembly members, many of whom never met a budget-busting new highway plan they didn't love, are expected today to put something like $160 million in new funding into their version of the 2007-'09 state budget for highway spending.

They'll do it by backing vehicle registration fees - - now there's a tax/fee/revenue enhancer that a good Republican can get behind! - - and tranferring millions in funding for education and other programs that Gov. Doyle has sustained with money once ticketed for the state's bloated highway budget.

Millions, billions for new roads (the unfunded portion of the southeastern Wiconsin freeway system expansion is in the billions), but K-12 and universities, ah, who needs 'em when there is concrete to pour?

And the Assembly GOP'ers will also kill Doyle's effort to tax oil industry profits for a reasonable contribution to Wisconsin's highway spending, forcing transfers of funding away from non-highway purposes to highway purposes.

It's a misprioritized loop, concocted by some loopy legislators who are driving in circles.

If the Assembly GOP gets its way, the state budget will be a special-interest document to serve the oil companies and road-builders.

In turn, Big Oil and the concrete-heads will reward their legislative patrons at election time, rest assured.

Suburban Race-Baiting Overlooks Out-Of-Towner Law Breaking On The Lakefront

Interesting that arrests of people living outside Milwaukee County make up the majority of recent arrestees at Summerfest, and I've seen this ratio earlier, too.

Attention Mark Belling and Pete Kennedy - - both Waukesha Freeman columnists who have gratuitously bashed Milwaukee lately while playing the race/fear card:

How do the numbers in this short story below from The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel fit into your demagogic templates?

"THURSDAY, July 5, 2007, 11:21 a.m.
By Diana Sroka
48 arrested Wednesday at Summerfest

"The Milwaukee Police Department reported today that 48 people were arrested Wednesday at Summerfest.

Of the 53 charges filed, 29 were for underage drinking, 10 were for drug possession, seven were for disorderly conduct and three for resisting an officer.

"Two people were arrested for outstanding warrants and 30 [note: more than 60%, addition mine] of the people arrested were not Milwaukee County residents."

Paris Hilton-Style Media Undercuts John Edwards

You'd think the media descent that began with the OJ Simpson slow-speed chase and scraped bottom with the Paris Hilton 'coverage' would not infect really important stories, like, oh, presidential campaigning.

Nope: John Edwards' haircuts and hairstylist lands in The Washington Post, then, of course, to the internet and cable TV, closing the OJ/Paris loop.

Big disappointment

Madison, Dane County Follow Wise Transit Path, As I Suggested

OK, it's not the most important part of the story, which is that the City of Madison and Dane County are finally on the same track, so to speak, when it comes to rail transit planning.

That's a great development for the Dane County region, and statewide, too, as planners in railophobic areas like Milwaukee County could learn a thing or two about inter-governmental cooperation and transit opportunities from Madison and Dane County.

But this two-track path was suggested two months as the right approach, in a column I wrote for the Capital Times.

Rest easy, taxpayers: I am not submitting a bill to the city and county for my services. But if the system gets up and running in the next few years, please invite me to the opening.

Saving SEWRPC

Can this marriage be saved - - the one that brought seven counties into a regional planning body, despite obvious incompatibilities?

First Milwaukee County supervisors began taking a look at withdrawing from SEWRPC - - the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission - - given the agency's routine preference for most things suburban.

Then some officials in Waukesha County thought they should pull out of SEWRPC, too, objecting to the agency's redistribution of state transit money to counties that actually have bus systems - - meaning Milwaukee County gained funding.

Could it be that Milwaukee and Waukesha were finally getting on the same page, cooperating, against SEWRPC!

Would the enemy of one's enemy become one's friend, so to speak?

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel thinks all this talk about getting out of SEWRPC is a bad thing, and whereas it's unlikely that Waukesha County would do something so rash over the loss of a fiscal pittance, it's interesting that SEWRPC's profile is rising, as is counties' displeasure with the way the agency is managed.

Marketing Hybrids: Toyota Gets It, GM Didn't

People are snapping up the Toyota Prius because it makes a green statement and saves buyers' money at the pump, too.

Carmakers for years have been catering to people's tastes - - big fins, V-8 engines, macho names, you name it - - so it's no surprise that there's a niche out there for people who want to display their environmental values, too.

It's baffling that the GM and other American carmakers didn't see this coming - - didn't understand that baby-boomers came to age politically during the 60's, now have cash, and could be counted on to put some of their remaining alternative perspective into a car purchase, too.

Thinking about Air Tran? Think About Sitting At The World's Busiest Airport For Your Connecting Flight

As the inexorable takeover of Midwest Airlines by Air Tran looms, with Air Tran's major hub being Atlanta, not Milwaukee, it's worth considering how many Milwaukee passengers will find themselves in this kind of transfer hell common at major airports?

Atlanta is the world's busiest airport.

One Young Michigan Sailor Sets Out To Help The Great Lakes

A young man from Michigan is sailing and writing on the Great Lakes, and he should be welcomed in Wisconsin on his one-man tour of Lake Michigan this summer.

And thanks to Dave Dempsey for his blog posting about this interesting development.

Pabst Farms 1% Solution For Downtown Oconomowoc

The million-square foot upscale mall planned for Pabst Farms will also send an estimated 10,000 visitors a month on into downtown Oconomowoc, the mall developers say.

That's a relative handful - - maybe 1-3% of mall visitors - - that will drive into town, the mall developers say.

Hard to imagine that if 97-99% of shoppers stay put in the mall that the traditional downtown store owners will feel compensated for their contributions to the millions in public dollars invested by Oconomowoc into the Pabst Farms development out at the interstate.

And those taxpayer contributions will continue, as police, fire and other services are provided to the mall and the rest of the commercial and residential occupants of Pabst Farms properties.

Rolling Stone Posts Article, Slide Show About Bush, Environment

Rolling Stone has posted an extensive review of the Bush administration's war on the environment, as well as a slide show.

These are excellent documents.

Michael Cudahy Pitches In, Again, On Light Rail Education

Milwaukee philanthropist Michael Cudahy is again flying local decision-makers to cities with light rail so they (read: Scott Walker) can see the systems and ride them.

If Walker has an open mind - - a big "if" - - Cudahy's generosity could pay big dividends for the future of the City and County of Milwaukee.

Belling Wrong About Ludacris Threat At Summerfest

Remember when Mark Belling wrung his hands over the booking by Summerfest of the hip-hop artist Ludacris?

Said July 1, the night of Ludacris' performance, might be a good night to stay away from the lakefront?

Turns out it was just another night at the festival, a victory over race-baiting.

Mequon Eagle Nesting Site Could Get Valuable Federal Grant

But the sponsoring southeastern Wisconsin conservation organization - - and the eagles - - need your help, as the Ozaukee Washington Land Trust explains in this email alert:

"We just received word that our grant for the acquisition of the Donges Bay Gorge is being recommended for funding by the Federal Coastal Management staff.

"However, it’s not a done deal. This grant is part of the federal appropriations process. We will need Senator Herb Kohl's (and Reps. James Sensenbrenner and David Obey’s) help in getting this funded.

"Without the federal share we can not make this happen.

"The Donges Bay Gorge is the site in Mequon where a pair of bald eagles have successfully produced an offspring. This is the first hatching of an eagle chick in Southeastern Wisconsin in over 100 years.

"The Donges Bay Gorge is listed as one of the projects eligible for funding in FY 2008 under the Coastal and Estuarine Land Conservation Program.

"We need Senator Kohl to make sure the Donges Bay Gorge project gets moved up toward the top of the project list, and that there is an appropriate amount of money available to fund the project. In the past, some projects get moved up in the processes and it makes their approval more likely."

"Please call Senator Kohl’s office (talk to Rebecca Young or his Chief of Staff Joanne Anton). We need to do this ASAP! The Appropriation Committees are meeting.

"Also, it would help to call Rep. Sensenbrenner (the local Congressman) and Rep. Obey (the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee).

"Any help here would be greatly appreciated. Here are phone numbers:

Sen. Kohl: Milwaukee Office: (414) 297-4451

Rep. Sensenbrenner: District office: (262) 784-1111

Rep. Obey: District Office: (715) 842-5606

Thanks,

Shawn Graff
Executive Director
Ozaukee Washington Land Trust, Inc.
PO Box 917
West Bend, WI 53095

Wisconsin Needs To Get Serious About Water Conservation

Disappearing lakes.

Dry streams.

Falling waterfront property values.

Our state's groundwater legal protections need strengthening, as this Wisconsin State Journal Sunday story explains, but we still take our water resources for granted.

That's evidenced by the state's inability to implement substantial water conservation measures, the DNR's frequent lack of aggressive enforcement, and the legislature's as-yet unwillingness to adopt the pending Great Lakes Compact, a regional water management plan that is in the best interests of Wisconsin and the other seven Great Lakes states.

The Compact doesn't take effect, and thus doesn't operate as an important regional agreement to preserve this major international water resource, until all the states adopt similar ratifying and implementing bills.

The summer heat is here. Water levels in Lake Superior are hitting record lows.

How many reminders do we need that water is not infinite, and that the Great Lakes are under stress?

It's our job as stewards of this great Public Trust in Wisconsin to make water conservation the equivalent of a second state motto.

Alabama Looks To The Great Lakes For Water

An Alabama newspaper carries the case for the deep south getting Great Lakes water.

A well-crafted Great Lakes Compact could make that impossible; a weakened or defeated Compact could help the water flow south.

Note: Michigan may add some qualifying language to its version of the compact, with changes found here, as legislators there cite potential demands for Great Lakes from faraway states.

Further note: Here is an alternate way to get to the story; Dave Dempsey's excellent Great Lakes water blog takes up the story, too.

New Progressive Blog Emerges in Walworth County

I am liking what I see at Sustainable Walworth.

If we could only get more like minded activists to use the Internet...

Former Waukesha Freeman Editor Trashes Milwaukee

Pete Kennedy, now a Freeman columnist, offers a Waukesha perspective about Milwaukee that should be remembered by Milwaukeans when they/we are told/lectured to cooperate with Waukesha, in the name of regionalism.

Kennedy's message, both in the lede of his most-recent column, as well as the last line:

"Milwaukee sucks."

And this appeared in a venerable daily newspaper, not some giveaway rag.

(And by the way, The Freeman, as its name suggests was a crusading abolitionist newspaper when it made high-minded journalism its identity.

Here's a line or two about another former Freeman editor, who'd probably turn over in his grave if he saw what former editor Kennedy was writing, and what the paper has become.

Or if he read the weekly op-ed rants by the AM radio squawker Mark Belling and the rest of the brace of rightwingers that have turned the Freeman'e editorial pages into into a shrill, far-right, one-note columns.)
And to you out-staters, speaking as a Milwaukean, the Pete Kennedy attitude is what we put up with in this area, everyday in regional media and talk radio - - this routine contempt for Milwaukee, Wisconsin's only major city.

The Milwaukee-Waukesha, two-county Census grouping is already the most segregated in America, and has the worst separation of jobs to job-seekers, too.

Anyone still wondering how that came about? Where exclusion from and judgementalism about urbanity when it comes to life and culture and politics in southeastern Wisconsin?

My suggestion from now on:

When Waukesha County wants Milwaukee land for freeways, or Milwaukee water to compensate for overused wells, or Milwaukee's agreement to help move jobs and businesses west of 124th St. in the name of regionalism - - that Milwaukee simply says "No," and sign it:

"Declined By The People Who Suck."

An Update: Remember when Mark Belling said it would be a good idea to stay away from Summerfest because a hip-hop artist was booked there?

His Pete Kennedyesque fears were unrealized.

In fact, we learn today (July 5th) that arrests at Summerfest last night were nearly 2:1 out-of-county residents than local people.

Maybe even some from out where Pete Kennedy lives, bringing crime and pressure into the city, and onto Milwaukee police and the law-abiding public?

Close the $25,000 Tax Deduction Loophole For Big SUV Buyers

Until Congress closes a hole in the US Tax Code, buyers of large SUV's like GM's Hummer and Escalade get a $25,000 deduction from their taxable income.

Meaning the rest of us subsidize those purchases, and their owners' conspicuous excess.

Solution: Call your Representative or Senator, as there is legislation to eliminate the wasteful deduction.

Democratic Party Convention Shut Out of Media, Xoff Notes

Bill Christofferson blogs about the under-covered Democratic State Convention held in Milwaukee this past weekend.

And asks all the right questions.

When Surface Water Becomes Groundwater By Disappearing

Disappearing lakes.

Dry streams.

Falling property values.

Our state's groundwater legal protections need strengthening, as this Wisconsin State Journal Sunday story explains.

We still take our water resources for granted.

That's evidenced by the state's inability to implement substantial water conservation measures, the DNR's lack of aggressive enforcement, and the legislature's unwillingness to adopt the pending Great Lakes Compact, a regional water management plan.