An honest discussion of race & Milwaukee must be regional & state

A piece in today's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel keyed to the Bucks' positive impact on racial harmony leads me to expand that analysis with some data, previous blog posts and commentary.

The story's headline - 

In segregated Milwaukee, the Bucks' playoff run and Deer District offer a glimpse at a more unified city 

- says "Milwaukee" and "a glimpse at a more unified city" without adding the word "area" or "region" to what is segregated and where, or is not unified.

For that I call out editors, not the bylined writers, whom I praise for acknowledging that there is a bigger picture:

And as fans pack the plaza outside the Bucks' arena known as the Deer District, cheering for a common goal in one of the most segregated metro areas in the nation, the team itself has developed a reputation for working to heal the community's racial divide. 

And which is something I have repeatedly blogged about:

I am adding to this [2019] post about environmental justice and government-enabled discriminatory planning in SE WI the schedule of an important television documentary about the destruction of African-American homes, business and neighborhood cohesion by I-43 construction from Milwaukee to the northern suburbs....

[Updated from 1/8/19 - - with news of litigation alleging racial profiling in a traffic stop on a stretch of interstate highway reminiscent of another outburst in Waukesha County which ended in hate crime convictions.]

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There should be widespread dissemination of yet another report focusing on Southeastern Wisconsin's worst-in-the-nation segregation, but let's add some history and information to the discussion - - especially with a new Governor more attuned to the needs of cities and their residents.

As I have noted often on this blog, the disparities have been fueled by multiple actions by multiple layers of government as far back as the 1950's - - and 50 years later - - and often involve transit, such the Robin Vos-led prohibition against regional transit authorities which can move people to jobs and housing across local jurisdictional lines, to repeated threats to the sparse bus connections which do link urban workers with suburban employers.

Also here: 

TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 2016

State and regional governments keep Milwaukee, minorities isolated, part II

This blog has covered these issues for nearly ten years. There are hundreds of posts with supporting documentation. Use the index box at the upper left.

If we're going to have a discussion about segregation, let's look at the bigger picture. 

And note that the two-year budget which Republicans just successfully adopted arbitrarily cut transit funding to Milwaukee and Madison by a flat 50% but left all other transit systems statewide without similar reductions. 

This ultra-partisan approach to transit in Wisconsin will continue what reflects suburban/Republican anti-urban animus extensively documented in Waukesha's case, here - 

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2011

Waukesha Officials To Cut Transit Links, Again - - And Undercut Water Plan, Again

Cutting transit to Milwaukee, again, are we?

Including service from downtown Waukesha to Milwaukee, the Journal Sentinel reports.

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2010

Waukesha County Considering Fresh Barrier To Milwaukee Job Seekers

Cut a bus route to the New Berlin Industrial Park.

This is getting routine for Waukesha County...

MONDAY, JUNE 21, 2010

Another Milwaukee-Waukesha Bus Route Eliminated

Now it's a line to Quad/Graphics.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010 

Waukesha County Opts Out Of Regional Transit; Milwaukee Should Do The Same With Water

Well, it's official; The Waukesha County Board of Supervisors has decided - - unanimously - - to decline joining a regional transit authority.

- and will keep the City of Milwaukee's minority-majority population intentionally separated from jobs, housing and other opportunities that further deepen the region's many divides.

Again - a reality long recognized by experts and journalists: 

Urban-suburban divide seen in Milwaukee area's employment gains 

The private-employment figures show that Milwaukee County has fared nowhere near as well as its much-more-affluent metro area neighbors since the recession....  

Marquette University economic professor Abdur Chowdhury also noted that the divergence in job creation between Milwaukee County and the metropolitan area's three suburban counties is a long-standing trend.

And with those counties poorly connected to Milwaukee by mass transit, he said in an email, relatively few African-Americans have secured employment in the part of the metropolitan area generating most of the job growth.

Let me add one list of links below - click through to the full charts which do not easily reproduce - or to the summarizing US Census website which shows the racial breakdown - among other information - of the populations of Milwaukee County and the three so-called WOW counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington which surround Milwaukee.

And you might say, 'Wow! That couldn't have happened by accident.' 

The categories and terminology are the US Census Bureau's language:

* Waukesha County: White alone, 92.5%. Black or African American alone, 27.2%

* Ozaukee County: White alone, 93.8%. Black or African American alone, 1.7%

* Washington County: White alone, 95.5%. Black or African American alone, 1.4%.

* Milwaukee County: White alone, 64.2%. Black or African American alone, 27.2%.

You can dig into the Census web site and the links for expanded, or more granular, comparative numbers, but the data - from race to income to housing and so on - speak to disparities, policies, and intentions which extend beyond just Milwaukee.

Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission. Poor transit connections have long kept City of Milwaukee residents and people of color separated from jobs, housing, schools and recreational opportunities suburban communities which surround the city and county of Milwaukee. 

 

 

Eight Milwaukee Aldermen Refuse To Stand Up To Walker, And For Milwaukee

[Update: Ald. Zielinski signed this afternoon, so the # of non-signers is now seven. See updates below] When Scott Walker went to Waukesha County and delivered a sleazy, coded attack wrapped in a shot at gubernatorial opponent Tom Barrett - -

People do not want to see Wisconsin "become another Milwaukee," Walker said.

- - you'd think all Milwaukee Common Council members, regardless of party, regardless of their relationships with Mayor Barrett, regardless...regardless...would hit back on behalf of the City.

And you'd be wrong.

The following letter had the signatures of seven of 15 Aldermen. (Now eight, see update below). Those not signing:

Alds. Robert Donovan,  Robert Puente, Joe Dudzik, Jim Bohl, Joe Davis, Terry Witkoswki, Tony Zielinski and Council President Willie Hines.

[Update: you have a Milwaukee.Gov E-Notification... Alderman Tony Zielinski adds name to "MILWAUKEE MATTERS" statement.]

[Further update: I'll bet this Facebook note today from Bill Christofferson got Zielinski's attention, and thank you, Alderman, for signing]:

One of the non-signers is my alder, Tony Zielinski. I just emailed him to suggest that if he plans to run for partisan office in the future as a Dem, this is a mistake. People will have long memories after this recall, no matter who wins.

I don't get it.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 18, 2012

Milwaukee Matters Joint Statement from Members of the Common Council

On May 8 during his primary victory speech, Governor Walker removed the City of Milwaukee from the State of Wisconsin and disconnected the city’s problems from the responsibility of the state government. He has repeated this same line of commentary when convenient during media interviews.

As elected officials and residents of the City of Milwaukee, it is extremely disturbing to listen to our Governor, the former top elected official for Milwaukee County, use our great city as a prop and make disparaging remarks about the city to gain political points with those outside the city. We are Milwaukee – resilient and strong.

We can only move Wisconsin forward with a strong Milwaukee – not the Governor’s plan of leaving Milwaukee behind.

We are working incredibly hard to focus on solutions to challenges we face, and despite dogged opposition from those supporting policies that have impeded our progress, we are fighting our way to a brighter future. It seems hypocritical for the Governor to slash funding to public education, deny federal funds that would have created jobs, repeatedly take over decisions that have traditionally been under local control, and then take zero responsibility for the impact those decisions have on the city.

Moreover, anyone who has observed the Governor’s budgeting priorities over the last decade, first in Milwaukee County at the Courthouse and now at the State Capitol, has seen a blatant aversion for the city and a desire to see the City of Milwaukee fail. It is his fiscal agenda.

As County Executive, the Governor devastated the Milwaukee County Transit System, and now as Governor, he added money to the prison and highway budgets and took money from public education and from shared revenue with cities, towns, and villages. Those cuts were felt most acutely – as he knew they would be – by the Milwaukee Public Schools and by the City and County of Milwaukee. And now he is bragging about that?

The leader of the State must have the capacity to bring all people in the state together in efforts to solve problems. Accentuating differences between residents in the state in a manner that is unproductive or adversarial is wrong, and only divides and distances us from one another. As Milwaukee goes, so goes the State of Wisconsin.

If Wisconsin is to move forward – Milwaukee Matters.

Ald. Ashanti Hamilton    Ald. Milele A. Coggs    Ald. Nik Kovac
Ald. Robert J. Bauman    Ald. Michael Murphy    Ald. Willie C. Wade
Ald. José G. Pérez

Milwaukee Right Spot For Righty WI GOP Convention? Maybe Not

Friday 6:50 p.m. update: Wisconsin's Republican Assembly members rediscovering the party's Lincolnesque roots. Still no word if Paul Ryan still thinks inner-city African-American males are thinking about working. More later.

Don't get me wrong: I'm glad the Republican Party of Wisconsin chose Milwaukee as the site of its 2014 convention that begins Friday, but can you blame me for wondering if our urban downtown is really the party's best choice?

After all, it wasn't that long ago that recall election candidate Scott Walker urged his supporters in Waukesha County's Oconomowoc Lake - - about as unlike Milwaukee demographically as you could get - - to back him against opponent Tom Barrett, Milwaukee's Mayor, lest Wisconsin become "another Milwaukee."

At the time, Walker couldn't wait to get out of the County Executive's suite in the downtown Milwaukee Courthouse, what with all the pesky supervisors and unions and crumbling County parking ramps and nightmarish mental health facilities and troublesome Internet routers giving a gubernatorial candidate a headache.

You can see how one Milwaukee was enough for that guy.

Then there's the matter of that secessionist resolution on the convention agenda.

A Journal Sentinel 2011 feature story disclosed that the second of 12,000 Wisconsin soldiers to die in the US Civil War was a young Milwaukee man.

Despite Wisconsin's modest population, only four other states sent more soldiers to battle. [That sentence reflects the correction of an error on my part. An earlier version said Wisconsin's soldier death toll had been fifth highest among the states.]

There's a display of Civil War memorabilia over at the Milwaukee Public Museum just up the street from where state GOP delegates are meeting at the Convention Center.

Does the Wisconsin GOP really want to talk secession in the shadow of Milwaukee's tribute to Wisconsin's Civil War dead?

There's another problem facing the delegates and the boss - - our state's stagnant, 35th-out-of 50 growth rating among the states.

Along with Walker's equally insufficient 42% progress towards his failing 250,000 new-jobs-after-one-term pledge - - a political burden going into another election, in part because Walker turned aside years of federally-funded employment to build an upgraded Milwaukee to Madison Amtrak rail line, bridges and stations.

In your face, President Obama!

Though it meant forgoing the construction work and also forcing the closing of a Milwaukee train assembly, repair and maintenance facility that had just been opened by a Spanish firm in a low-income, heavily-minority neighborhood near W. Capitol Dr. and 30th Street.

Convention attendees might actually be able to break for a field trip to the shuttered assembly plant as it dispatches to Michigan two brand-new made-in-Milwaukee/banned-in-Milwaukee/mothballed-in-Milwaukee trains.

All the details about the loss of the train work, Walker's jobs-creating failing and more, are linked or referenced in one posting, here.

Walker's handlers and speech-writers will have to cherry-pick all the disappointing job-creation data, so maybe the convention would have been better held in Door County, where cherry picking is a virtue.

Or the convention could have been better scheduled  in Madison, where the delegates could have decamped, en masse, to the Capitol Theater for the May 6th performance by "Fitz and The Tantrums."

How do you not jump on that?

A: Because Vos, suburban GOP need a stunted Milwaukee

[Updated Tuesday, 11:40 a.n., from Sunday 5:29 p.m.] Q: What is wrong with these people?

Robin Vos, the GOP assembly speaker from the Racine County Village of Rochester, threw cold water on state partnership participation in funding an NBA arena in downtown Milwaukee.

His ostensible excuse, which among reasonable adults was too stupid to even consider?

The new owner/investors of The Milwaukee Bucks had motored on over to Milwaukee's airport to greet a recent visitor, a certain Barack Obama, a/k/a The President of the United States.

Also a Democrat. The horror!

Disregarding that Wisconsin Republicans had sloganeered that the state was open for business, that these basketball team owners had spent a half-billion dollars on the team, and had pledged to pony up a couple of hundred million dollars more to kick start the arena funding, and were looking to attract another billion or so bucks to make The Milwaukee Bucks and the downtown something of a world-class showcase.

Downtown Milwaukee? All dressed up? Not in Vosland.

Update - - Nice to see papers statewide, now including the La Crosse Tribune, slam Vos for his pear-brained arrogance.

So while you're sorting through his embrace of the ridiculous, remember also that signs are pointing to Republicans using their Legislative majority to quickly change the rules governing local financing tools to block Milwaukee from beginning to fund a streetcar system which would not only tie together and boost a number of major downtown office and housing developments, but could also move Bucks' fans and others easily to and from multiple downtown venues.

Update - - And props to Mayor Tom Barrett for refusing to back down on the streetcar issue - - and thus on pledging to fight for local control and transportation funding fairness - - by refusing to turn over the city to suburban interests that would keep Milwaukee's economy stalled so the out-city areas can more greatly prosper.

Republicans have a deep, ideological and fetishistic fear about transit vehicles that run on rails and carry more than one occupant:

*  They have from the outside barred Milwaukee for nearly 20 years from reaping rail transit's jobs-and-development potential.

*  Vos led the more recent killing of regional transit authorities, lest any rail virus work its way into precious suburban territory.

*  He killed the Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter train line even though it would have served his Racine County constituents, alleviated some of the traffic congestion on their stretch of I-94, and offered commuters what conservatives claim is always the goal: a choice.

*  And Vos' boss Scott Walker blocked the Amtrak extension from Milwaukee to Madison even though federal funds had been set aside to cover 100% of its construction.

That self-defeating partisan sop to Walker's Tea Party base and talk radio echo chamber also made sure that no NBA fans in Madison could ever board a Bucks' express into Milwaukee, or that no Amtrak train would carry Badger fans in our region the other way to games or events.

Or bring people on any number of everyday family, business, university, civic, cultural, entertainment or other trips between Milwaukee and Madison.

Like I said, you gotta wonder what's to be gained in our economically flat, jobs'-deprived state by cutting and stifling growth, connections and commerce - - "progress" - - in and between our two largest cities, but principally here in Milwaukee?

Now the answer:

Suburban, Republican conservatives, whether talk radio hosts or legislators or this particular, peculiar Governor need a scapegoat city - - a city they are willing to tie in knots and under-performance through double-standards and traps to validate their stereotyped, skewed vision of cities, and especially Milwaukee, as inferior to their 'successful,' whiter, often wealthier suburbs and exurban towns.

It's as old as Tommy Thompson's "stick-it-to-Milwaukee" sales pitch in favor of a regional Brewers' stadium tax for which he needed and won critical out-state support for passage.

And don't forget that Vos helped end Milwaukee's residency rule for its taxpayer-paid employees - - over Milwaukee's objections - - rolling over the long-time GOP principle of local control and helping move middle-class taxpayers to the suburbs. Maybe even to the Village of Rochester or elsewhere within Vos' district.

A jazzy Milwaukee downtown, with a new entertainment complex built around an NBA franchise energized by new players, with people moving around town on modern light rail all weekend long from condos and apartments and parking ramps and hotels to the arena  - - then to clubs and watering holes - - then the next day to museums and galleries and restaurants to the Lakefront and then to the Amtrak station or the airport defeats the conservative narrative that you're supposed to be afraid of cities, and avoid them.

New Urbanism actually threatens aging or remote suburbs. Millennials, young marrieds and empty-nesters often prefer urban - - walkable neighborhoods, lofts, coffee shops, nightlife and a rail pass - - not commutes in cars to cul-de-sacs, in many cases.

In the Robin Vos/Scott Walker's political world, a city like Milwaukee that is already landlocked by a special 1950's state law works best if it doesn't have too many new options - - which is what cities are really all about.

Vos and Walker prefer a negative relationship with Milwaukee - - which becomes a positive for them at election time when power is taken and used to reward friends and donors.

Walker put his finger on this truth in the upscale Waukesha County community of Oconomowoc Lake towards the end of his 2012 recall campaign when he whipped up the crowd by saying you don't want Wisconsin to "become another Milwaukee."

When It's Convenient, Walker Uses Milwaukee

With the nation's governors about to convene in Milwaukee, Gov. Scott Walker is taking a break from his cross-country Presidential junketing - - and there's more to that, here - - to spend a few days closer to home and finally has said something nice about the city he loves to hate.

Not that it is coming easily, as the Journal Sentinel writes it:

"It's kind of cool, that for a couple of days beginning in August, it's all going to be right here in Wisconsin, in Milwaukee," Walker said in an interview.

Like a movie's establishing shot, Walker correctly locates Milwaukee in Wisconsin, though note that Wisconsin is the first locale out of his mouth.

It's probably hard for Walker to articulate the word "Milwaukee," since, as you will recall, Milwaukee is where the County District Attorney sent several of Walker's appointees to prison for various on-the-job crimes perpetrated just a few feet from Walker's then-Milwaukee County Executive office.

Or where Walker, after supporting budget cuts to city public schools, threatening to de-fund urban transit, pushing for partisan barriers to the ballot box, fresh obstructions to health insurance for the low-income, and dangerous limitations to reproductive healthcare for poorer women - - not to mention championing obliteration of cities' home-rule powers covering public employee contracts and residency - - is now polling a City of Milwaukee approval rating of just 30%.

Walker eventually mouthed to the Journal Sentinel some nice things about several Milwaukee institutions that all, by the way, enjoyed some winners-and-losers' public financing.

In fact - - Jeepers!! - - Walker sounds like a surprised Milwaukee tourist himself as he rattled off a few things Milwaukee's "got,' (though as we will see in a bit, he hardly has been consistently supportive):

"Just bringing people to Milwaukee, literally people from all across the country, to see firsthand some of our great attractions will be a huge benefit, because it kind of opens people's eyes that we have a world-class ballpark, got a great lakefront, got the Harley-Davidson Museum. I just think there is tremendous value in that regard that kind of changes people's perceptions," Walker said. 

In social outings, the governors will visit all those venues, walking onto the field at Miller Park, getting a chance to to ride Harleys, and feeling the breeze outside Discovery World at Pier Wisconsin.

Visiting media or the Governors might want to understand that Milwaukee "got" the Harley-Davidson Museum in large part due to the hard work of Milwaukee Tom Barrett.

A point I do not think Walker will help his audience 'get.'

And our inquiring visitors could amble a few blocks farther West from their downtown meeting site to Marquette University - - the school from which Walker dropped out - -  and where early Walker campaign rule-breaking during a student election helped GOP government misbehavior expert John Dean to conclude that Walker was "more Nixonian than even Nixon."

The inconvenient on-the-record truth about Walker's relationship with Milwaukee dates to the 2011 recall election against Tom Barrett, the true Milwaukee advocate among the two.

That's when Walker, the divide-and-conquer specialist, was busy rounding up every suburban, smaller town and rural anti-Milwaukee voter, or as it's also known, Basic Statewide Wisconsin Republican Election Strategy.

Walker went to the upscale Waukesha County exurban and virtually-all white stronghold of Oconomowoc Lake to delivered the fear-driven message eaten up by the GOP base that he didn't want Wisconsin to become another Milwaukee.

Richard Nixon famously said he wasn't a crook.

Don't let Walker suggest he's always been Milwaukee's friend.

Waukesha County's Long Hostility To Transit Links With Milwaukee

I thought I'd repost a few lines from several Waukesha-related transit items from this blog or a Crossroads piece in I wrote that look relevant in light of a meeting about transit and water - - troubled waters - - scheduled for a Common Council meeting Wednesday in Milwaukee City Hall.

Each headline is a hyperlink, and clicking on it will take you to the full text - - and remember, Milwaukee's conditions for selling water to a community like Waukesha include proving that there are transit plans in place that have been effective as a job opportunity tool for Milwaukee residents:

...a written report to the aforementioned communication file indicating that the community has adopted and implemented...

D-3. A comprehensive public transportation plan and can demonstrate that such plan has resulted in the expansion and improvement of public transportation links between persons living in the City of Milwaukee and job opportunities in the community which has applied for water service. Such plan may include, but is not limited to, participation and inclusion in the Southeast Wisconsin Regional Transportation Authority or an equivalent entity.

------------------------------------------ 

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Waukesha Officials To Cut Transit Links, Again - - And Undercut Water Plan, Again

Cutting transit to Milwaukee, again, are we?

Including service from downtown Waukesha to Milwaukee, the Journal Sentinel reports.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Waukesha County Considering Fresh Barrier To Milwaukee Job Seekers

Cut a bus route to the New Berlin Industrial Park.

This is getting routine for Waukesha County...

Monday, June 21, 2010

Another Milwaukee-Waukesha Bus Route Eliminated

Now it's a line to Quad/Graphics.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Waukesha County Opts Out Of Regional Transit; Milwaukee Should Do The Same With Water

Well, it's official; The Waukesha County Board of Supervisors has decided - - unanimously - - to decline joining a regional transit authority.

Sunday, Sept. 14, 2008 

The railroad not taken

Had talk radio and suburban opposition not sunk a 1997 plan, we’d be riding sleek transit by now

A starter light rail system was recommended for Milwaukee County in a major state-funded regional transportation study in the 1990s that had considerable public and private sector support.

But conservative AM talk radio and opposition in Waukesha County blocked further study of light rail for Milwaukee, even though $241 million in federal funds was set aside specifically for transit improvements in Milwaukee County.

Had plans unfolded on schedule, the starter light rail, with an estimated 21,000 riders on weekdays, would have opened in 2006 and run about 10 miles from the Third Ward to Summerfest, downtown, Miller Park, the Milwaukee County Zoo and the County Grounds...

Extensions to Milwaukee's north side and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee would have generated support, and light rail could have assisted Waukesha County commuters because years of Zoo Interchange and I-94 reconstruction are planned west of Milwaukee...

But Daniel Finley, a Republican then-Waukesha County executive, vetoed his board's resolution over the light rail element, even though the proposed line didn't extend into Waukesha County.

Sunday, June 29, 2008

The Freeman Balks At Regional Transit Cooperation, Milwaukee Rail

Said the Freeman, Waukesha's daily paper, on 6/28/08:

Regional leaders, including some from Waukesha County, were involved in several discussions this week to discuss regional transportation issues.

The Waukesha County Action Network held talks about funding transportation and regional leaders attended a summit in Milwaukee to discuss transportation and mass transit.

We’d like to address a few items that came up during the discussions:

First of all, while we are fine with regional partnerships and cooperation, we remain firmly against Waukesha County being part of a regional transit authority.

It doesn’t make sense and is not in the interest of Waukesha County residents is to establish a regional transit authority that has the power to raise your taxes and will have aims that mostly benefit Milwaukee...

Leaders repeatedly referenced Mark Belling’s recent Freeman column critical of mass transit. But instead of taking his opinion into consideration, many of the leaders chalked it up to the NEGATIVE climate surrounding the regional transit issue.

This dismissive attitude from some of these leaders toward those who oppose a regional transit authority is arrogant and condescending.

The reason there is negativity toward a regional transit authority is because it is a bad idea that would cost taxpayers a lot of money. Of course, we realize we will now be labeled as part of the NEGATIVE alliance against light rail and high taxes. We can live with that.

Friday, December 21, 2007

Dropping A Workers' Bus Route Is Fail-Fail-Fail: No Transit - - No Water, Period.

Here's how one leading Waukesha County official put it to the Journal Sentinel:

'Waukesha County Public Works Director Richard Bolte said he also did not sense any strong sentiment for maintaining the service when County Board members debated and approved the 2008 budget with no money for Route No. 9.

'The route's low ridership makes it a logical candidate for elimination, Bolte said.

"I didn't push the route real hard," he said, "because I didn't think it was worth saving...."

New Berlin And Milwaukee Are In Two Different Worlds - - Is There The Will To Reconnect?

Milwaukee and New Berlin are neighbors, yet their demographic differences are so vast that they might as well be located on different planets.

A critical gap is job availability - - Milwaukee has tens of thousands of unemployed residents and New Berlin has the largest industrial park in the state.

But direct transit service to the industrial park from Milwaukee ended in 2004.

(You can still ride an express bus into Milwaukee from a more northern point in New Berlin, which doesn't do anything to get Milwaukeans to the industrial park, or a two-hour+ round-trip series of buses, transfers and charter coaches to get from Milwaukee to the industrial park, and back )

There has been talk of adding direct bus service to New Berlin from Milwaukee, but those discussions have not produced results, proving that too often around here, regionalism is more talk than action.

The relevancy of this?

Milwaukee aldermen meet Tuesday (it's a public hearing, so you can listen and speak in Room 301-B, City Hall, at 10:30 a.m.) to consider selling water to New Berlin - - to acreage where it says it could build 1,119 more homes, create another 5,668 jobs, and already has approved the construction of its a convention center, hotel and water park complex.

The water sale would be for a 20-year period.

Should Milwaukee help New Berlin expand its economy, when Milwaukeans have less direct access to employment in New Berlin, and little chance of finding affordable housing near jobs there?

Consider these facts from the 2000 census, and related updated estimates:

Milwaukee has 605,000 people, New Berlin, 39,234.

21.3% of Milwaukeans live below the poverty line, or about 125,000 people. In New Berlin, the figure is 2%, or about 780.

Milwaukee is 37.3% African-American. In New Berlin, 0.4%.

The average value of an owner-occupied housing unit in Milwaukee is $80,400. In New Berlin, the figure is $162,100, or about double.

The average per-household income in Milwaukee is $32,200. In New Berlin, $67,500, again double.

New Berlin would pay the city a projected $966,000 a year for the water - - helping the utility meet with its budget - - but lowering bills for existing Milwaukee Water Utility customers between $1.50 and $4.50, depending on variables in the calculations.

New Berlin would also pay Milwaukee $1.5 million upfront in a one-time so-called regional benefits payment.

Though it could buy more expensive water from other Lake Michigan communities, New Berlin's proposed payment to Milwaukee is not likely to make a dent in the regional housing and transit issues that historically have undermined Milwaukee - - land-locked by state law - - and have allowed suburban cities like New Berlin to flourish.

Milwaukee needs to reframe the discussion and get some experts to help it calculate the value of water and its relationship to nearby development.

And it needs to consider with its regional partners all of the important planning issues as a whole - - transit, housing, air quality, development, jobs - - and not have them considered separately, years apart, without coordination and common focus.

That's how the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission has been treating these issues for decades. The SEWRPC way does not serve Milwaukee or the region, and New Berlin and Milwaukee will only be imitating it if they sign a water deal that leaves housing and transit discussions for another day.

Milwaukee and New Berlin can set an important precedent by sitting down and making an agreement with a broader scope, thus making sense and adding more value to the region than what is on the table now.

Official WI Tourism Site Ignores Milwaukee - - Which Is #1 In Tourism Spending

[Updated, 10:45] Here's something that people in Milwaukee fully understand and the rest of the state ignores or undervalues: Milwaukee County leads the state in tourism spending, the Journal Sentinel reports.

But the Walker administration, politically hostile to Milwaukee and all things urban, posts and features many non-City of Milwaukee, non-urban images, destinations and specific businesses on the state's official tourism web page - - except for a photo of a Milwaukee-area Interstate Highway and directional sign, I kid you not (click on it and it takes you to a WisDOT travel safe/road conditions' website) - - with this main text block:

Welcome to Wisconsin! 

Throughout the year, the state of Wisconsin welcomes visitors from far and wide with countless exciting travel options. Visit extraordinary natural wonders such as Cave of the Mounds or the Apostle Islands. See the landscape in a whole new way with a thrilling zip line adventure. If you’re all about the great outdoors, Wisconsin is a paradise for hunters, fishermen, and campers. Foodies, wine, and beer lovers will delight in discovering Wisconsin’s artisan cheese makers, wineries, and breweries; as well as farmers markets and award-winning restaurants. Great places like Wisconsin Dells, Door County, and Lake Geneva offer tons of options for family fun as well as resorts for romantic getaways. Golfing, boating, skiing, shopping, and sightseeing are just some of the activities you’ll find during a trip to Wisconsin. Whatever it is you like to do; Travel Wisconsin has something special in store for you!

Where are the feature pictures of the Lakefront, Summerfest, The Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum, The Milwaukee County Zoo, Miller Park, Water Street and the club scene, the City's many ethnic restaurants, Milwaukee County's world-famous parks and botanical gardens, The Urban Ecology Center, The Performing Arts Center, The Pabst Theater, a downtown filled with historic architecture, including its iconic City Hall, etc.

I don't see a single City of Milwaukee upcoming event listed in "Things To Do," nor a single restaurant, sub and sandwich shop, Bed & Breakfast, pub, tavern, fast food joint, hotel or motel - - not even a coffee shop - -  on the site's featured lists.

What? Milwaukee residents and businesses don't pay taxes to the state which puts up this website and sends commerce elsewhere?

Why does the state sell a single recreational culture to potential visitors? Cabins and kayaking and waterfalls and off-road vehicles - - not that there's anything wrong with that - - but what about the rest of the state?  

And, really: Hiking Wisconsin trails is promoted with a photo that takes you to "Walk with Walker" - - which is a list of walks with Tonette Walker, pictured? In an election year?

A tab takes you to South Central Wisconsin, where The Dells gets the lede and as much text as Madison.

The Southeast Wisconsin tab give Milwaukee four lines (and, wow, finally a photo of the Calatrava is thrown up, but Lake Geneva and its fancy homes belonging to Chicago owners is in the same paragraph.

Why isn't the Milwaukee business community raising holy hell over this? They put Walker in office; where's the reciprocity?

I don't see a feature or obvious photo with a person of color.

Why does this administration's anti-urban bias - - remember when Walker, seeking gubernatorial votes against Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, warned against Barrett turning Wisconsin into "another Milwaukee" - - have to infect so much of what it does in our names?

Milwaukee streetcar OK reverses lengthy suburban, GOP blockade

The Milwaukee Common Council voted 9-6 today to approve a starter urban rail system.

Barring last-minute legal or political maneuvering, the vote could finally end almost two decades of costly and divisive anti-urban politicking by suburban-focused conservative talk radio agitators and Republican state legislators and Waukesha County politicians who blocked city rail investments and the development opportunities which rail will trigger while continually backing more expensive highway expansions that served commuters and removed Milwaukee properties.

I defer today to local writer Jeramey Jannene's authoritative account of the project and Council posted at the Urban Milwaukee website.

I also want to reproduce for context and the record the text of an op-ed I wrote for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in 2008 about the partisan, suburban and state governmental politicking that blocked consideration of a starter light rail system in, for and through the city. I was policy director and/or chief of staff in the office of former Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist, a light-rail proponent, when much of the battle over light rail took place.
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The railroad not taken 

Had talk radio and suburban opposition not sunk a 1997 plan, we’d be riding sleek transit by now

By JIM ROWEN

Sept. 14, 2008

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The Associated Press recently reported that spiking gas prices have brought double-digit ridership increases this year on light rail trains in Baltimore, Minneapolis, San Francisco and St. Louis.

Even small cities such as Norfolk, Va., are building light rail lines with their signature short, sleek electric trains, while other cities are showing solid ridership gains on longer-distance commuter rail lines using bigger trains.

Though a Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter line remains under study, Milwaukee is still among the few major American cities without light rail or commuter rail.

A starter light rail system was recommended for Milwaukee County in a major state-funded regional transportation study in the 1990s that had considerable public and private sector support.

But conservative AM talk radio and opposition in Waukesha County blocked further study of light rail for Milwaukee, even though $241 million in federal funds was set aside specifically for transit improvements in Milwaukee County.

Had plans unfolded on schedule, the starter light rail, with an estimated 21,000 riders on weekdays, would have opened in 2006 and run about 10 miles from the Third Ward to Summerfest, downtown, Miller Park, the Milwaukee County Zoo and the County Grounds.

Talk about a missed opportunity. It would have provided Milwaukeeans with a spiffy transit option in the face of $4-a-gallon gasoline, with higher eventual prices predicted.

The system would have benefited from the city's condo-and-loft boom, a resurgent Milwaukee Brewers' ballclub, the successful Potawatomi Bingo Casino and an expanding Milwaukee Regional Medical Center.

Extensions to Milwaukee's north side and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee would have generated support, and light rail could have assisted Waukesha County commuters because years of Zoo Interchange and I-94 reconstruction are planned west of Milwaukee.

The plan

But back to 1997: That's when five years of research and hearings managed by the state Department of Transportation and a consultant finally produced a draft plan with three key elements:

• Highways: Marquette Interchange and east-west corridor reconstruction with special carpool and bus lanes from downtown Milwaukee to Highway J in Waukesha County: $1.32 billion. 

• Light rail: The starter line in Milwaukee County: $330 million.

• Buses: Greatly expanded bus service connecting Waukesha and Milwaukee counties: $90 million.

In late January 1997, then-Gov. Tommy Thompson and aides showed the two-county transportation plan to local officials and asked them to support the package even if they disliked one or another element. As policy director to then-Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist, I attended the meeting at which Thompson made his pitch. Though opposed to special lanes, Norquist agreed not to attack the plan.

Light rail already was controversial: The late business leader George Watts said publicly in late 1996 that light rail could deliver "strangers" into unsuspecting communities and threaten their property and children - a remark some felt was racist. And "light rail" was and continues to be aimed as a partisan, fear-laden phrase against Milwaukee and its urban, Democratic majority on conservative talk radio and in some Republican-dominated suburbs.

Sensing a backlash in Thompson's base, an administration spokesman told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for a Feb. 1, 1997 article - just days after Thompson's presentation to Norquist - that not "a nickel" of state money would be spent on light rail in Milwaukee. Nevertheless, the $1.76 billion plan, including the light rail element at an estimated 20% of the package's cost, was presented to the Waukesha County and Milwaukee County boards for their mutual consideration.

Both boards, practicing enlightened regional cooperation, passed their resolutions in April 1997 to accept and acknowledge the plan but not to formally approve it.

The resolutions' intents were to trigger up to two more years of studies, preliminary engineering and detailed planning - and, no doubt, disputes and compromises - for eventual implementation.

But Daniel Finley, a Republican then-Waukesha County executive, vetoed his board's resolution over the light rail element, even though the proposed line didn't extend into Waukesha County.

The Waukesha County Board approved a substitute resolution in May 1997 that supported the plan's highway and bus elements but specifically said light rail should not be located in or financed by Waukesha County.

As the light rail option in Milwaukee was being crippled, the national average price of regular unleaded gasoline in May 1997 was $1.21 a gallon, the authoritative Lundberg Study showed.

Four months later, as part the state budget process, the Thompson administration pledged, in writing, that no state or federal funds would be used to build or study Milwaukee light rail.

Then-Rep. Scott Jensen (R-Town of Brookfield) declared "light rail is dead," and the highways/rail/bus package was not implemented. 

(For this op-ed, efforts to reach Thompson by e-mail were unsuccessful. Finley, now president of the Milwaukee Public Museum, declined to comment.)

Where to go from here

In subsequent years, more than 60% of the federal $241 million was spent on Milwaukee transportation projects after Thompson and Norquist agreed to divide the money into equal $120.5 million shares and prevent its reallocation by Congress.

The state controlled one share, and the Milwaukee city and county governments jointly controlled the other. With varying contributions from the shares, the Park East Freeway spur was torn down, and a new Sixth Street Bridge was built. Both projects provided new street connections and land for development.

The special carpool lanes weren't built, and a large piece of the state's $120.5 million went to rebuild the Marquette Interchange. The interchange reconstruction was the first phase of a seven-county, $6.3 billion regional freeway reconstruction plan that will add 127 miles of new lanes.

There is still an intact $91.5 million from the original federal transportation funding in the share controlled by Milwaukee's city and county governments. The money could go to the KRM commuter line; an effort to invest it in a downtown electric guided bus system fell through a few years ago, and politics continues to keep the funds frozen.

A Milwaukee County pension scandal forced the 2002 removal of County Executive F. Thomas Ament, a light rail supporter. 

County Executive Scott Walker, a former Republican state legislator from Wauwatosa and an outspoken opponent of light rail, remains the post-Ament incumbent. An ally of conservative talk radio and opponent of urban rail alternatives, Walker is battling with Tom Barrett, a Democrat and Milwaukee's mayor since 2004, over how to spend that $91.5 million.

Walker wants the money for express bus service. Barrett has proposed splitting the money between express buses and downtown streetcars.

Though Waukesha County and Walker keep light rail shelved, and Ament's demise helped derail it, it's technically not dead: It survives as a potential transit alternative that could link Waukesha to downtown Milwaukee, according to a key document: the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission's 2035 Regional Transportation Plan.

Citizens concerned about dirty air, failing transit and excessive regional highway spending should demand that officials activate that light rail alternative and get busy with an updated, comprehensive and balanced transportation study.

People should organize against opinion-makers and elected officials who limit choices, job opportunities and our region's development by crying "light rail, light rail!" It's time to end the train blockade in our state's largest city.

James Rowen is a local writer and consultant who blogs at thepoliticalenvironment.blogspot.com

My Op-Ed In The Freeman About Regionalism

The Freeman generously allowed me op-ed space in its edition today to raise some of the regionalism issues I've discussed on this blog.

Here is the text: [Update: I need to correct or amplify two points. First: Where I reference "core staff" at SEWRPC, the correct term is "management staff," meaning the eleven senior positions only. This was a misunderstanding on my part of SEWRPC terminology. Secondly, where I say that the Milwaukee County Board and Common Council voted against new freeway lanes, I needed to say more precisely that those votes were against adding new in the City of Milwaukee only]

GUEST OPINION

Milwaukee gets second-class treatment from SEWRPC

Despite public funding, agency fails to represent its population base

By JAMES ROWEN

(James Rowen has written for newspapers and served as a senior mayoral staffer in Madison and Milwaukee. His blog can be found at http://www.thepoliticalenvironment.blogspot.com)

Milwaukee County and its largest jurisdiction, the city of Milwaukee, should withdraw from the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission and create a new organization to better serve a big city.

And while we’re talking about reforms to SEWRPC, a healthy dose of sunlight on its spending and decision-making would help taxpayers across its seven-county region better assess SEWRPC’s performance – not just for Milwaukee, but your town and wallet, too.

First, some numbers (rounded-off):

Using 2007 official estimates, Milwaukee County’s 951,000 residents total 47.5 percent of the region’s population of 2,003,000.

But because each SEWRPC county has three seats on its 21-member board, Milwaukee County has only 14 percent (one-seventh) of the board seats.

It gets worse.

The city of Milwaukee, with 603,000 residents, gets none of the SEWRPC board seats because of the county-only appointment procedure.

That’s the situation even though Milwaukee’s city population exceeds each of all six non-Milwaukee County SEWRPC counties – ranging from Waukesha County’s 379,300 people to Walworth County’s 85,600.

And even more discriminatory:

City of Milwaukee taxpayers transferred $396,000 in property tax dollars to SEWRPC for its current operating budget, while Walworth, Washington, Ozaukee, Racine and Kenosha counties paid between $145,400 to $196,000.

Beginning to see the picture?

Suppose this were Waukesha’s situation. Would that be OK with you, in the name of regionalism?

(In fact, Waukesha County’s contribution to SEWRPC this year of $669,000 was exceeded only by Milwaukee County’s $834,000. Since Waukesha County gets the same number of SEWRPC seats – three – as the less-populated, lesser-paying counties, Waukesha County taxpayers might ask whether SEWRPC is a good deal for them, too.)

For the city of Milwaukee, this is disenfranchised governance, and taxation without representation – circumstances made more unacceptable because no senior, so-called “core staffer” at SEWRPC is a city of Milwaukee resident, or is a minority individual, though most of the region’s minorities live in Milwaukee, where minorities now constitute the majority.

The frequent absence of minorities on SEWRPC’s advisory committees, where much of the agency’s policy development takes place, enhances the belief that SEWRPC has a pro-suburban tilt.

Examples of that suburban orientation:

SEWRPC spent nearly $1 million studying and endorsing adding 120 miles of new freeway lanes in the region at the loss of millions of dollars in Milwaukee taxable property. The plan was opposed by majorities at the Milwaukee Common Council and Milwaukee County Board.

SEWRPC is helping with hurried approvals for a $25 million Interstate 94 interchange to a proposed shopping mall at Pabst Farms in western Waukesha County – even as a far, far less expensive bus line bringing Milwaukee workers to jobs in Waukesha County was eliminated.

SEWRPC has failed since 1975 to write a much-promised regional study about affordable housing. Yet it has spent millions on operations and studies since 1975, including nearly $1 million on the freeway plan, and close to another $1 million on a separate three-year study, now nearly complete, that will likely recommend Lake Michigan water diversions for suburban communities.

Bottom line: Milwaukee’s issues and relationship at SEWRPC have second-class status.

SEWRPC has a budget this year of $7,280,000 made up 100 percent of public dollars, but often behaves less like a public agency, and more like a private business, according to records and interviews.

For example, it selected current SEWRPC Deputy Director Ken Yunker to be executive director beginning in 2009, though did not conduct a search or other public outreach.

SEWRPC bought its current (City of) Pewaukee office building headquarters in 2001 without equivalent consideration of other properties, and agreed to pay $20,000 to Waukesha County for departing early from leased space in the Waukesha County Historical Society and Museum.

SEWRPC pays for public relations services rather than rely on in-house personnel, though it has not yet implemented one proposal from the PR firm: changing the agency name from Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission to Regional Planning Commission of Southeastern Wisconsin.

Conclusion: Though a governmental agency, SEWRPC is tucked away from the population centers of its region, spending public money with little accountability, citizen awareness or taxpayer participation.

The creation of a new urban regional planning commission would be good for Milwaukee; the removal of Milwaukee County’s big annual tax payment might put the brakes on new car spending for staff and some consultants, and bring about other belt-tightening.

A new commission, perhaps with additional jurisdictions, could team up with SEWRPC. That would redefine and expand regional cooperation and produce better, more inclusive results.

Planning can and should be energetic, proactive and trendsetting. It should welcome fresh ideas and formats – especially in these challenging times – and make new approaches work for the most people possible.

As constituted and managed, SEWRPC fails that test.

Anti-transit ideology, fantasy still rule region, Walker budgets

[Updated] I want to add one more item to nearly two weeks' blogging that tries to expand the context in which citizens and opinion-makers and officials discuss the recent violence in and reporting about Milwaukee, including these blog items:

* A summary post about the many intentional state and regional financial, policy and legal decisions over decades which kept the City of Milwaukee land-locked and its predominantly-minority residents segregated by race and income from regional housing, business development, job opportunities and transit in the wealthier, whiter surrounding suburban counties;

* A followup post focusing on then-Milwaukee County Executive and now Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's long disinterest in Milwaukee employment and hostility to the city and Milwaukee County's transit deficits and solutions.

Then a blog reader reminder me of a post I'd written in February, 2007 about Walker and transit. 

I was grateful for the reminder, as I sometimes forget what I've posted here - - there are more than 17,000 posts just since June, 2010, when Google began keeping score - -  but shame on me for not going back further in the archives to find something relevant.

And relevant to more than the discriminatory disconnects and disregards and damage done to Milwaukee through public policy choices and spending that marginalize the state's biggest city.

The story told in the posting sheds more light on the mindset - - a term used advisedly, and generously - - of Scott Walker which he'd tipped us to nearly ten years ago, and a good three years before he was elected Governor.

A Governor who is willing to starve state transit, borrow to the hilt, ram through, despite denials and double-talk even more highway expansion on the west side where residents don't want it and please the road-builders with a blank check because he told us in 2007 he wants everyone in Milwaukee to own and drive a car.

Even though before the Great Recession deepened, data showed that 23% of City of Milwaukee households were without access to a vehicle.

As ludicrous is the poor en masse magically getting flush enough to buy cars - - does Walker - - he with the private transit taxpayers r\give him 24/7 since January, 2011 via state-paid cars, drivers, airplanes, pilots - - see the contradiction and his cause-and-effect responsibilities as he keeps the minimum wage frozen at a poverty-enforcing $7.25/hr? - -  given the upfront purchase, licensing and registration costs to owners, plus operating and maintenance expenses, the greatly expanded car ownership Walker fantasizes about does underscore his hostility to transit and 'justify' the added highway expansion he supports that would reward his road-building pals. 

Talk about a win-win for ideologically-blinded free marketers.

So if you still need a "Eureka Moment" to grasp who Walker is and to explain, shall we say, his 'philosophy' - - if his audible dog whistles about the poor, or his warning to upper-income exurban Waukesha County exurbanites about letting Wisconsin 'become another Milwaukee,' or his presence at a secretive and under-reported right-wing summit anointing him for leadership didn't already supply that nugget you needed to grasp who Walker really is, I give you the 2/24/2007 posting, in full below (and if I can get a link to the Journal Sentinel roundtable cited, I will pass that on, too):

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Scott Walker: County Executive of Fantasy Island 

Politicians say the dumbest things when the spin machine is making too much noise in their heads.

Case in point: Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker, who trashed Mayor Tom Barrett's recently-announced bus-and-trolley transit improvement proposal.

In a County with a declining transit system organized around outmoded buses, why would the County Exec. dump on a plan that would benefit the system and the county, too?

Here's what the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Walker told the paper's editorial writers Tuesday about why he opposed transit improvements in the county he purportedly leads:

"...Walker said he would like to grow the local economy enough so lower-income people don't have to rely on transit and could instead afford to buy cars if they chose."

As a friend quipped to me Friday night, right - - so they can drive their cars to jobs in Waukesha?

Walker even invoked the ghost of light rail, killed in Milwaukee by talk radio and the Thompson administration nearly a decade ago, to demagogue against Barrett's proposal - - which is not a light rail plan.

I know Walker knows the difference, but when have the facts ever driven the local debate about transit?

In Milwaukee County politics, talk radio sets the agenda, then Walker, knowing his lines, reacts with rigidity, fantasy and spin.

There's a slogan you can write down and put on your refrigerator [echoing Walker's 2002 campaign mantra].