Milwaukee-Area Transit Debacle, Decade II

It's hard to imagine that Milwaukee-area transit could be placed on shakier or more disrespected ground than the Tommy Thompson/Scott Jensen/Daniel Finley engineered regional crack-up of about a decade ago, when these GOP leaders blew up Milwaukee's light rail planning.

It was the "Stick-it-to-Milwaukee" era, and Republicans from Waukesha to the state house kicked Milwaukee around, racking up out-state votes at the city's expense.

Those short-sighted Republicans helped doom Milwaukee to second-class, old-fashioned transit while the Twin Cities, and even smaller St. Louis put in light rail.

All the while our bus system aged, declined and then suffered even more under Republican County Executive Scott Walker's ideologically-motivated unwinding of transit as a basic service provided by guvmint.

Now here we are ten or twelve years later: the bus system is fading and floundering, with increased fares, shortened routes and without even a local streetcar loop downtown because Walker iced that planning for years, too - - though federal funds to start it languished in political limbo.
Fast forward to November, 2008: Milwaukee County's populace voted to tax itself to keep the buses running and transit improving, yet, astoundingly, Gov. Jim Doyle - - a Democrat - - removed a reduced variation of that county tax from the legislatively-approved state budget - - despite his earlier support for the full county tax increase ok'ed by county voters, leaving Milwaukee County, its predominantly-Democratic county board and, most importantly, county bus riders high and dry.

Now the county board is fighting with Doyle; a regional transit authority and a related commuter rail plan look derailed, too - - with home rule and a transit plan and strategy undermined, too.

It's hard to imagine a worse situation, with, of all people, Scott Walker removed politically, for now, as the obstacle to rationalized and progressive transit in the city, county and region.

Which further bleakens the transit picture as enter a replay of the"Stick-it-to-Milwaukee" era.

The Governor and local officials need to meet and immediately resolve this mess, or the political and policy ramifications are going to get worse.

Put another way: this could be the death-knell to transit in Milwaukee, and there is no way the city and county can come back from that.

We're talking about a fatal blow to the commercial and residential center of the state.

Milwaukee simply cannot be used as a political and partisan pawn in a game where cutting taxes or being able to escape even supporting a tax approved by local voters can trump everything and anything.

This is no way to run government - - except into the ground.