Monday, December 5, 2016

SE Wisconsin apartheid is suburban money-maker, regional embarrassment

Thanks to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel investigative reporters for exposing the shameful realities of complex ownership connections between an upscale absentee landlord who lives in the tony Village of River Hills where there are very picky construction guidelines covering types and colors and angles of materials, landscaping, lighting, tennis court and swimming pool set up and screening, etc., and run down, out-of-code rental units that landlord, a securities industry leader, owns in the City of Milwaukee's lower-income and heavily-minority central city.

I've argued for years that there are outside regional forces and inequities at work - - and, yes, apartheid is an accurate label for some of that, and the term found its way into a piercing Journal Sentinel op-ed a few years ago - - which contribute to Milwaukee's central city poverty and resulting social and economic problems rippling statewide; the Journal Sentinel story today puts a face on the condition, the victims and on one of the beneficiaries.

Today's Journal Sentinel story is part of a longer series.

Well done.

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