Belling's Existential Doubt

Mark Belling was in high rant this afternoon, devoting the 4-4:30 p.m segment of his WISN-AM drive time radio show to more emotional fulmination about commuter rail.

His specific complaint: Larry Nelson, the "lu-lu lefty Mayor" of Waukesha, had told the Waukesha Freeman he hoped a proposed southeastern Wisconsin commuter rail line would extend past Milwaukee County to stop in the City of Waukesha.

Belling tried to whip up his audience, then got no calls despite his repeated warnings that terrible tax increases would fall on communities in counties not close to stations.

After saying he'd take no calls since no one had phoned in quickly enough (Oh, the drama of the Theater of the Mind!) - - but finally ginning up two callers, the second of whom admitted he hadn't heard any of Belling's earlier warnings about the evils of the rail proposal - - Mark went to a break, asking his screener, aloud, "I wonder if I serve any purpose at all?"

Political Pollution: Feds 'Work' With BP Rather Than Bar Lake Michigan Dumping

The US Environmental Protection Agency is encouraging British Petroleum to do some feel-good spending to tamp down furor over planned contaminant dumping in Lake Michigan.

The EPA should have objected in the first place to Indiana's recent permission to BP that allows the oil giant to deposit three more tons daily of sludge and ammonia into Lake Michigan.

Suggesting some backing-and-filling to BP as a response to growing criticism across the Great Lakes region is little more than EPA pandering.

Its stance to this exceedingly wealthy company should have been: build onsite waste treatment facilities with your billions in annual profits: We are the Environmental Protection Agendy, not the Enabling Pollution Agency.

Mayor Richard Daley, Mayor Tom Barrett and a slew of others have joined most of the House of Representatives in objecting, and citizen petitions are giving way to boycotts.

But in Wisconsin, a Lake Michigan state: Continuing silence from our state officials.

Feingold Calls For Great Lakes Action: Here Are Followup Suggestions

US Senator Russ Feingold, (D-WI), has called for swift action to acknowledge and confront falling levels in Lakes Superior and Michigan.

It's good that a major political figure is finally willing to break out of the region's inertia and recognize that there are problems with the Great Lakes getting worse by the day.

Dredging for shipping by the US Army Corps of Engineers in the St. Clair River, a Great Lakes tributary which drains Lake Huron and borders the US and Canada, is believed to be a major reason - - but a fixable one - - for the needless daily loss of Great Lakes water through the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Atlantic Ocean of more than two billion gallons a day.

Additionally, Lake Superior's level is hitting an historic low, most likely caused by changes in weather patterns; study by the appropriate bodies, with urgency, is among Feingold's suggestions.

A public hearing by the US Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and action by a joint, US-Canadian water management commission are pieces of Feingold's action plan.

Those efforts need to be followed by related activities, and promptly, because some studies to deal with these issues have completion dates five years away.

That's unacceptable.

Legislation to fund a fast-tracked plan to add fill to the damaged St. Clair River needs to be introduced in the Congress, with companion legislation on the Canadian side, too.

The Great Lakes Council of Governors, chaired by Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle, needs to call immediately for the quick adoption of remedial efforts in the St. Clair River, including longer-term, more permanent structural repairs and conservation improvements.

Grassroots organizations need to push for and support a package of legislative and scientific efforts; officials on a bi-partisan basis at the local, state and federal levels need to support these efforts, too.

Doyle and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Chancellor Carlos Santiago should also pledge the resources of UW-M's pioneering Wisconsin Aquatic Technology and Environmental Research (WATER) Institute as a coordinating technical body.

Wisconsin and Milwaukee are perfectly situated to take leadership; if they don't, it's a missed opportunity for the entire Great Lakes region, and certainly for UW-M, which has dreamed of playing a larger research role and now has that chance because of circumstances literally in its front yard.

Curiously, Santiago has pinned his hopes for an upgraded UW-M research identity on building a new engineering center on Milwaukee County-owned land in Wauwatosa, 12 miles from his admittedly-crowded East Side campus.

Yet Santiago admits he has no money to build or staff the proposed new facility, and if he did, then 50-82 acres would never make it onto the tax rolls - - reasons that suggest that his focus on new University bricks-and-mortar miss an important countywide goal.

Enhancing the WATER Institute, an existing UW-M, would be both a quicker and more sustainable win.

Petition Drive, Ads Against British Petroleum Gaining Strength

The Chicago Tribune reports that the petition drive against British Petroleum over the oil company's plan to increase pollution dumping into Lake Michigan is gaining strength.

Picketing at some BP stations in the Midwest has been reported. Ads are running in Chicago, all adding more public pressure to force Indiana officials to rethink and rescind their permission permitting BP to add tons more ammonia and sludge daily to Lake Michigan at the Whiting, IN refinery.

Here's a YouTube posting about this regional outrage, courtesy of US Sen. Dick Durbin, (D-IL).

Wisconsin politicos, some of whom are distrubinglin silent on this crucial issue: Take note: that's leadership!

Do your part: sign an online petition - - one opportunity here - - another here - - and buy your gasoline elsewhere.

George W. Bush: Key Democratic Organizer

Pres. George W. Bush blocks states from extending health insurance to some children.

It's more important to keep as many Americans in their for-profit health care plans than it is to make sure families have affordable health care - - for the kids.

That's keeping your priorities in line.

Watch his few remaining Republican supporters desert him before the 2008 elections.

Watch Karl Rove's "permanent majority" fully disappear.

Water Woes And World-Wide Political Pressures

From Washington, DC to Walworth and Waukesha Counties in Wisconsin, water is emerging as the crucial political issue of the 21st century.

Climate scientists tell The Washington Post that greenhouse gas emissions are altering historic rainfall patterns worldwide, leading to population and political shifts that will get more intense.

This, of course, should be spurring the Great Lakes legislatures to move with a sense of heightened urgency to adopt a pending (since 12/05) regional agreement, the Great Lakes Compact, in order to preserve Great Lakes water through conservation and controlled diversions.

Illinois and Minnesota are the only two of the eight Great Lakes states to have ratified the Compact.

Wisconsin, in past generations a leader in water conservation, has been unable to approve and implement the Compact because developers and politicians in Waukesha County, and their allies in the legislature, have managed to slow the legislative drafting process to a crawl.

Within Waukesha and Walworth Counties, small, localized skirmishes over water have begun to spill over into legal complaints.

Bigger struggles are coming, as the City of Waukesha, having failed to win a Lake Michigan diversion behind closed doors, is likely to seek a large diversion that could be be denied by the State of Michigan.

And that could lead to a court challenge to federal law that gives one Great Lakes state the power to initially block another's effort to move water beyond the boundaries of the Great Lakes basin - - a challenge that could open the Great Lakes to wholesale water withdrawals, without protections, such as returning a like amount to cover the withdrawal and maintain the lakes' levels.

Having the Compact in place would rationalize much of the diversion process.

And it would help protect the Great Lakes as climate change pushes drier areas in the US to look to our region for water supplies.

It's time for citizens and organizations to demand that the legislature pass a strong bill to implement the Great Lakes Compact. Most important for Wisconsin to enforce:

Provisions toughening local community conservation plans, diversion permissions, prohibitions reining in water bottling companies and guaranteeing that the public can intervene in water policy and regulatory disputes.

Details of what should be in that bill, according to a growing number of Wisconsin opinion-makers, conservation and environmental organizations, are here.

State Sen. Lazich Continues Her Assault On The Great Lakes Compact

Though she represents New Berlin, the sole Wisconsin community seeking a diversion of Lake Michigan water, State Sen. Mary Lazich (R) continues her assault on the Great Lakes Compact with three new, blow-up-the-Compact documents (see "The following items distributed at the request of Senator Mary Lazich," under the August 21 meeting heading) delivered to a key state legislative study committee as it prepares for another meeting Tuesday.

The Compact is a multi-state agreement designed to protect and preserve the Great Lakes and rationalize requests to divert its waters beyond the borders of the Great Lakes basin.

The Compact generously includes a relatively easy diversion standard for communities like New Berlin - - while bringing about water conservation and wise water management across the Great Lakes.

What Lazich can't grasp is an essential political and procedural truth about why she should be championing the Compact, not continuing to undermine it:

If the anti-Compact mentality held by Lazich, and her allies in the Waukesha County Chamber of Commerce and the Ohio legislature were to prevail - - and the Compact stalled or died in one or more of the Great Lakes states - - New Berlin and the City of Waukesha could lose access to Great Lakes water because current US law makes diversions much harder, if not impossible to obtain.

The documents that Lazich has sent to the committee have been prepared in Ohio, where like-minded, anti-regionalists are raising off-note, fearsome political issues about sovereignity and property rights to slow down or kill Compact adoption in the Buckeye State.

The leading Ohio opponent of the Compact is State. Sen. Tim Grendell, who told this blog that anti-Compact legislators from across the region will gather this Saturday in Traverse City, MI.

Grendell is the author of one of the Lazich documents, and the recipient of another, the study committee's website indicates.

Lazich had earlier been prodding the committee, which has stalled for a year over various objections and red herrings thrown in by Waukesha County exceptionalists, to study the views of a Colorado legal scholar who has suggested scrapping the pending Compact (nearly five years in the drafting) and starting over.

Now there's a constructive approach!

While there are no doubt interesting ideas in Ohio's legislature and Colorado's academies, it is Wisconsin law and tradition that will guide the Compact committee.

The same goes for a separate bi-partisan committee on the Compact that Governor Jim Doyle set up after the legislative study committee, dominated by Waukesha-area members, was idling to a halt a month ago without having produced a draft bill.

Doyle left Lazich and her obstructionist tactics off the committee, and though she griped about it to the Journal Sentinel, which let her disclose her own powerless in her own words - - "I'm supposed to be the senator representing the area"- - Doyle's call was the right one.

Because what he established was a working group.

Technological Breakthrough! SEWRPC On Internet Video

No...it's not a SEWRPC-produced or supplied service.
Far be it that a multi-million dollar, publicly-funded operation would add live or recorded video to its dreadfully-archaic website, or regular communications services.

This video instead is produced by Gretchen Schuldt, a neighborhood activist and co-founder of Citizens Allied for Sane Highways, which has pushed SEWRPC for years on highway planning and other related matters.

Schuldt (posted here) a recent SEWRPC presentation on economic justice, with responsive comments by ACLU attorney Karyn Rotker, as SEWRPC's Environmental Justice Task Force, (EJTF), was finally called to order after a long delay.

The EJTF is an effort by SEWRPC to address complaints that the planning agency has excluded minority and low-income participation.

Those complaints have dogged the agency for years, and were forcefully communicated at a 2004 Milwaukee public hearing (nicely summarized again by Schuldt) before federal officials who control a key piece of SEWRPC's role and identity - - the ability to review for approval billions in federal highway spending in southeastern Wisconsin.

Note that the response by SEWRPC was to create a citizen task force, not a full-fledged internal committee or an advisory committee. Nor did the SEWRPC effort come with modern communications to publicize the task force's work and enhance its stature.

Upgrading its website (it has no search capability, for example) and adding streaming video for people unable to get to SEWRPC meetings have been suggested to agency officials, with no follow-through.

Sprawl Kills Welsh Heritage In The Kettle Moraine

Mike Johnson of The Journal Sentinel writes eloquently about the loss of Welsh heritage in the Kettle Moraine, as historic structures and farms go the way of subdivisions.

This is what the struggles over land-use, water, and regional planning and decision-making are all about in southeastern Wisconsin: one set of values rolling over another, but with the force of government, tax policy, big banks and political power greased with campaign donations on the prevailing side.

Here's another solid piece of writing about the Kettle Moraine, this time by former Journal Sentinel environmental writer Paul Hayes.

Waukesha County expects to increase its population by more than 40% in the next several decades - - essentially adding close to twice the entire Ozaukee County population within Waukesha County borders.

So goodbye Welsh heritage, and a whole lot more.

Waukesha-Walworth Communities' Water Wars Provoke Legal Action

Several citizens and lake associations in Walworth and Waukesha Counties, frustrated with what they call insufficient regulation by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, have filed a legal document seeking more controls on approvals for new, large wells.

The plaintiffs fear their waters and nearby wetlands are threatened by new, so-called "high-capacity"wells drilled by thirsty and fast-growing neighboring communities.

The DNR has said it is operating within the law; the complainants want more aggressive planning for and oversight of wells based on the state's historic Public Trust Doctrine.

That is the state's constitutional protection of Wisconsin waters in the public interest, and, coincidentally, it is the public trust doctrine that has been raised by some pro-development opponents of the pending Great Lakes Compact to justify their opposition to the eight-state, cooperative agreement

The outcome of the Waukesha-Walworth communities' action could strongly influence development and land-use patterns in southeastern Wisconsin, including where water-based growth and wealth is created, and where water shortages could occur.

It could also lead to court action mandating that the DNR use the public trust doctrine to implement more aggressive regulation of Wisconsin waters - - in the public interest - - and that, in turn, could influence whether Wisconsin would or could support diversion of Great Lakes waters to areas of the state currently forbidden from receiving them.

In December, 2006, Wisconsin Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager issued an opinion that said the DNR did not have the authority to approve a diversion of Great Lakes water to New Berlin or Waukesha without the approval of all eight Great Lakes states' governors.

Lautenschlager now works for the Madison law firm of Lawton & Cates, which has filed the legal papers that call for stronger DNR oversight of high-capacity wells.

What Are Waukesha's Real Water Needs And Goals?

The City of Waukesha touts new data on water conservation, telling the Journal Sentinel the city's lawn-sprinkling restrictions are producing savings.

That's good news, though the data does show usage by some measurements actually increasing.

But Waukesha deserves credit for its ordinance, and a new rate structure that will require some large users to pay a higher rate.

Critics rightly have said the new rate should kick in at a much lower level to have more than symbolic meaning, but the trend is good, especially if the ordinances and rate reforms are given real teeth.

The problem is that while Waukesha says it is embarking on conservation, the volume of diverted water it has eyed from Lake Michigan has grown over the years.

Not long ago, Dan Duchniak, the city's water utility manager, told The New York Times that a diversion of 20 million gallons a day would suffice.

Soon thereafter, attorneys hired by the water utility, using materials prepared by another set of consultants also hired by the water utility, twice confidentially asked Gov. Jim Doyle to approve a diversion of 24 million gallons a day - - 20% more.

(To his credit, Doyle did not act on the request, and its existence was only discovered through a 2006 Open Records request).

So which is it:

Is Waukesha committed to water conservation, or is it committed to obtaining water from Lake Michigan in amounts that seem only to expand?

Or is the water diversion planning serving related goals: saving water, but using the savings politically to achieve eligibility for a much-larger supply of water from the Great Lakes - - access currently blocked by federal law because Waukesha is outside of the boundaries of the Great Lakes basin?

Waukesha could clear up the confusion by addressing these questions:

1. Will Waukesha reduce the 24 million gallon-per-day target to reflect its conservation successes? If its peak demand has fallen to just below 10 million gallons a day, why is it proposing diversions in the 20-24-million gallon-per-day range?

2. Will Waukesha pledge that diverted water will not flow to acreage beyond its current borders, since expansion will only add to the water need?

3. Will the city substantially lower the threshold at which its conservation rate kicks in, and wait an effective period of time to discern if that rate change produces more measurable water savings?

Put together with its sprinkling restrictions, and paired with additional water reuse and recycling techniques, it is conceivable that Waukesha may not need to access Lake Michigan, thus saving the region from a precedent-setting battle over Great Lakes access that could open them to far wider withdrawals.

4. Will Waukesha agree not to participate in regional acquisition or distribution of Lake Michigan water, either on its own as the acquirer and/or supplier, or through a new regional water authority or board similar to those described by a legal consultant to the regional planning commission (SEWRPC)?

(Battles between and among communities in Waukesha and Walworth Counties over surface and ground water have recently provoked what could be a precedent-setting claim for stronger DNR regulations.

A further legal wrinkle: The Attorney General has already ruled, in a little-noticed December, 2006 opinion, that the DNR cannot approve a diversion of Great Lakes water to New Berlin or Waukesha without the prior approval of all the Great Lakes governors.)

This blog is available for a response.

Onion-Like Headline From Local Waukesha Paper: "Condos Eyed For Bait Shop"

A former Village of Pewaukee president who is now a Village trustee eyes a mansion-esque condo redevelopment for Smokey's, his landmark lakeside bait shop.

Journal Sentinel Demands Action On Great Lakes Water Loss

The Journal Sentinel editorial board is correct in calling for quick action to fill and repair earlier dredging in a key Great Lakes waterway that has allowed untold billions of gallons of fresh water - - an estimated 2.25 billion daily - - to flow senselessly into the Atlantic Ocean.

It's another important voice added to others - - this blog included - - demanding more assertive action on the part of Wisconsin officials when it comes to protecting and preserving the Great Lakes.

This is a big issue in Canada, too, where politicians and groups are joining American counterparts looking for decisive, remedial action.

One alternative is to wait for the results of a proposed, three-year study, but the planning to launch the study isn't even completed, meaning there could be a delay of about five years before a plan to plug the drain in the Great Lakes.

That's absurd.

Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle is chairman of the influential Council of Great Lakes governors, and could play a leadership role in fixing this hole in the Great Lakes, if he chose to do so.

The time for action is now.

Michigan Legal Victory Show Wisconsin Can Help Keep Ruinous Pests Out Of The Great Lakes

A federal court ruling upheld Michigan's new law strongly regulating ocean-going ships, and preventing them from releasing invasive species into the Great Lakes.

Invasive species cost all the Great Lakes states' economies; Michigan, tired of waiting for federal controls, went ahead with its own legislation, and its right to take action has now been ruled legal.

This should encourage Wisconsin legislators of both parties to press for similar legislation.

When Las Vegas Runs Dry in 2010, Don't Think The Great Lakes Won't Be Offered As Relief

Some published predictions about the City of Las Vegas running dry (that's water supply, not booze) as early as 2010 ought to be a kick in the pants to Wisconsin water policy obstructionists like State Sen. Mary Lazich, (R-New Berlin), because the more she and her cronies delay the pending Great Lakes Compact from being implemented, the more the Great Lakes are vulnerable to wholesale, even distant diversions.

The diversion protections in the Compact, which are coordinated with conservation practices spelled out in the Compact, function as a plan to reserve Great Lakes water for rational, pragmatic uses in the Great Lakes basin.

Without the Compact - - Lazich is a member of a state legislative study committee tied up in knots for a year over Waukesha County demands for self-interested exemptions and exceptions - - the Great Lakes remain vulnerable to wholesale and thoughtless withdrawals.

Lazich and her allies on the committee and in the Waukesha County Chamber of Commerce are also concerned that Michigan might block a Waukesha County community's request for a diversion.

But the greater threat is that the entire Great Lakes system could be tapped for diversions to faraway locations that could not return any water - - something bad for Waukesha County, all of Wisconsin and the entire Great Lakes region.

Some people have said Las Vegas, or Alabama, are too far to pipe water.

Let's not forget that the same thing was said about piping out Alaskan oil, too.

Battle Against BP Pollution Making Progress: Keep It Up

The pressure from Great Lakes mayors and residents is having an impact on the state of Indiana, where officials had given British Petroleum permission to add tons more pollutants daily to Lake Michigan.

The Detroit Free Press has weighed in editorially, adding an important voice, too.

Continuing pressure is a must; there were various online petition opportunities - - one is here - - and Wisconsin groups and individuals should press their elected officials to join the growing coalition demanding that BP be disallowed from adding more toxins to the very lake that millions depend upon for drinking water, recreation and employment.

Streetcar Derailing A Long-Term Blow To Transit Modernization

Madison will rue the day it put trolley planning aside, in favor of commuter rail, which will help remove some commuter traffic from crowded streets - - and which purportedly frees up spending on social problems that conservatives who hail the death of trolley spending will never allow to be allocated to social problem eradication.

Nor will highway spending ever be held to the same level of scrutiny, or be allocated according to its need and value compared to spending on crime, education and other social priorities.

Rail politics in Wisconsin has made city rail - - light, trolley or hybrid vehicles like those suggested, but also derailed for Milwaukee - - so difficult to achieve that the state's major cities will be the Light-Rail-Free-Zones of the US.

When gasoline breaks $4 a gallon, then $5 in the next five years, the demand for more transit will grow louder.

And Madison, Milwaukee and other short-sighted cities will have no others to blame.

That Now-Infamous List Of 50+ Things You Won't Hear On Talk Radio

Couldn't get to posting it, but go through Paul Soglin's blog for the list of things you won't hear on talk radio.

The Wisconsin blogger Pundit Nation actually comes up first in a Google search on the subject, by the way.

Midwest Bidding War: The Flying Public Could Lose, Shareholders Will Win

The higher the bidding goes for Midwest Airlines, and the holding company that manages the airline, the higher the risk to the flying public and the service that will result when a final bidder is declared.

If AirTran has to pony up tens of millions more, then that is more money it will have to borrow and repay, which could lead to a sale of some Midwest assets, or a discontinuation of some routes.

The winners are the shareholders, and to a degree, state and federal tax collectors eyeing the shareholders' capital gains.

So it goes.

Great Lakes Water Issues Require Doyle's Leadership

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel carries another major piece about falling Great Lakes water levels.

The Corps of Engineers is probably responsible for a portion of the falling levels, but there are other factors - - warming temperatures, thinning winter ice, more rapid evaporation - - so there is a need for coordinated evaluation and action planning to avoid a bad situation getting worse.

And the entire question of the value of the St. Lawrence Seaway, when measured against the costs of the invasive species brought into the Great lakes by ocean-going vessels, should be addressed. Now.

Then there is the ongoing furor over Lake Michigan pollution being allowed to worsen, courtesy of the State of Indiana's permission to British Petroleum allowing added dumping of added daily tons of ammonia and toxic sludge.

Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle is the chairman of the Council of Great Lakes Governors. The Council can focus science, technology and media on the quality and quantity problems now plaguing the Great Lakes.

Other than convening the December, 2005 meeting of the region's governors and Canadian premiers to sign the draft Great Lakes Compact, Doyle has not assertively called the Council to meet and to act.

With serious issues facing tens of millions of Great Lakes residents, and recreation, shipping and fishing economies looking at problems too expensive and expansive to be handled by any one state, Doyle should energize the Council - - and the public - - with an aggressive agenda.

What better time than now?

BP Permit 'Solution:' An Independent Review

Mitch Daniels, The Indiana Governor, dodges responsibility in the BP pollution permit fiasco by asking for an 'independent' review.

This is the oldest dodge in the elected-officials'-in-trouble playbook, right up there with the independent commission.

The review is hardly independent because Governor Daniels appointed the independent reviewer.

Daniels approved the permit. He should have the smarts and political backbone to rescind it. And to say he made a mistake in approving it.

That's the way an elected official make a wrong into a right

That would be leadership.

More On Midwest

It's a little too early to know just what Midwest's future will be. Obviously, with Northwest as a part-owner, there may be less service to some markets out of Milwaukee.

And I suspect that Midwest's identity will be subsumed, but that would have happened with the AirTran buyout, too.

Milwaukee customers might find better international connections through a NWA partnership, as well.

I wasn't a fan of the AirTran takeover. I thought it was getting a plum brandname for a bargain price: take out the thinly-valued AirTran stock, and the company wasn't putting much cash into the deal.

NWA has lost credibility in the business as its ontime departures and other scheduling problems have become well-known. But its money could help keep Midwest afloat until the next shoe drops.

I'm an optimist.

Free Bikes: A Hit in Paris, A Plan for Milwaukee

Ah, you know those French. Never a good idea, right?

Mais non! Turns out, in fact, that the free bike plan instituted recently in Paris is a smash.

So the more modest plan in Milwaukee proposed for 2009 might just be a hit, too.

Tres bien.

Midwest Sale Saga Diverted To New Route

AirTran has pulled out of the negotiations with Midwest, suggesting that a higher price is at hand through another buyer, perhaps Northwest Air Group and another local partner.

So the saga continues, though the future of Milwaukee-based air service is getting really cloudy.

One thing is for sure: the days of the old Midwest are numbered.

Sixth Place Is Not First Or Second

Tommy's electoral and career miscalculation ends in a 6th-place finish in the Iowa Straw Poll for something close to a year's work.

Running for President of the United States is a serious business, and having been Governor of Wisconsin does not translate into a national presence.

The real campaign among authentic candidates can now continue.

Walker Takes Hit In County Board Special Election

It had been called a referendum on Scott Walker's leadership, so the County Executive's power got dialed down when his preferred candidate in a special election went down to defeat in the August 7th, County Board special election.

This led to something predictable from right-wing talk radio: hyperbole that the taxpayer revolt is over!

Which led to the more predictable protestations from talk radio's lock-step blogger devotees that no, the revolt is NOT OVER!

Blah blah blah.

What's more likely is that stage-managing ususally backfires when elected officials try to influence a separate local race.

Walker's pick probably would have had a better chance if he'd just stayed out of the race, but it's hard to resist the King-Maker role.

So congratulations to the winner, Patricia Jursik. The Board needs strong voices that are independent of the County Executive.

Some Good Environmental News In Wisconsin, For A Change

One of the state's leading producers of mercury pollution agrees to cut it out, reports the Journal Sentinel.

That's good news, long overdue - - but don't eat the downstream fish new Port Edwards just yet, says the DNR.

Now to get busy on the rest of the river and lakes polluters - - and the DNR needs to get on the bandwagon to force Indiana to rescind its pollution permit for British Petroleum to drop three tons daily of ammonia and toxic sludge into Lake Michigan.

Indiana Media Question BP Pollution Permit

Major Indiana media are not buying the bogus jobs-creation and-environmental protection arguments put forth by state officials and British Petroleum to justify the higher amounts of pollutants BP will be allowed to dump into Lake Michigan.

Still nothing in objection from Wisconsin's Department of Natural Resources, while Wisconsin and Illinois lakefront Mayors, and the US House of Representatives are loudly saying "no."

The more I think about it, the more my years in city governments and other years covering government for news media tells me that a deal has been cut - - echoing the deal that got made towards the end of the Great Lakes Compact negotiations in 2005 that came up with new categories of communities and counties beyond the Great Lakes basin which would qualify for Great Lakes diversions:

This deal:

Wisconsin says nothing negative about Indiana's actions on behalf of BP, and Indiana says nothing negative about Wisconsin's actions on behalf of Waukesha communities seeking Lake Michigan diversions.

Neither state accuses the other of hypocrisy, or of piling on, and if others object, well, so be it. As deal-making goes, it's pretty standard.

And, hey, if I'm wrong, fine. I'd love to be wrong as can be. Just show me.

Convicted Cops, Political Allies, Continue To Rip Off Milwaukee Taxpayers

The Jude cops figure out a way to extend their unwanted stay on the city payroll.

Thanks to a special law adopted by the legislature just for Milwaukee, convicted cops stay on the payroll until all appeals are exhausted.

Other cities can bounce them much earlier, but the police union pushed through the law, donating to many out-of-city legislators' campaign committees.

The best chance of repealing the law died when GOP Assembly Speaker John Gard, a police-union financed candidate for Congress, dumped the bill into committee, where it died.

The legislature has to repeal this law. It's discriminatory, illogical and wasteful.

Shepherd-Express Calls Out Doyle on BP Pollution

This blog has raised the question several times:

Why is Wisconsin silent on Indiana's permission to British Petroleum to pollute the Lake Michigan water that millions in the region rely upon for their drinking water?

Now the Shepherd-Express asks the question of Gov. Jim Doyle, and his office's response is jaw-dropping.

A New Talk Radio Dynamic: On The Defensive

I caught a bit of Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker on Charlie Sykes' AM 620 WTMJ morning show Friday, and I was struck by a couple of things:

Walker was again defending his actions with regard to the latest County pension scandal. He'd been on the ball, Walker claimed. Had done a lot. Was still peeling back the onion, as if that was aggressive reform.

And explaining, again, why he opposed Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett's downtown trolley plan.

Charlie had earlier bemoaned the election in a special county board election of the lesser-conservative candidate, whom Walker had promoted.

Walker and Charlie were clearly on the defensive. They had seen an election go the other way. Walker has taken a beating on the Journal Sentinel editorial pages over his trolley obstructionism, and still faces long-term political damage over a pension scandal that festered on his watch for five years.

Walker still gets a free ride on conservative AM talk radio, but it's to explain, explain, explain, and justify, justify, justify.

Not to boast, brag, and back-slap.

In politics, continuing to explain yourself is the same thing as admitting you're losing.

I can hear the sound of the air going out of a once high-riding political-and-media balloon.

More Reasons To Avoid Bottled Water

You can believe the spokespeople who say the risks from residual plastic toxins are acceptably low, but those ubiquitous bottles carrying more and more designer brand beverages might not be the best way to get your daily intake of water and other liquids.

Refilling plastic bottles is an especially bad practice, other experts say - - something you can avoid altogether and save money if you just hydrate yourself by enjoying a glass of good, old-fashioned Milwaukee tap water.

Spanish Journal Corrects Crime Story Wrongly Used By Talk Radio

The Spanish Journal newspaper in Milwaukee is helping correct an erroneous story promoted recently by leading right-wing talk show hosts and some blogger devotees that suggested a Milwaukee County Board supervisor provided sanctuary to a young shooting suspect.

It takes relentless community surveillance and fact-checking to counteract the misinformation often spread by the rightist talkers.

Good for the Spanish Journal in helping set the record straight, and to prevent a bad situation from getting worse.

But will the talkers apologize, or just move on to the next subject to be carelessly demagogued?

Gee. What a tough question.

Tommy Thompson's Chutzpah

Tommy got pretty nice coverage in the Journal Sentinel during his erratic, vanity campaign for President of The United States of America.

And why not. He was the hometown guy. Everyone knew his campaign was going nowhere with the likes of Guiliani, Romney and other candidates of articulation, stature and national funding in the race.

But rather than be grateful for paper's Valentines that kept coming his way, Tommy has the temerity to blame the same Journal Sentinel for fund-raising woes that will cost him the Iowa Straw Poll.

The negative stories that Tommy is griping about were generated by the candidate's incurable foot-in-mouth behavior on the stump and in national debates.

He was in way over his head running for President of the United States, and the campaign revealed it.

Campaigns are rough. Losing is no fun. I happen to know a thing or two about that, having around plenty of losing efforts, including my own loss for Mayor of Madison.

But frankly, I'd expected more of Tommy than to fall back on the most tired of political excuses: blame the media.

When it comes right down to it, unless there was a Rovian figure in the background sabotaging your every move, candidates who lose know the loss begins with them/us.

Another Smart, Funny Blog: Illusory Tenant

Great name, too. Check it out.

Tommy's Self-Destructive National Campaign Limping To Merciful Conclusion

Our boy Tommy will have to work long and hard to recover from his misstep into national politics.

An Iowa survey on the eve of the statewide Iowa straw poll, on which Tommy had premised his entire goofy presidential bid, shows him polling somewhere between less than 1% and 2.1% - - generously described in the Journal Sentinel as not getting much traction.

Lautenschlager Rips State For "Do Nothing" Water Policies

Former Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager blasts Wisconsin officials for their "do nothing" policy in the wake of Indiana's permission to British Petroleum allowing its Whiting, IN refinery to increase polluted dumping into Lake Michigan.

Lautenschlager is right about Wisconsin's curious and disappointing silence - - something I had noted on this blog almost two weeks ago.

And Lautenschlager mentions the rush to push Lake Michigan water to some Waukesha County suburbs.

While Attorney General, Lautenschlager issued a 20-page opinion saying the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources did not have the authority to approve any diversions of Lake Michigan water without the approval of the other seven Great Lakes states.

I have several times on this blog pointed to Lautenschlager's December, 2006 opinion - - here is the first mention - - and said repeatedly that its existence has been ignored by mainstream media.

And also by the DNR, which is moving willy-nilly towards approving a Lake Michigan diversion to the City of New Berlin - - a diversion specifically mentioned in Lautenschlager's opinion that would require the other states' approval.

(Lautenschlager is now an attorney in private practice in Madison, and made her remarks in an op-ed published by the Madison Capital Times.)


Todd Ambs, the DNR's lead water policy official, said the agency has no written record of any responses from the other states about the New Berlin proposal, or even summaries of the verbal discussions that occurred.

New Berlin's first application in 2006 was criticized harshly by some of the other states as inaccurate and inadequate.

A coalition of Wisconsin environmental and conservation organizations have urged policy-makers to agree that, prior to any diversion approvals, Wisconsin should adopt a strong version of a pending agreement among the Great Lakes states that would establish first-ever diversion standards, conservation requirements and other rules designed to protect Great Lakes water.

But the DNR continues to move in an opposite direction, declining even to hold a public hearing on the New Berlin application, and scheduling instead a barely-publicized public comment period on the application.

We're left with the DNR's word that the other states said the New Berlin application was acceptable.

So maybe the issue isn't just that the state has a "do-nothing" approach to water policy.

It's a "trust-us-while-we-do-whatever-we-want-behind-closed-doors" policy.

And the DNR wonders why it has become such a target, even from groups who strongly support the agency's resource protection mission?

Iraq 'Timetable:' Moving Target, In Their Own Words

The Atlantic has posted the ever-changing 'timetable' for our adventure in, then departure from Iraq, complete with photos and dates offered by our always-wrong leaders.

The site is here: use the scroll bar at the bottom to move through the months and years.

I-35W Bridge Warnings Were Dire, Ignored, Since 1996

Inspectors' reports reviewed by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune show dire warnings as early as 1996, including a tilting support pillar.

Some will call this finger-pointing.

You know what? Good. It's an object lesson for governments and inspectors and budget officers in and far from Minnesota.

To treat these matters with more of a sense of urgency.

And to redo transportation spending prioritization - - away from building new highways and adding lane capacity, to inspections, follow-through, repairs and replacement of aging facilities.

In other words: "Fix-it-First."

Exxon Begins To See Validity In Global Warming Science, Cuts Off Funding To Opposition Groups

Even Exxon is beginning to see the light, cutting off funding to some of the climate-change denying groups it had earlier funded.

Oil Companies Support Anti-Climate Research, Documents Show

Oil companies have spent at least $16 million on anti-climate change publications that muddy the scientific and public relations' waters, documents show.

Think Tank Offered $10,000 Fee For Climate Change Debunking

The American Enterprise Institute, a conservative Washington, DC think-tank heavily financed by major US oil companies and other businesses, offered a $10,000 honorarium for publication of a climate change debunking report.

The AEI letter with the offer is here.

In a related development, tobacco companies have been funding anti-climate change materials.

Details collected here.

Stop Buying That Expensive And Wasteful Bottled Water

The New York Times provided an excellent editorial a few days ago that laid out the case against our national obsession with bottled drinking water.

For those of you who missed it, or need a few facts to convince your friends to go back to tap water, here it is.

And Wisconsin legislators need to insert strong language into the state's version of the Great Lakes Compact, which allows unlimited diversion of water out of the region in bottles smaller than 5.7 gallons, to close the bottled water loophole.

That loophole allows Nestle to export millions of gallons of water from the Lake Michigan watershed away from the Great Lakes while leaving behind empty Ice Mountain plastic bottles for communities across the country to landfill.

Newsweek Traces Big Corporate Money Behind Anti-Climate Change 'Science'

Exxon and other big companies have been coordinating a self-serving and deceitful movement to create doubt about climate change and global warming.

Newsweek published a cover story to unmask the effort.

See the most recent post's anonymous comment, below, for the effects of that industry-sponsored movement.

Six Miners Trapped In His Utah Mine: Owner Rips Environmentalists Over Global Warming

The Utah coal mine owner who's got six of his employees trapped 1,500 feet underground in a cave-in uses a news conference at the site to go off on environmentalists concerned about global warming.

I figure this "first-things-first" performance - - and a separate denunciation of AP and Fox News for false reporting - - will win him the 2007 Coal Operator of The Year award, for sure.

SEWRPC Backs Away From Power Grab

This blog reported Monday that the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission had sent state officials a proposal to essentially assume all water policy planning power in the region - - and have the Wisconsin Department of natural Resources pay SEWRPC $1.5-$2 million annually to manage the planning and cut other agencies and groups out of the process.

Sunlight and objections from some other parties hurt, apparently:

On Tuesday, SEWRPC sent around a notice that withdrew what is called the "governance" piece of this policy-making approach - - the piece that would have put SEWRPC in charge, even though others want policy-making in the region to be a shared responsibility by a wide group of public, private, and non-profit groups, as endorsed on May 11th by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

With SEWRPC's track record of enabling sprawl, water over-consumption, freeway expansion and farmland conversion, it's the wrong agency to be allowed to assume water management policy in the watersheds in and near Milwaukee, and across southeastern Wisconsin.

By withdrawing the part of the proposal that deals with whom will be in charge, the region buys time to make better decisions, and to be more inclusive in this fundamental planning environment.

Here is the text of the SEWRPC notice sent to the other parties, and internally at SEWRPC:

"MEMORANDUM

TO: SEWRPC Technical Advisory Committee for the Regional Water Quality Management Plan Update for the Greater Milwaukee Watersheds
FROM: SEWRPC Staff

DATE: August 3, 2007

SUBJECT: CONSIDERATION OF PRELIMINARY DRAFT CHAPTER XI, “PLAN IMPLEMENTATION ,” of SEWRPC Planning Report No. 50 (PR No. 50),A Regional Water Quality Management Plan Update for the Greater Milwaukee Watersheds

We have been asked by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD), one of our partner agencies in this planning effort, to withdraw the subsection of Chapter XI entitled Institutional Frameworks for Implementation of the SEWRPC Regional Water Quality Management Plan Update for the Greater Milwaukee Watersheds and Appendix XI-2 “Consideration of Alternatives to the Recommended Plan Implementation Structure,” from consideration by the Advisory Committee at its meeting on August 7, 2007.

The MMSD has suggested, and the SEWRPC staff agrees, that a thorough discussion of the issues raised in that subsection and appendix should be undertaken by the Oversight Committee which was established to review and coordinate issues related to the SEWRPC regional water quality management plan update (208 plan) and the MMSD 2020 facilities plan (201 plan). That Committee includes representatives from the MMSD staff, the WDNR, the 201/208 plan consultant team, and the SEWRPC staff.

Therefore the subject chapter subsection and appendix will not be considered at the August 7, 2007, Advisory Committee meeting. Those documents will be brought back to the Advisory Committee at a later date after the issues are addressed by the Oversight Committee. The other portions of Chapter XI, which can be considered independently of the subject subsection, will be reviewed at the August 7th meeting.

* * *

#129966 V1 - RWQMPU PR-50 CH-11 MEMO TO SEWRPC TAC
300-4001
PCE/MGH/pk."

While Lake Superior Falls, Some Smaller Wisconsin Lakes Disappear

Long Lake in Waushara County is pretty much Gone Lake, reports the Journal Sentinel's Meg Jones, as spring-fed lakes dry up in a continuing drought.

Part of the inland lakes' problem, as also noted in news about Lake Superior's falling levels, is that the air temperatures have trended higher, and that leads to later and thinner winter ice.

So more and more water evaporates.

Which is not good for Long Lake, Lake Superior, or the economies that these bodies of water support.

Maybe it will begin to rain and snow more regularly.

Maybe there will be more planning around conservation and less towards building and consumption statewide.

Maybe the blue-ribbon committees meeting in the State Capitol will get overcome short-sighted business and rightist ideological objections and recommend the adoption of a strong Wisconsin bill to endorse and implement the pending Great Lakes Compact.

That eight-state agreement would set up rules and standards to manage the Great Lakes precisely because the entire Great Lakes watershed is under growing and negative pressures.

We'll see if the politicians in our state can connect the dots.

Or are they comfortable reading about dwindling water resources in a state literally created because of its proximity to the Great Lakes and to land naturally-enriched by streams, rivers, lakes and underground supplies left behind by melting glaciers?

Oy, Vey! Tommy Thompson To Visit Jon Stewart!

Save the date: August 20, 2007:

That's the day that Tommy Thompson, presidential candidate and professed admirer of Jewish money-making, meets Comedy Channel's Jon Stewart, a proud Jewish-American who probably earns more money than our former Governor.

Perhaps Tommy will come away with a few stock tips? Or at least not behave like a schmo.

Highway Lobby Seizing Control Of Highway Spending Issue After I-35W Tragedy

Wisconsin activists are allowing the highway lobby to grab the initiative in the wake of the I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis, using it as an excuse to call for even bigger transportation budgets rather than pressuring the state to make bridge safety, not new highways, the higher priority.

The issue isn't that a relatively small amount of state transportation funding is now moved from its bloated, major-highway intensive building program to other uses.

It's that the major highway building program is already over funded, starving transit, repairs and maintenance.

Activists groups need to be more outspoken, re-emphasizing the "fix-it-first" philosophy.

Gretchen Schuldt at Milwaukee Rising has the analysis and the data to back it up, and Paul Soglin at Waxing America hasn't missed a beat, but where are the state's progressive, grassroots organizations on these issues?

Tracking AirTran's Promises

I was working on this very sort of compilation, but Steve Jagler at the Small Business Times beat me to it with a better piece than I'd have done.

I still think that wiping out a solid brand name and genuinely special air service so shareholders can become instant investors in generic airline is a loss for Milwaukee.

And renaming the Midwest Convention Center the AirTran Center will demote our downtown's meeting and exhibition facility with the fake-named Petco Parks and Safeco Fields of the country.

Not everyone will know what an AirTran is, or why you'd go to a meeting there unless your air-conditioner went on the fritz.

Four Decades After the Urban Riots: Let's Grow The Suburbs Faster?

The Journal Sentinel's retrospective on the '67 riots and what has followed was well-done. I didn't live in Milwaukee 40 years ago, so I found the reporting valuable.

I wonder if the solution to the poverty that has persisted since then is best found in moving more jobs, housing, highway systems and Lake Michigan water to the suburbs and neighboring cities, villages and towns?

Tommy Thompson Home Page Photos

Maybe it's the lighting, but in some of these pictures and videos, Tommy looks like he's got some kind of 'dark hair on top, white sidewalls/near-Mohawk' hairstyle going.

Here's the full picture album.

Lake Superior's Problems Underscore Need For Great Lakes Stewardship

I used my slot on the Madison Capital Times op-ed pages to describe some of the problems facing Lake Superior.

My goal goes beyond helping to get the word out about Lake Superior's troubles.

I'm arguing that Lake Superior's historic decline should stop those (State Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin, the Waukesha Chamber of Commerce, the Metropolitan Builders Association, et al) who support eased Lake Michigan diversions before standards and proven conservation policies in the Great Lakes Compact are put in place by the Wisconsin legislature.

Check Great Lakes Water Levels On This Website

More and more stories are cropping up about the drop in Lake Superior's water level.

This US Army Corps of Engineers website allows you to type in several variables, including the year and the lake, among the Great Lakes, to see the patterns for yourself.

Minneapolis Star-Tribune Writer Offers Powerful Bridge Collapse Column

Nick Coleman's piece after the I-35W bridge collapsed speaks many truths, especially to the "no-new-taxes" crowd.

Charlie Sykes Rips County Officials in Pension Scandal, Overlooks The County Executive

Charlie Sykes, the lead conservative AM radio talker at 620 WTMJ - - and, not coincidentally, also the major media creator and protector of County Executive Scott Walker - - has managed to scold all the parties involved in the ongoing county pension scandals - - except Scott Walker, county exec since 2002.

How convenient.

Imagine the coordinated GOP/rightwing radio and blog blitz that would have been launched against Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett - - a Democrat - - if a potential $50 million liability were discovered having festered on his watch.

Nothing could have contained the outrage.

But Walker is a Republican, and the Right does not hold its own accountable, whether it's Scott Walker on the local level, or George Bush nationally.

The Right only has one standard of judgement - - the double standard: Democrats can do nothing right and Republicans can do nothing wrong.

Here's One Really Insightful Comment On The I-35W Bridge Collapse

I excerpted this from a comment on an earlier post of mine about the Minnesota bridge collapse.

"Next to 35W is the 10th Avenue bridge, completed in 1929. On the other side is a railroad bridge completed in 1887. Both are still standing while the collapsed 35W barely lasted 40 years. The Romans invented the keystone arch 2000 years ago and many of their bridges are still standing."

As the commentor asks: why can't an Interstate Highway bridge last more than 40 years?

New SEWRPC Power Grab For Even Wider Regional Water Management

The Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission is at it again.

The result is going to be more sprawl - - endorsed and directed by non-elected officials who spend taxpayers money with virtually no oversight.

If SEWRPC is allowed to seize control of water management policy in southeastern Wisconsin, the taxation without representation that finances and operates SEWRPC will guarantee that sprawl and resource waste will become the region's signature planning outcome.

And efforts at the State Capitol by two working committees to draft comprehensive water policy planning for the state, then codify it in the Great Lakes Compact, will be skewed towards diversions of Lake Michigan water throughout southeastern Wisconsin - - away from water conservation and management - - arranged or blessed by SEWRPC.

That's too much power for a regional planning commission made up of 21 appointed commissioners, none of which represent the City of Milwaukee, which is also the largest municipality in the region and the most likely sought-after source of Lake Michigan water by suburban communities.

What is this all about, this inside baseball being conducted by inter-agency memo?

Read on:

Not content with guiding a regional water supply study that points to an inevitable recommendation to create a new regional, SEWRPC-defined authority that could distribute Lake Michigan water to sprawl-driven communities - - details here - - SEWRPC is now pushing to be in charge of who gets to implement a coordinated water management plan for the Milwaukee-area watersheds - - an area that extends beyond SEWRPC's seven-county region (Milwaukee, Waukesha, Washington, Ozaukee, Kenosha, Racine and Walworth).

The Journal Sentinel had editorially endorsed enthusiastically in May an inclusive planning effort for the watersheds' water quality and treatment plan that involved representatives from several community groups, business leaders, and University scientists.

The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage Commission, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and SEWRPC would play prominent roles in support of the effort with technical staff and resources from their respective agencies.

And that could work together to meet the goal of better, coordinated water quality management for polluted runoff and traditional, so-called "point" sources, like wastewater runoff in the region.

Not so fast to such an alternative, inclusive planning process, SEWRPC documents show.

SEWRPC has told state officials in a draft document - - SEWRPC Planning Report No. 50, A REGIONAL WATER QUALITY MANAGEMENT PLAN UPDATE FOR THE GREATER MILWAUKEE WATERSHEDS, Chapter XI PLAN IMPLEMENTATION - - that it wants control over the process.

Why:

In part, I am told, because SEWRPC is fed up with public criticism and the involvement of other organizations that the agency feels are on its regional planning turf.

So the import of the recommendation to DNR is:

We're in charge; everyone else can buzz off - - but SEWRPC expects the DNR to get state law changed to get SEWRPC broadened powers, and to pay SEWRPC to do the work, the SEWRPC proposal says, to the tune of $1.5-$2 million annually.

A revenue stream, which, by the way, would cover many SEWRPC operating expenses as the water supply funding dollars wind down.

(The funding proposal comes at p. 138 of the draft document, below:

"Accordingly, it is recommended that the WDNR [Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources] seek increased direct State funding of all continuing area-wide water quality management planning efforts in the State. The amount to be secured for each designated management agency should be based upon an agreed-upon overall work program prepared and approved annually, and should be related to the budget cycle currently followed by the State. Based on recent SEWRPC budgets for water quality planning, the great majority of which has come from the seven-county property tax levy and service contracts, it is estimated that about $1.5 to $2 million would be required to adequately fund continuation of the ongoing SEWRPC water quality planning work along with the expanded program envisioned under the regional water quality plan update implementation recommendation. " )

If approved by the DNR, to which SEWRPC recently delivered it, the same old-boy network of behind-the-scenes SEWRPC planners and their favored consultants - - the same crew that has given the region sprawl, farmland eradication, water over-consumption and overbuilt freeways - - will ultimately control water delivery and treatment options in a huge portion of southern and eastern Wisconsin.

Because whomever controls the water (both supply and treatment) controls development - - much the way railroad control guided development in an earlier era.

From the report's final index is this summary of the powerful, SEWRPC-created agency it envisions:

"A regional water quality authority would be an umbrella organization established to oversee all significant water quality-related activities in a watershed or group of watersheds. Such an authority could raise revenue through taxation, special assessments, sewerage service charges, and issuance of revenue and/or general obligation bonds, or could be funded by the State or the municipalities in the watershed(s)...in addition, the authority could have the power to enact ordinances to control nonpoint sources of water pollution that are generally not currently directly regulated by ordinance, including agricultural sources."

A short Q and A.:

Q. What do you think will be the outcome of that kind of 'planning,' and implementation.

A. More sprawl, and less public input, with the shots being called from SEWRPC's inaccessible Pewaukee headquarters - - an office building, by the way, that it bought in a no-bid purchase from one of its favored contractors, Ruekert & Mielke, the same firm that is managing the ongoing water supply study, and which wrote the New Berlin application for diverted Great Lakes water.

All in all: The DNR and the public is looking at a SEWRPC-power grab, funded by state taxpayers, contained in an obscure SEWRPC planning document, that cuts most groups out of what could and should be a very public and inclusive process.

You gotta admit it: SEWRPC does have nerve, but it has shown that it knows how to work the system to get what it wants.

In order to fully fund the three-year, million-dollar water supply study, it pulled $260,000 in Milwaukee County funds in 2004 out of an obscure, public-private mapping committee's account that is gathered from county deed registration fees.

Kurt Bauer, SEWRPC emeritus director, contractor and chairman of the SEWRPC water supply advisory committee also chaired the mapping committee and supported moving the money to SEWRPC, records show.

So don't underestimate SEWRPC's ability to play the inside, bureaucratic game, especially if funding and budgets are involved.

Final thoughts:

1. The DNR would be crazy to endorse the SEWRPC power play, and if does, the DNR would sacrifice what remains of its credibility in southeastern Wisconsin. The DNR's indifference to air pollution and suburban diversions of Lake Michigan water have left the agency on the thinnest public relations and policy-making ice possible in southeastern Wisconsin.

2. Instead of letting SEWRPC take charge of all water planning in the region, the DNR and regional officials should advise SEWRPC that it needs to better coordinate transportation, land-use, and housing recommendations (SEWRPC has not written a housing plan for the region since 1975).

3. The DNR and all the other organizations with an interest in these issues should work on water management matters together.

Conclusion:

SEWRPC can be at the table, but they should not be put in charge, and the DNR needs to make that crystal-clear.

Bush May Veto Great Lakes Cleanup Funding

Media are reporting that President Bush may veto funding for Great Lakes cleanup and related water quality projects.

Hey, why bother with any domestic spending?

But there's money enough for $12 billion a month for the Iraq and Ahghanistan wars - - which means the Great Lakes and its neighbors can continue to fend off Asian carp and literally eat mercury, ammonia and every other pollutant dumped into the lakes by Bush's corporate allies.

New Progressive Blogger/Veteran Labor Voice Joins The Fray

Check out Roger Bybee's Bread and Roses blog, here.

Xoff - - Mayor Nelson Internet Tilt

Pete Kennedy's now-infamous anti-Milwaukee screed has spun off an op-ed from Waukesha Mayor Larry Nelson, and a response from Bill Christofferson.

Because Bill's response contains the full text of Mayor Nelson's remarks in text, I can get you into the debate most easily at Bill's blog, here.

A few thoughts of my own:

Kennedy's rant was over-the-top, and with parts correctly labeled "gutter" by Mayor Nelson.

You can access Kennedy's remarks here, where I also had my say on Kennedy's demagoguery.

I don;t agree with Mayor Nelson that Bill's response to what Kennedy needlessly stirred up was in any way the equivalent.

But I was glad to see Nelson getting involved, standing up for Milwaukee and not sticking it to us.

Bill's analysis of the cities and the region is right on, and again shows Kennedy, a former Waukesha Freeman editor, to be the small thinker in this debate.

Safety Fixes For Nation's Bridges = 22 Weeks Of War Spending

Last October, USA Today said that the cost of upgrading all troubled bridges in the country was $63 billion.

The current cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is $12 billion a month, which means all the country's bridges could be made safer by the end of January, 2008.

Think this won't emerge as a major presidential campaign issue?

Former Ashland Mayor Endorses Strong Great Lakes Compact

Fred Schnook, the former Mayor of the City of Ashland, WI, establishes himself as one of the most articulate proponents of why a strong Great Lakes Compact is an absolute necessity for Wisconsin and the Great Lakes states.

His op-ed in the Ashland Daily Press is required reading for Wisconsin legislators, the Doyle administration and others trying to get the Compact - - in a strong and useful version - - through the legislature.

Online Petition Opportunity To Oppose Oil Company Pollution Of Lake Michigan

A Wisconsin environmental organization has created an online opportunity for citizens to register opposition to British Petroleum's plan to add tons of additional ammonia and sludge to Lake Michigan at the BP Whiting, Indiana refinery.

Citizens across the state and region area ahead of Wisconsin's state government, which has yet to announce any pressure against Indiana to rescind its permitted pollution increase to BP.

Bridge Collapse Underscores Need for Maintenance, Not New Construction

Wednesday's collapse of the I-35W span in the Twin Cities underscores the need for a major change in the way federal and state transportation funds are spent.

The solution: Stop adding more highways and widened lanes, and instead aggressively maintain the facilities we have.

In our state, 1000 Friends of Wisconsin, and CASH - - Citizens Allied for Sane Highways, led by Story Hill neighborhood activists Gretchen Schuldt and Robert Trimmier - - have been making this case for years, but politicians and the highway lobby and the regional planning commission (SEWRPC) have been going in the opposite direction.

(A 2006 US government compilation says that there are 1,335 structurally-deficient bridges in Wisconsin. On the chart in that compilation, "SD" means structurally-deficient, which the Federal Highway Administration defines this way: "Structural deficiencies are characterized by deteriorated conditions of significant bridge elements and reduced load-carrying capacity.")

But politicians love to announce a new bridge or road in their districts. Contractors make more money on new projects than maintaining older ones, and in concert with developers and subdividers, prefer new construction to the less expensive, less remunerative and more tedious business of inspections, maintenance and repairs.

So everyone at the top gets paid and paid-off, but the paying public gets short-changed in the long run.

Many bridges in the US share the same problematic deficiency rating that characterized the I-35W.

One major national study found a number of states with a significant number of bridges rated structurally-deficient, yet billions nationally in bridge repair spending went unused because states preferred to use transportation dollars on new projects.

Oklahoma was at the top of that ten-worst list, with 33.5% of its bridges structurally-deficient, whereas the national average was put at 14.2%, according to the report issued by the authoritative Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP).

Minnesota and Wisconsin were not on that ten-worst list for structurally-deficient bridges, but nearby Iowa and Michigan were.

(Wisconsin finds itself on two other top-ten negative lists compiled by the STTP, and both indicate low rating for air quality, telling us something again unsettling about the way that public funds are used, or not, on infrastructure improvements in Wisconsin.)

One STTP list showed Wisconsin spent relatively less of its transportation dollars on projects to reduce traffic congestion and improve air quality. The spending figure for Wisconsin was 20% less than the national average, which means fewer bike paths or other transit-related or pollution-control programs were financed here.

The second list showed an increase in exposure to bad air quality days in Wisconsin, when the national average actually improved slightly, even if the improvement in California, where most of the nation's air cleanup is occurring, was removed from the national data.)

But back to spending on road repairs: Minnesota allocates much of its transportation system maintenance dollars regionally because of political pressures, so portions of the system most in need of repair do not get attention when needed.

The rough pavement west of the Wisconsin border at LaCrosse on I-90 is a perfect example.

The regional allocation system in Minnesota maintenance and repair funds that could improve I-90 has been ticketed for use elsewhere in the state, a knowledgeable state source has told me.

Some years ago, a national study found Wisconsin the 8th worst state in the country for annual vehicle repair costs due to bad roads - - something of a hidden tax on motorists in states where road repairs were insufficient.

Even earlier, back in 1997 and the heyday of big spender Tommy Thompson's road-building binge, Mike Ivey of the Capital Times complained that the state's diversion of road repair funds into new highway projects was forcing us to drive on sub-standard infrastructure.

It's an old story.

It's all a matter of priorities. Wisconsinites and Americans everywhere need to get them changed across the country.

If we fail, there will be more tragedy and costs, like those now now burdening Minnesota, as well as the everyday nickle-and-diming of motorists in Wisconsin and elsewhere - - all traceable to upside down transportation spending that turns the logical "Fix-it-First" mentality to one of "Later-for-That."

Final note: Last October, USA Today said that the cost of upgrading all troubled bridges in the country was $63 billion.

Current cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: $12 billion a month, which means all the country's bridges could be made safer by the end of January, 2008.

Think this won't emerge as a major presidential campaign issue?

Tail Wags The Dog At Pabst Farms Interchange

Could there be a worse example of poor land-use and transportation planning coordination than the scramble to find millions in state funds to hurriedly build an I-94 interchange for the proposed, upscale shopping mall at Pabst Farms?

Suppose the 1,600-acre 'planned community' had two malls? Or some other big attraction. Would the state revise its transportation budgets for a second interchange?

Maybe while the state is busy searching for available millions, it could throw in a helipad for the helicopter commuters now whirring through the Waukesha County skies, too.

After all, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation says it's for mixed, multi-modal transportation schemes, so why not put in a full-blown airfield, since Crites Field is, what, a distant ten miles away?

It seems we have highway expansion now "on demand" for certain transportation needs, and the priorities are getting clear..

Downtown Milwaukee can't get a rail loop begun after more than a decade of planning - - with the full process - - meetings, designs, charettes, hearings and various iterations of inter-governmental discussions.

But state planners say they should be able to find by next year the $20-30 million needed to help shoppers get to a Crate and Barrel in Western Waukesha County. It took them just a few months to get cracking and find the dough.

That's regional planning for you.

Walker's Lame Defense On Pension Scandal During His Tenure

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker explains his asleep-at-the-switch behavior as pension outrages occurred on his watch - - with a self-serving email to AM 620 WTMJ talk show host Charlie Sykes (proving a point I made in separate posts about Walker's joined-at-the-hip relationship with rightwing talk radio on transit issues.)

The full text is reprinted below.

In the email, Walker blames "bureaucrats," a focus-group tested canard if there ever was one, but one usually aimed by an outsider to government (perhaps even one seeking the mantle of "reformer"), and not by the incumbent who has been in charge of those bureaucrats for the last five years.

He blames himself a bit - - for not being cynical enough when it comes to the machinations of these evil bureaucrats.

And Walker falls back on the weakest of responses to a genuine problem - - the appointment of a yet another task force. A task force to do his job: lead, root out corruption, waste and insider self-service, and then governing.

Separately, Walker made much the same case to the Journal Sentinel, which broke the story about the discovery of what could be a $50 million obligation to the county pension fund and/or county taxpayers because special pension eligibility and extra retirement benefits were allowed to about 500 county employees.

The full text of his email to Sykes follows - - with one insert because the text cries out for correction. I've italicized it in brackets so no one will think Walker wrote it):

"Charlie,

Sorry I did not get a chance to email you sooner as I was camping with my sons’ Scout troop in northern Wisconsin over the weekend and just got back last night.

First, we made a mistake in not pursing more information on the buy back/in program when it came to light in once case involving Sue Baldwin’s former employment with Milwaukee County. Based on the information we had at the time, we believed that it involved special treatment given to her by the past administration.

Our mistake was in not being more cynical about the possibility that others had dreamed this up and let a larger group know about it.

The people who are wrong in this are the bureaucrats who dreamed it up and enacted it without formal approval from the former pension board.
By the time Baldwin was no longer an employee, the person most responsible for this idea was out of the county government.

The issue next came to light in 2005, when another individual sought to get the approval of the new pension board to do what Baldwin did. They were surprised and said no and took action to end the program, but they did not understand the IRS implications.

Earlier this year, the pension board was given information about the IRS issues. They and our administration agreed that the county must self-report to the IRS. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel does a good job of explaining the issue and of looking into the details.

To see if there are more land minds in the retirement system, I am putting together an independent panel to review all areas and make recommendations on further changes.

The reforms we made to the pension board were done to guarantee financial literacy, insure independence and to prevent the concentration of power. In the past, the County Executive controlled the pension board and that left the door open for trouble like this.

Finally, we addressed the pension issues that were presented in the 2002 and 2004 elections. We got waivers from cabinet, executive and new employees.

[Now hold on. Waivers were not gained from all employees, as claimed, and promised earlier. Only after Walker opponent David Riemer called Walker on the issue in the 2004 campaign did Walker get all the waivers, the Journal Sentinel reported.]

We ended the backdrop for non-represented employees years ago and finally got the last union to agree to the cap.

We enacted reforms to the pension board so new benefit proposals get a through review in the future and we proposed a plan to remove the unfunded liability of the pension system.

Still, we have work to do as it becomes clear that previous administrations left even more land minds in the system than we originally thought when we first came into office.

Unlike the people of Milwaukee County (for whom I am eternally optimistic), many of the bureaucrats from the past require me to be completely cynical about there [sic] actions and motives.

Unlike the pension enhancements that were approved in the fall of 2000 where there is clear evidence that several actuaries mislead the county, this issue seems to be enacted with clear intent and with a disregard for the future.

Scott"

"Healthy Wisconsin" Gets National Exposure

The American Prospect magazine runs a piece on the Wisconsin health care reform plan that has passed the State Senate.

In the long effort to bring sanity and fairness to the country's health care chaos, Wisconsin's initiative is playing a valuable role.

More Air Quality Problems For Lakeshore Counties

Some have argued that the air is getting cleaner and healthier in southeastern Wisconsin, or that air pollution is the price we have to pay for job growth in the region, but no matter how you 'see' it, not everyone should go outside in the lakeshore counties today, according to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.

UPDATE: The DNR has expanded the scope of the air quality watch for Thursday, with the following information:

"The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is issuing an Air Quality Watch for Both Ozone and Particulates effective Thursday, August 02, 2007 12:01:01 AM through Thursday, August 02, 2007 11:59:59 PM for:

Brown, Calumet, Columbia, Dane, Dodge, Door, Fond du Lac, Green Lake, Jefferson, Kenosha, Kewaunee, Manitowoc, Milwaukee, Outagamie, Ozaukee, Racine, Rock, Sauk, Sheboygan, Walworth, Washington, Waukesha and Winnebago counties."

State Assembly Endorses Dumb Growth

How else can you interpret the GOP-run Assembly's plan to exempt 87% of the state's land mass from comprehensive land-use planning requirements as conservative legislators try to roll back the state's Smart Growth policy?

1000 Friends of Wisconsin has the details, complete with contact-your-legislator directions.

Gard To Run For Congress Again? Bad Timing

A top GOP party official thinks former State Assembly Speaker John Gard will run for Congress, trying to unseat incumbent Democrat Dr. Steve Kagan, who defeated Gard for the office in 2006.

Kagan won, in part, because Democrats were scoring big nationally in 2006, and 2008 will be an even bigger year for Democrats.

Which doesn't bode well for Gard and other Republicans.