As spiking oil prices makes city living more attractive, Milwaukee's Urban Ecology Center on the Milwaukee River is showing the documentary film "Escape From Suburbia" this Tuesday night.
Great timing.
The Urban Ecology Center is one of Milwaukee's genuine treasures.
Program details here.
Last Sunday, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Sunday Crossroads section published an op-ed I wrote about the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (SEWRPC).
I argued that the agency was a bad deal for Milwaukee because, by law, its 21 commissioners represent seven Milwaukee-area county governments, but the City of Milwaukee, with more people than four of the seven SEWRPC counties combined) Kenosha, Walworth, Ozaukee and Washington), gets no commission seats, and thus no voice in the direction of the agency.
I called that taxation without representation, and it's a sad and true fact.
It's why SEWRPC has a suburban and exurban planning focus, and why it wrote for the state transportation department a $6.5 billion freeway rebuilding and expansion plan - - implemented in the Marquette Interchange since 2004, and scheduled soon to begin $1.9 billion in spending on I-94 south from Milwaukee to Illinois - - without dedicated dollars for new transit lines.
SEWRPC receives a big chunk of its operating budget every year from property tax payments transferred from the seven counties: Milwaukee city residents pay about half of Milwaukee County's annual tax transfer - - the largest of those paid annually by the seven counties - - yet the Pewaukee-based agency is physically and functionally isolated from the city of Milwaukee.
None of the SEWRPC senior staff have City of Milwaukee addresses or are minorities, according to agency records.
Milwaukee's urban needs and its low-income and minority residents just don't show up on SEWRPC's radar.
Another example:
In 2007, SEWRPC established an Environmental Justice Task Force to provide guidance to the agency on issues of importance to low-income and other inadequately-represented groups.
It set up the task force - - not a full-fledged SEWRPC committee - - after the agency was chastised at a 2004 federal highway hearing for ineffective outreach that excluded or discounted the participation by minority residents from regional planning.
So it took about three years, but SEWRPC finally set up something to facilitate the participation, albeit only wuth a task force, by excluded groups.
Will it be a real, functioning, partner with and inside SEWRPC, or is it more show than substance - - a sounding board, perhaps, but without actual power?
An early clue:
SEWRPC did not honor a task force request to allow it a meaningful voice in the agency's recently completed fast-tracked/no-search/no-public input hiring 'process' in which the agency named an insider as the next Executive Director.
The task force said, "hold on, slow down."
SEWRPC's executive committee - - a real committee made up of commissioners - - went ahead and made the hire.
Because that's the way SEWRPC has always hired the boss, the agency explained. It has had three executive directors since it was founded in 1960.
Bold and open are not the agency's style when it comes to leadership succession, or advice from the outside world, where citizen-taxpayers live and send in the budget.
So I argued that after being in business for 48 years, and having failed to write a housing plan for the region in 33 years (back when Gerald Ford was president) - - but recommending the construction of 120 miles of additional freeway lanes that will induce traffic, that will fuel sprawl and will be built- - it was time for Milwaukee, city or county, or both, to start fresh in the regional planning business.
That meant taking advantage of state law allowing a municipality to withdraw from an existing regional planning body and to petition the Gobernor to create a new one - - a Milwaukee-based and focused regional planning agency that redefines regionalism, and does not blow it up.
And that could put transportation, housing and other planning needs at the top of an agenda.
An urban agenda.
There are two pieces in response to my last Sunday's op-ed in the current Sunday, June 15th Crossroads.
An editorial acknowledges some of SEWRPC's short-comings, but suggests that Milwaukee removing itself from the agency would be a bad idea.
You can read the editorial here.
The paper also published a response to my op-ed signed by the seven county executives in the SEWRPC region.
Frankly, it struck me as wasteful of these elected officials' time and energy. though I agree with the headline, "Region must use planning to work for the benefit of all."
My point, exactly.
I had opined that a new planning commission focused on Milwaukee, city or county, could actually do that and strengthen regionalism, too.
I believed a new structure, patterned after what is in place in Dane County and Madison, would put Milwaukee on a par with the rest of the region.
That's because counties like Walworth, Washington, Ozaukee and much of Waukesha, Racine and Kenosha have more in common with each other - - rural land, working farms, smaller populations, relatively few minorities - - than they have with Milwaukee County and especially the City of Milwaukee and its 600,000+ residents.
The county executives, in their group op-ed, would have none of it.
Anyway: You can read what they signed, here.
Four final thoughts:
1. If there's a continuing conversation to be had on any of these issues, I'm in.
2. More people should join the discussion.
3. The seven county execs signing a joint op-ed supporting the status quo reinforces my belief that the counties support regional planning that keeps the City of Milwaukee in a secondary position, and holds back the region, too.
4. In state law, Milwaukee is referred to as a city of the first class.
At SEWRPC, Milwaukee is a second class citizen, and that's why its a bad deal for the city.
You can't build your way out of highway congestion by adding more lanes. All you get is induced traffic, and more motorists.
Similarly, you can't drill your way to more oil and expect the price to drop, as some hope will happen now that Saudi Arabia may increase oil production.
Psychologically, that may cause oil prices to dip - - temporarily. But adding supply will only stimulate more driving here, and certainly more buying for motorists being added by the thousands daily in China and India, to name but two expanding markets.
Throw in a falling dollar and speculation, and, well, forget it.
Alternative energy production, conservation, transit expansions - - these will reduce consumption, and air pollution, too.
Don't be fooled by the Saudi oil ploy, if it happens. The Saudi royal family will still scoop up more US consumer dollars, and in the end, gasoline prices will respond to the increased - - I'd argued induced demand - - and prices will soon be higher than they are now.
There will be more interest in transit, especially from people with long commutes from areas not served by decent transit as gas prices rise and motorists want alternatives denied them by one-dimensional planning.
Transit should be a bi-partisan, non-partisan issue, and as I have argued repeatedly, it's a great failing that the state and regional planning commission (SEWRPC) have given us a 25-year-highway expansion and rebuilding plan in the seven-county Milwaukee area that costs $6.5 billion, but is without new transit systems.
The Capital Times makes the same point.
The more support for transit as a needed public service - - commuter rail/light rail/buses - - the better the chance that transit improvements are possible.
Milwaukee and the area are ready for change, and the Multimodal station is in place.
Allies are always welcomed.
I had posted earlier about the continuing uproar at the Chuck E. Cheese on Bluemound Rd. in the Town of Brookfield, where out-of-control grownups were provoking police calls and raining on the kids' birthday parties.
Sanity prevails; the chain announced it was giving up its liquor license.
Score one for a safer and more friendly environment at the restaurant and on the area roads.
In the wake of the June floods, Clean Wisconsin has released a link to its 2007 Global Warming report.
Clean Wisconsin reiterates that predicted impacts of global warming are happening sooner than many had thought.
Other related materials are here, including my suggestion that when the emergencies are over there be a serious examination of land-use in southern Wisconsin - - wetlands and farm land losses, for example - - and the possible impact on uncontrollable stormwater runoff.
A referendum on financing Milwaukee County transit with a half-cent sales tax (and a companion deduction in transit-supporting property taxes) has the support of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
That's good.
And should the presidential election spur the big City of Milwaukee turnout that is probable, a referendum on a service vitally important to city residents should benefit from being on the November ballot.
That being said, referendum questions are more likely to win approval if there is an organized, coordinated, well-financed television-heavy campaign, so the work in getting a referendum question approved is no small feat.
Dave Dempsey has posted an explanation of the push in Michigan for a strong bill to implement the Great Lakes Compact with the Public Trust Doctrine as the guide.
That doctrine, dating back before statehood to the Northwest Ordinance, places an obligation on government to recognize water as a public resource protected in trust for the people.
Wisconsin's constitution incorporates the doctrine, and state law, including the recently-passed bill to implement the Compact here, does the same.
The issue, whether in Great Lakes diversion permissions or numerous other water questions in the state is, and will continue to be, just how vigorously the doctrine is enforced.
Sometimes the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources does a solid job with its enforcement role, and sometimes not.
Local governments have to be involved, too.
Allowing Summerfest to close access to Lake Michigan during festivals is an outrageous violation, though there is now circuitous access to the lake on sidewalks and paths provided by the new state park behind the festival grounds.
It was a creative, but expensive, solution.
The recent ban on fishing along a stretch of the Rock River in Fort Atkinson on a publicly-financed riverwalk weakens the doctrine.
And some communities in Waukesha County have limited access to lakes through parking restrictions, violating the doctrine's spirit.
It's refreshing to see former Michigan governors in both parties urging strong legislation to elevate the value of the Public Trust Doctrine.
This bi-partisan spirit was missing from portions of the Compact approval debate in both Ohio and Wisconsin, where false fears about property and water rights were used as obstacles to smooth legislative processes.
The objectors did not carry the day.
Last Sunday I wrote an op-ed in the Journal Sentinel Crossroads section explaining how Milwaukee's lack of representation on the regional planning commission's 21-member board has left Milwaukee and urban issues discounted.
It's a taxation-without-representation and discriminatory arrangement and Milwaukee should begin the legal processes to remove itself, or Milwaukee County, from the commission.
Now we learn that a separate state legislative study committee to be appointed to look at the issue of regional transportation authorities - - a possible breakthrough means of saving and expanding transit in Milwaukee - - also under-represents Milwaukee.
Same issue. Same problem. Different venue.
It's an unacceptable situation at the regional planning commission (SEWRPC), and it's wrong for the State Legislature and its study committee appointing process - - designed to produce legislation - - to follow a similar, discriminatory path.
Brookfield's Mayor is practicing an odd form of intergovernmental relations.
1. I didn't know such a thing a thing existed until...
2. I saw a college-age kid driving one down my UW-M neighborhood street, then turning onto a major boulevard, thus proving two things:
3. I don't get out enough, I guess, and...
4. Wisconsin's obsession with beer and driving knows no bounds.
After the rains stop, and after the basements dry out, and when concern and assistance can turn to longer-range planning and action, communities west to east, and particularly in hard-hit southeastern Wisconsin, need to begin addressing a serious question:
Is there a relationship between the June flooding damage and the development that converted porous, rain-absorbing farmland and green space to impervious parking lots, streets, driveways and other materials that then pushed rain and surface water faster into storm drains, culverts, streams, rivers and lakes - - and then into homes and downtowns?
Given predictions in recent years of more routine heavy rain events in the upper Midwest in a warming climate environment, assessing the situation with land-use patterns as an overlay would make a lot of sense.
Much the way that land-use and development patterns have been studied in the wake of western and southern states' increasing problems with water shortages and forest fire damage.
The blog Wisconsin Truth Watch raised this matter several weeks ago in what is now a very prescient post.
Paul Soglin wondered about the land-use issue the other day as he drove back to Madison from Milwaukee and noted the high levels of water.
How much flooding is the result of heavy rain, and how much is related to the way the heavy rain runs off?
Good question.
And not surprising coming from a former long-term Mayor.
But are other officials making these connections, or raising the questions?
Local, state and federal officials are busy with the present emergency.
And that's exactly as it should be.
That's why I said at the beginning that when things calm down, let's make sure other questions get asked and answered.
I would propose an independent study - - and I would think that the UW-M WATER Institute, with its experts and data bases and unimpeachable credibility is in a perfect position to carry it out.
A Milwaukee County Board committee has endorsed an eventual referendum that, if approved by voters, would replace $65 million in property tax spending on the failing bus system with an identical sum of money raised by a half-cent sales tax.
It's a tax switch, not a new tax on top of an old one.
Positioning himself for a 2010 Republican Party candidacy for Governor,, and aligning himself with the anti-tax/anti-transit talk radio cabal, County Executive Scott Walker has promised to veto the plan and keep it off the ballot.
Walker's opposition is unconscionable, given the bus system's decline as a county asset on his now six-year watch, and its importance to hundreds of thousands of county residents.
The plan is a practical way to provide the bus system with a revenue stream for operations and equipment that does not burden property taxpayers.
Most cities already finance their transit systems without relying on the property tax - - a known regressive fiscal tool.
A sales tax also brings in revenue from visitors, and the amount is minimal: five cents on a $10 dollar purchase. Big deal.
Kudos to the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce and the Greater Milwaukee Committee for aligning the business community behind the plan.
Walker could learn a few things about commonsense, financial planning and political leadership from those two organizations.
Clyde Winter, a blogger and columnist for the Ozaukee News-Graphic - - well, make that a former columnist - - has posted on his blog the column that was sent back by the paper along with his termination notice.
You can read the column on Winters' Hearts and Minds blog.
That leaves a real void in the paper's pages, that's for sure. The News-Graphic is part of Conley Publications, perhaps best known in the area as the publisher of The Freeman, Waukesha's local daily.
Winter is one of those people I only know through the Internet, and I am a fan of his blog. We need more of these authoritative and literate local voices.
His blog bio says he's a former military man who lives on the same farm his family founded in 1848.
After his column came back, Winter posted it with an addendum that he plans to run as an independent for the Senate seat held by Glenn Grothman.
Among them: Nestle, and that infamous Ice Mountain brand - - from a Michigan wetlands.
Advocates wanting a downtown location for UW-M's new engineering campus are strengthening their case with the issuance of a white paper.
Link and related information, here.
Once its Governor signs the bill, Ohio will become the sixth of the eight Great Lakes states to approve the Great Lakes Compact.
Still to approve and adopt the agreement: Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Then the agreement goes to the Congress for approval, a step that may run into opposition from arid states in the south and west.
It's not well-known that studies and plans for modern rail connections statewide are gathering dust on the shelves of government planners even as gasoline prices make better transit a matter of personal and social survival.
Here is a link to the details of existing high-speed rail plans for Wisconsin, and how that system could be joined to a Midwestern rail grid hubbed in Chicago with links to St. Louis, Detroit and other cities.
Wisconsin could have better rail connections statewide, but it chooses to commit $1.9 billion rebuilding and expanding I-94 from Milwaukee to Chicago - - gaining no significant improvement in commuting times for motorists - - and making no start on the commuter rail line proposed in the same corridor.
It isn't a lack of money that prevents Wisconsin from obtaining better rail services, whether in cities or connecting them.
That $1.9 billion I-94 no-rail highway project is part of a $6.5 billion regional plan that includes no transit, but 120 miles of new lanes across seven counties.
Rail is stymied in Wisconsin and our southeastern area by the lack of political will - - and this extends from state government to county courthouses: no one will lead because the highway lobby is too strong and the status quo, until recently, had allowed The SUV To Be King.
Along with Cheap Air Fares.
No more.
State government should operate major rail lines as it operates highways because transportation is a public service and responsibility.
A portion of the gasoline and other fuel taxes should be dedicated to transit, in part because transit spurs economic development along its routes, and surrounding stations, including housing and commercial growth.
And we have to have a reasonable conversation in this state about transportation and taxes.
If Denver can launch a growing state-of-the-art 122-mile light and commuter rail system with a financial package that includes an eight-county sales tax of 4 cents on a ten-dollar purchase, why can't we?
The Denver financing scheme also funds 18 miles of rapid bus lines and 21,000 new parking spaces. Something for everyone. It's a package, and it serves all the public, not just motorists.
Minneapolis figured this out. Charlotte and Portland and Baltimore, and on and on, so the states and federal government can do the same when it comes to connecting cities, too.
Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett likes Denver's rail initiative, but he can't get County Executive Scott Walker to split $91.5 million in available federal funds to get started on downtown trolleys and more extensive express buses.
Locked into the old paradigm and using the city as a political punching bag, Walker says "no" to the rail component.
Talk radio laps that up, at the public's expense, and Walker can put it in his 2010 gubernatorial campaign ads, but what about the rest of the community left with stalemate, dwindling bus service, rising fares - - the burdens of a dismissed citizenry.
There should be modern train service in Milwaukee. We have an InterModal station. Let's have it live up to its name and promise.
And there should be passenger rail through Milwaukee to Green Bay and Madison. There should be stops along the way, with local rail or modern buses moving to and from stations.
Getting from the planning for rail to construction and operations has never been a high enough priority locally and statewide, but should be now.
Cities and other communities that are connected and criss-crossed by modern transit will flourish in an era of rising gasoline costs.
Waiting until gas goes to $10-a-gallon to get started on 21-century transit, including rail, would further stress the economy, diminish our cities, and make a mockery of democracy
.
