Soglin’s One Year Report Card

Yeah, grading the professor.

So, this is a really hard post to write due to the next post I’m going to write. But, the Wisconsin State Journal did their story and I had started to write this and felt like I had to finish since the good things I said about Mayor did not make the article, of course. Only the criticism. Clearly I supported Soglin, as I once did (2003) Mayor Dave. And if you’d have asked me after a year of Dave in office, he would have gotten a decent grade from me, but I’ve since become just a wee bit more cynical about elected officials who use people to get elected and then promptly forget their campaign promises. So, here’s my analysis.

STYLE
So, it seems like the mayors in this town get judged quite a bit on their personalities. What do people remember about Sue Bauman, the way she rolled her eyes. Mayor Dave, he was a “nice” guy. And this mayor, well, this mayor is “grumpy” and maybe a little too blunt in what he says. So, here’s a few thoughts about style.

GRUMPY
I mostly don’t care that the Mayor is grumpy, one notable exception in the next post coming up. I’d much rather have a grumpy mayor who says what he thinks and is honest with you than a “nice” mayor who jokes around and people thinks is nice and then does bad things. I particularly don’t care that he is grumpy with the elected officials. I think elected officials should argue with each other, stand up for their values and make better policy as a result of the exchange of the ideas, even if it sometimes get heated. That’s the whole point. If everyone just gets along and doesn’t disagree so we can all be “nice”, they aren’t doing their jobs. So, I don’t mind a grumpy Mayor for the most part, given all his other good traits. So, this is mostly a non-issue for me. Again, one very notable issue in the next blog post.

TRANSPARENCY
This mayor gets an A for me in his transparency. He believes in open meetings law and understands that transparency in government isn’t something to be afraid of. He understands that government isn’t a business and isn’t forcing the way businesses do business into government. I don’t think we’ll see secret committees or reports that get held back until a press conference, or hiding his appointments until and hour before the meeting. He stands behind his opinions and is open and honest about them.

SAYS WHAT HE THINKS
Speaking of being open and honest, hey, the dude says what he thinks. You might not like it sometimes, but at least you mostly know what you are working with and what the issues are. I also give him an A on that. I value that honesty and appreciate there’s no game playing or messing around and being cute about things.

CHANGES HIS MIND
Even better yet, he says what he thinks and sometimes, he changes his mind. You can argue with this mayor and he doesn’t dig his heels in and stick to his ideas just because he had an idea. If you make a good point, if you bring up something new, he considers it. It means that you can work with him, even when you disagree. That’s really refreshing after the last “it’s my way or the highway” Mayor Dave.

PROFESSOR PAUL
Ok, this is one thing that kinda drives me nuts. I appreciate the history and knowledge he has about the city. I appreciate that his academic knowledge about government is colored by his real world experience with it. I appreciate that he shares his thought through his, um, lectures. It’s just sometimes, his lectures are a bit much. They could be a little shorter and to the point! 🙂 However, compare him to some of the other verbose local politicians and at least he’s mostly interesting and doesn’t reinvent history!

SENSE OF HUMOR
I love his sense of humor and that goofy smile that creeps across his face every once in a while. He should show that side of himself more often. Sometimes I feel like he doesn’t really like people to see that part of him, because he gets what he wants by being grumpy. Maybe not, I’m not sure. But he really should smile more.

VALUES CITIZENS
I saved the best for last. Again, perhaps my opinion is a little colored by the last Mayor who had open disdain for public process and committees and their work. But this mayor “gets it”. I say that all the time about him. But, he understands Madison, he understands Madison’s process and isn’t trying to make it more like state government. He embraces the public process and even goes as far as opening up new processes like his community conversations on the budget. Remember how Mayor Dave would wait til the last minute to announce his public hearing a few days before he held them in August when many people were not in town. This mayor is very much the opposite. One small exception is that he is trying to shrink the size of the committees, which is many cases is a good thing, but committees that have 5 or 7 are too small and create other problems.

SUMMARY
I like the Mayor just the way he is. Maybe its because he is exactly what I expect from a politician. He’s open, honest, and tells you what he thinks. He argues his point, he changes his mind, he does his job. Sure, he’s a little prickly – but for the most part, its not a bad thing. It’s a tough job, and there’s a lot to be grumpy about. So, its ok by me, like I said earlier, I worry more about those who pretend nothing is wrong and are all smiles and nice. So, go ahead and be grumpy, just the way you are Paul. Tho, I say all this, knowing that the next blog post is not going to be very complimentary.

ISSUES
Ok, let me just say, I’m so glad he re-opened issues and re-examined them and in almost every case, ended up with a better result. It’s totally acceptable that a new administration and a new council make different decisions than the past ones. Um, that’s politics. That’s what happens. I think we all want the next state government to rethink some of the past issues that have been rehashed in the last year, right? So, I’m glad he reconsidered so many things with better results.

OVERTURE
Well, I agree. What can I say. This issue is coming back to the council eventually. I don’t think they have the right plan and I fear that it will crash and burn as well. And, while the council spent a lot of time on the issue, I think they missed some of the bigger issues and were rushed and as a result, it was a bad process and I think there will be a bad result. I hope I’m wrong on this one, but I’m afraid I’m not.

RIDE THE DRIVE
Yup, I agree again! I’m really glad he raised questions even when it wasn’t popular. I know its a popular event, but there were issues to be resolved and in the end, the events were improved and increased and as a result of his criticisms, we have a better result.

EDGEWATER
I honestly didn’t expect this from him. I”m so glad he looked at the details, considered what was before him and came to a conclusion I never thought we’d see from him. This was a bad deal and he knew it. So, I don’t just like the result, but what I see as integrity as well.

CAPITAL BUDGET
I LOVE what he did with the capital budget. Some truth in budgeting for a change. He didn’t put $11M parking ramps in the capital budget to send a signal to the business community that he supported it, knowing full well it wouldn’t get done during the year. I appreciate removing all those projects from the capital budget. I also appreciate the philosophy of cutting back in the capital budget because that money impacts the operating budget. It’s not free money and the spending was getting out of control. I know, this one is a little geeky, but it might be one of my favorites!

GRANTWRITER
Yay! He not only let this position go through, but he embraced it and fully understands why it is important and expanded the usage of that position. It’s a no-brainer to me, and extremely important to the city. I don’t know why we never had this position before, but I’m glad he supports it and understands its value! As a side note, there are some in the non-profit community that are worried that they will get forgotten in the grantwriting priorities and until recently, I didn’t believe that to be true. I may be wrong on this one, but I’m hoping not.

NEIGHBORHOOD RESOURCE TEAMS
I like these neighborhood resource teams. I’m glad he’s returning to the model. Of course, in his last time around, some of these neighborhood resource teams did some kinda awful things to some low-income neighborhoods and I think we need to remain vigilant, but I’m hoping that he realizes that moving everyone out of a neighborhood through redevelopment just creates another challenged neighborhood and that the solutions for neighborhoods don’t lie in renovating or tearing down existing housing and moving everyone and making them reapply and then rejecting them. So, neighborhood resource teams, do the good stuff and learn from the past please!

BUS WRAPS/BILLBOARDS
Um, I LOVE IT!!! Seems silly, but I’m so glad he is not in favor of bus wraps. What I appreciate even more is that one of the reasons is because people with disabilities can’t see out! I’m so glad he recognizes this as an issue! It’s one that should never have been ignored. It’s a wonderful shift in thinking in my opinion and shows a real difference between this and the previous mayor. This mayor does have compassion and stands up for not just popular opinions.

PRIVATIZATION AND CONTRACTING
I’d like to see him do more, but I appreciate at least two instances of bringing services in to the city staff instead of contracting out for them. But so far, I only noticed the landscaping issue and the sales of advertising on the buses. I’d like to see more, particularly in the planning and transportation areas.

MIFFLIN STREET
You can’t shut down Mifflin St. It will just make it worse. He will get riots. You have to transform it and maybe even co-opt it. I hope the mayor realizes this.

WOMEN
So, I’m glad he talked a lot about the role of women in government. I just wish we could see results quicker. The reports are still really bad. I’d like to see him articulate a plan to resolve this issue post haste!

EMPLOYEES
I like the way the mayor listens to the city staff and values their expertise. I’ve only heard one complaint about him from staff so far. I consider that pretty good. (Of course, now I may hear more, but it can’t be as bad as it was before.) He doesn’t bully staff to get the answer he wants. I don’t think staff fear losing their jobs in the budget because the mayor doesn’t like them. I consider this a huge improvement. We have a mostly great city staff and the city can be better if they can do their jobs.

POVERTY
I have seen the mayor do some things that might be addressing poverty, but again, he needs to lay out his plan. I don’t know what his plan for poverty is, and after all his talk and campaign promises, I think we deserve to know what he plans to do. (Ok, now we’re getting to the point where we might not be seeing eye to eye.) It seems he says he cares about poverty, and then does things that do not seem to honor that commitment.

HOUSING
He promised me, over and over, without me asking, that “we will do housing”. I never really knew what he was saying and I quite frankly didn’t care because it couldn’t be worse than the last mayor and all the other positives outweighed whatever he did on housing. I didn’t condition my support on this issue. Tho, I did appreciate his acknowledgement of the issue. I still don’t know what he means and again, would like to hear his plan to deal with the issue. He has committed to hiring a housing person, but I have no idea what that means or what the person will do, but I think we will finally get a housing plan out of it, I hope. Tho, I may not like what the plan ends up being. It’s disturbing that the housing committee still isn’t functioning a year after he’s been in office. And, its disturbing that I don’t think he’ll appoint me to the housing committee (apparently they want me to sit on the tenant/landlord committee and I don’t want to, there are potential ethics issues and I don’t want an exception), which is slightly annoying on the ethics front and the non-appointment issue. So, I’m not sure what to say about all this.

HOMELESSNESS
Ok, see the next post. I’m speechless. This is an issue we can’t seem to agree on anything and he’s “Dr. No” and apparently incapable of even discussing this one in a rational manner.

FINAL GRADE
Despite the dramatic downturn at the end of this post, I’ll give him a B+, but in the last week or two, I’ve been highly disappointed in him and challenged in my support. And, its over the very reasons why I didn’t support him in 2003. This time around, I endorsed him with full knowledge that this was going to be an issue and that we were going to just agree to disagree or completely clash on a few things that are very important to me. However, given all the other issues, he’s better than his opponent – who was also awful on the same issues. In the end, I’m still more pleased with the way issues are handled and have more overall confidence in this mayor because of many of the fundamental issues that are raised above. I know he’s not perfect, but at this point in time, I’m overall pleased with is first year.

Now, read the next post as soon as it is done, and you’ll understand how hard it was to write this post. It pains me to have to do it, but you have to hear what happened. (Hopefully by 10 am)