Ok – here’s part II, I’m not too focused today, expect a part III plus a part IV on the Edgewater . . .
SOGLIN MASTERS THE ART OF OVER-SIMPLIFICATION
Wow, this is his summary of the problems with poverty?
* Liberals refuse to acknowledge that gangsters, extortionists, and drug dealers follow the impoverished families to Madison and a law enforcement response is required.
* Conservatives refuse to acknowledge that law enforcement is just one tool in combating crime and that without programming that empowers families, crime will prevail no matter how many police officers are sent to a neighborhood.
* Housing advocates refuse to acknowledge that no one is helped by continually adding to the supply of more low income housing if employment, child care, transportation, health care, and family enhancement programs are not developed at a comparable rate as the housing stock.
* The employment, child care, transportation, health care, and family enhancement programs are not effective if understaffed, poorly funded and uncoordinated.
* No matter how sincere the commitment, none of this works without government revenues and private sector participation. That means a tax base of businesses, particularly office buildings and retail, must be continually developed to provide the resources to fund effective programming.
Here’s a few thoughts:
* People push back on the notion the poor means crime because often it is the only think associated with poverty. And, law enforcement should do the same job in low income neighborhoods as in the rest of the city. If drugs are an issue, why don’t we see the same law enforcement type activities in the downtown/campus areas?
* Uh, the housing advocates are the same folks who advocate for more funding for employment, child care, transportation, health care, and family enhancement programs are not developed at a comparable rate as the housing stock. You can’t work in housing and not see the obvious. And you don’t need to tell us were underfunded and understaffed. He’s way off base here.
* The issue is one of balance. It seems that businesses and developers always get theirs, unions get theirs, community and services haven’t seen the same type of support in years from the county or city. Minimal increases that don’t keep up with inflation or flat funding coupled with living wage requirements have resulted in wage compression and layoffs and service cut backs and overworked staff that turn over more frequently.
* When 30 new cops are paired with equal investments in community service, then we can talk. Until then, expect to get push back on businesses and police getting everything they want, while the gap widens between the two Madisons.
Also, I missed this in part one, but read what Cooley has to say about poverty and demographics here, mostly in red comments.
WHAT’S THE PROBLEM?
Good question! What is the problem Michael Schumacher and Mayor Dave Cieslewicz are trying to solve with their ordinance they proposed to ban bartenders and musicians and others from drinking while working? Schumacher withrdrew his support and Mayor Dave narrowed the ordinance to drink servers and allows them to taste their product, but the Cardinal asks the right question, what will this solve?
CHICKENS AND CHURCHES
After the Edgewater meeting last night, Ald. Paul Skidmore was telling me about his little foray into the chicken world. A church in his district wanted to have some chickens to raise eggs to give to food pantry programs. They started to look into the issue and initially thought the chicken ordinance would not apply and they might need an ordinance change to allow it. Then, they found out the church was actually zoned agriculture and could raise up to 12 chickens. Never a dull moment in the world of chickens in the city. It’ll be interesting to see what happens and how the neighbors respond.
CONDEMNATION FOR 2 OF 4 SOUTHSIDE LANDLORDS
Stuart Levitan asked for the CDA to reconsider (thank you Stuart), Kristen comments more on it here, but apparently, they are not willing to do so. They didn’t even get assessed value. The city is arguing that depressed real estate values justified their offers. How many property owners do you think are going to use this argument against the city? And how many do you think will be successful in getting their assessments reduced? It’s come a long ways from being $1M short of the $2.3M assessed value of the properties – a true low-ball offer, but still, they aren’t there yet, but the property owners now don’t have a choice, unless the court sides with them.
• John Lucille accepted $688,000 — $65,000 below assessed value — for three buildings on the 800 block of West Badger Road.
• David Hammonds accepted $380,000 — $62,400 below assessed value — for a building at 2405 Cypress Way.
• Lue Thao was offered a total $800,000 — $26,000 below assessed value — for buildings at 2409 and 2413 Cypress Way. Thao made a counter offer of $840,000, which the city rejected.
• Nedra Bobo, offered $252,000 — $28,000 below assessed value — for a building at 838 W. Badger Road, missed a deadline of 4 p.m. Wednesday.
I still think it is wrong to take one owners property to benefit another private developer. If the city is going to do that, why not target a certain large landowner in the downtown area that is notorious for having underutilized properties?
HOW BIZARRE
Thuy Pham-Remmele? Is she planning to become the new champion of affordable housing in town? I’m dying to know how she ended up on the invite list for this.
WHAT HAPPENED TO CHANGE?
Obama and the left, what happened? This could be an interesting discussion. Check out all the sponsors and a great panel of (mostly men) speakers.
HMMMMM . . .
Too busy for more than a month? That sounds a little crazy. My questions to Sconz are can’t you schedule a 10 minute phone call or email the questions you have? A tip, being specific about what you need will get you in quicker. I had problems finding time to build rapport with someone, but if they wanted to talk about current issues, I’d find more time and quicker. Not sure why you’re trying to meet with her, but I could see finding an hour of face-to-face time is hard. That’s what floors me about Alder Manaici’s refusal to answer questions on a listserve, but being willing to meet face to face while she complains that this job takes too much time. More about that later. (I’ll link it when I get it done.)
DID THE MAYOR FORGET?
Economic Development vs. Economic Growth, a basic concept the Mayor would like to focus on. I usually find the Mayor’s posts shallow and subject to several interpretations depending on how you read it. But, his post on the nerd mayors was odd. As I read the paragraph about hardware stores vs. table saw makers all I could think about was the Edgewater Hotel and how his argument flies in the face of the argument he was making. And, I’m surprised that he found that to be a new concept, since it was sort of the heart and soul of the Economic Developmennt Plan the city paid for a few years ago. It’s not a new concept, only then we (including the Mayor) were talking about it in terms of “basic sector” jobs. Does he read his own press releases?
