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Monthly Archives: June 2008

City, Planning

Planning Commission Meeting from 6/16 (Part 1)

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In some respects, this is a new Planning Commission, with a new chair (Kristine Zaballos) now in that role, and a new term, beginning after the latest round of nominations from the Common Council. This is still true even though many others on the Commission are incumbents.

Staff reports now appear earlier on the agenda, and that’s a good idea. Setting out any updates early may prove useful for discussion later in the evening.

In those staff and community updates, Tami Brodnicki noted that Downtown Whitewater has a portable device for merchants and volunteers to help vacuum streets in the downtown area. The device may be modern, but it’s a positive step for merchants and volunteers to maintain their own sidewalks even if conventional municipal services are unavailable.

Better still – even when conventional services are available – as merchants can monitor their own areas more effectively than others. (Jane Jacobs points out — in all her works, I think — how taking ownership of one’s area and caring for it oneself is a sign of a healthy community. It’s more work, I know, but it achieves a guaranteed result. Over time, some conventional municipal services may become superfluous.)

Two restauranteurs, both mature and established, received conditional use class B permits for the sale of beer or liquor by bottle or glass at their establishments. I favor the decisions in both cases. It’s a common part of our culture to have a drink with a meal. It helps the businesses, but it helps them because it allows them to meet a common, existing customer expectation. It’s not an additional idea or concept, to my mind; it’s a effort to fulfill a common expectation.

(What would be new? Something that wasn’t common elsewhere, such as a combination restaurant and dog grooming salon, for example. You just don’t see a lot of those, and you probably never will.)

The Commission considered a certified survey map for a property in the city, for division into two lots. Fred Kraege, a local historian, had several objections to current city practices. He noted that he did not trust city services and staff to enforce existing regulations appropriately, and he did not trust how private property owners had managed the current property.

Fair enough. What’s interesting to me is that Kraege has doubts, as far as I can tell, from the opposite direction of mine. I am not confident — at all — in existing enforcement, either. I think, though, that there’s too much enforcement, poorly and selectively administered. I am not unwilling to say as much.

Whitewater will continue to change, though, and all the overreaching enforcement in the world will not be able to stop it. On the other side of this issue are some who see conditions changing, and decry the lack of enforcement to prevent these change, or to enforce in the way they’d like.

Daily Bread, Uncategorized

Daily Bread: June 18, 2008

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Good morning, Whitewater

There are no public meetings scheduled for Whitewater today. (Even school is out of session.) What will everyone do? There’s lots to do, and you don’t need government assistance, guidance, regulation, or partnership to do it. A free and clever people doesn’t need a guiding hand, it needs a clear, unobstructed path.

According to the Wisconsin Historical Society, Isaac Stephenson was born in 1829. I had never heard of him, but he was a banker and a politician in our state and a representative to Congress. He may have been prominent in his day, but I’d guess he’s virtually unknown today. His public service must have seemed significant once, but it’s unknown now.

Public service may have many values (and private life still more), but an enduring popular legacy is often not be among them.

City, Police

Whitewater Police Department Re-Accreditation

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Update: 6/17, 6:58 p.m.

At our Common Council meeting tonight, Chief Coan predictably lauded his department’s position (and implicitly his leadership) as one of only 16 accredited departments in the state, out of over 600. He didn’t say how many even bothered to apply for accreditation. (See Point 1, below.)

One more point, not minor at all — if you are going to acknowledge new Community Service Officers on television, either remember their names, or write them down for reference when your memory fails.
_____

I’ve mentioned re-accreditation of our police department before, and in that post I noted that it matters less than what has actually happened in Whitewater over the years.

In the City Manager’s weekly report for 6/13, there are a few brief remarks about re-accreditation:

Last Friday the Whitewater Police Department was formally reaccredited by the Wisconsin Law Enforcement Accreditation Group (WILEAG) Governing Board of Commissioners. The Board found that the Department is in compliance with all 220 applicable standards. The Board
is comprised of representatives of the Wisconsin City and County Manager’s Association, Wisconsin Department of Justice Training and Standards, the Wisconsin Chiefs of Police Association, the UW-Milwaukee School of Criminal Justice, and the Cities and Villages Mutual Insurance Company.

We should be very proud of our Police Department’s distinction as it remains one of only 16 law enforcement agencies in the State of Wisconsin to be accredited. The Whitewater Police Department is the smallest of the 16 agencies and the only such accredited agency in all of Walworth and Jefferson Counties. I believe that accreditation stands as a testament to the quality of our Police Department and to the caliber of its personnel. It also ensures that our policies and practices are in accord with contemporary law enforcement standards.

I’ll take a few moments to address the ways that the remarks from the City Manager’s report miss part of the story. (You’ll see, then, why I think that accreditation is mostly empty of value.)

1. Number of Departments Involved. Being one of only sixteen accredited departments sounds impressive – after all, there are hundreds of communities in Wisconsin. For only 16 to receive accreditation, from all the police departments in the state, would be a high honor.

Here’s what the City Manager’s Weekly Report doesn’t mention – the accreditation effort is self-selected. Communities join the program, and members from their forces participate in rating other departments, often nearby.

This is not like a test administered to every student in the state, where some children score at the very top.

The correct measurement is not 16 out of the entire state, but 16 out of those who voluntarily joined the program. That’s a far smaller, self-chosen pool.

2. 220 Standards Met?!? To any sensible person, achieving 220 out of 220 on a checklist would be a dubious achievement.

Success at that level would raise an obvious question: What was on that checklist, anyway?

This should be a tip off: If you’re measuring hundreds of checklist items, some of them may be small or obvious. Even Cal Tech students don’t do 220 important things right. They may operate at a high level of achievement, but not that high.

Consider the items, from the WILEAG accreditation checklist, available on that group’s website. Most involve procedural matters that are the minimum any department should achieve, including organizational structure, fiscal management, collective bargaining, recruitment, communications, etc.

Many of these items are mundane, and no more related policing than they would be to running a candy store or dry cleaning business.

It’s easy to run up the score of items completed when many of them are not unique to the real community concerns of policing.

Achieving 220 items on a checklist of 220 only sounds impressive until one thinks about what it really means.

3. Who Accredits? There is no truly independent rating authority – they’re often representatives of community police departments.

There is no Consumer Reports for accreditation, so to speak; these are often local forces checking lists of standards for each other. Many know each other well.

They’re not afraid to mug for the camera, either. A local website ran a photo during the onsite visits of someone from the accreditation team with a smiling member of our Police and Fire Commission. A true auditor would avoid a happy-time photo in the very middle of the onsite visit.

(A police leadership with any real cunning would also shun a photo like that, the better to preserve the appearance of a serious process.)

It’s as though Ford, GM, and Chrysler joined forces to rate their cars. Can you guess what they’d say?

The Pinto – There’s more to life than ‘safety’
The Aztek – Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
The Hummer – Only the weak worry about gasoline prices

They want you to look away from their problems, and a lengthy checklist of (often simple) items helps divert your gaze.

That’s why the ACLU correctly notes that “Current accreditation standards represent minimum, rather than optimum, goals. They are very good in some respects but do not go far enough in covering the critical uses of law enforcement powers….a police department can easily comply with all of the current standards and still tolerate rampant brutality, spying and other abuses.”

(More on the ACLU in a bit.)

4. What Accreditation Ignores. Consider sensible standards that serious, unaffiliated institutions and organizations have proposed that directly concern the most important matters in policing.

First, from the U.S. Department of Justice, Principles for Promoting Police Integrity.

Second, from the ACLU, a Community Action Manual with goals and strategies to assure a good, community-oriented police force.

I know that Chief Coan might say that the ACLU is a liberal group – and from one of his emails one might suspect that he doesn’t like liberals – but what does he say about these points?

Forget the group, and focus on the substance of their ideas. You’ll see that these are good suggestions.

To follow the suggestions from the Department of Justice and the ACLU, though, would require a real effort to make this a well-led force. It’s hard, but far better for our community.

I am neither liberal nor conservative, neither Republican nor Democrat — I’m a libertarian.

Most police departments are well-led. When they’re not, they’re a mess for officers and the community. Cheerleading won’t make our city better.

To laud the current police leadership for an empty checklist is easier, but places their interests over the community interest.

Our local officials will often talk about their years in government, considerable experience, etc., but that makes me wonder: Do they not understand this, or do they hope that others won’t?

In the end, this is a feel-good, praise-me-but-do-not-look-too-closely achievement. Accreditation has the same relationship to meaningful policing for our community as a chocolate bunny has to a live rabbit.

Uncategorized

Wisconsin’s Long Path to Recovery

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Over at the Wisconsin State Journal, there’s a story on the Wisconsin Department of Revenue’s assessment that Wisconsin will not see economic recovery until 2010.

That’s a long way off for many businesses and families.

The Dept. of Revenue report is a statewide assessment; some areas may lag the Wisconsin average. One could guess — but it’s just a guess — that communities that have been strong will recover more quickly.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread: June 17, 2008

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Good morning, Whitewater

In Wisconsin history, on this day in 1673, Marquette and Joliet reached the Mississippi. The Wisconsin Historical Society notes that they did not discover it; tribes and other explorers knew of the Mississippi far earlier. It was an amazing accomplishment nonetheless.

Like yesterday, the city has three public meetings scheduled for today: a CDA board of directors meeting at 4:30 p.m., an Alcohol Licensing Committee meeting at 5:45 p.m., and a Common Council meeting at 6:30 p.m. All will be held in the municipal building.

Some of the items on the Common Council agenda include the following:

STAFF REPORTS:

Police Chief 1) Accreditation; 2) New CSOs

RESOLUTIONS:
R-1 Waiving No Wake Ordinance for July 4th celebration (4th of July Committee
Request)
R-3 Resolution Approving Acquisition of 4th Street Properties (CDA Request)

ORDINANCES – First Reading
O-1 Amending Chapter 19 relating to waiting period required before applying for
rezoning. (City Manager Request)
O-2 Rental Registration Ordinance (City Manager Request)
O-3 Amending Chapter 1.21.010, Schedule of Deposits (City Attorney Request)

ORDINANCES – Second Reading
O-4 Amending Chapter 11.48.100, Regulation of School Bus Warning Lights. (City
Attorney Request)
O-5 Amending Chapter 19 of Municipal Code to allow three cars to park in front and
side yard instead of current limit of two cars. (Neighborhood Services)
O-6 Ordinance Amending Section 19.09.520 Concerning Limitation of the Number of
Residents in a Non-Family Household (Neighborhood Services Director Request)
O-7 Amending Membership of Police and Fire Commission to include one council
representative in place of a citizen member (Councilmember Singer Request)

CONSIDERATIONS:
C-1 Presentation on University Research Park Feasibility Study (CDA Coordinator
Request)
C-2 Approval of Class B Beer and Liquor License for The Cowboyz, Craig Martin,
Agent, for former Novak’s property at 111 W. Whitewater St. (City Clerk Request)
C-3 Approval of transfer of Class B Beer & Liquor License for College Pub LLC, Kirk
Rasmussen, Agent, Whitewater Street, effective 8/4/2008 (City Clerk Request)
C-4 Approval of renewals of Class “A” Beer Licenses; “Class A” Beer and Liquor
Licenses, Class “B” Beer Licenses, “Class B” Beer & Liquor Licenses, and
Wholesale Beer License (City Clerk Request)
C-5 Appointment of Citizen Member to Police and Fire Commission and to Plan
Commission (City Clerk Request)
C-6 Action on Fourth of July Committee’s Request to Close Whitewater Street in
conjunction with Fourth of July Celebration (July 3 thru 6th – various times) (4th of
July Committee Request)
C-11 ADJOURN to Closed Session per Wisconsin Statutes 19.85(1) “(e) Deliberating
or negotiating the purchase of public properties, the investing of public
funds, or conducting other specified public business, whenever competitive
or bargaining reasons require a closed session.” Item to be discussed:
Possible purchase of Unit 2 in building located at 261 S. Fourth Street / 332
W. Whitewater Street

The National Weather Service predicts a slight chance of thunderstorms with a high of 75 degrees. Over at the long-range Farmers’ Almanac, there’s a prediction of fair weather, then dangerous thunderstorms during the 6/16-6/19 period.

City

Our Low Expectations

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Wisconsin has been a high tax state for years, stretching well back from the Doyle administration through Tommy Thompson’s many years in office (Gov. McCallum having served only briefly in between).

The Wisconsin State Journal recently noted positively a study contending that Wisconsin was out of the rankings of the ten highest taxed states for the first time in years. In fact, one of the few times times out of the top ten highest-taxed states since 1969.

(As the Journal correctly notes, even this belated and dubious accomplishment — we are still highly taxed, and ranked that way — is disputed. Another study still places us within the top ten on the list.)

The next time that someone mentions to me how much Tommy Thompson did for the state, I will remind him or her (as I always do) that he did too little to reduce our tax burden and size of state government. Far too little.

This high tax burden statewide presents an opportunity for Whitewater. If we significantly reduce our local tax burden through a significant reduction in the size of local government, we can offer an comparative advantage for new residents and businesses.

(I am convinced it would be a comparative advantage, not merely in tax burden, but it quality of life even apart from taxation. When I post on the ongoing budget process in the months ahead, I will present the case for a much smaller municipal budget. A reduction in government’s size doesn’t just save money — it reduces the scope of meddling and intrusion into private life.)

Daily Bread

Daily Bread: June 16, 2008

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Good morning, Whitewater

There are three public meetings scheduled for Whitewater today:

First, a neighborhood meetings concerning the Moraine View Park Plan, at 4 p.m. Later, at 6:30 p.m., there will be a meeting of the Young Memorial Library Board, at 6:30 p.m. At 7 p.m., there will be a meeting of the Planning and Architectural Board.

The library meeting will be held at the library; the other two meetings will take place at the municipal building.

Selected items from the Planning Board agenda include:

  • Consideration of a Conditional Use Permit for a Class B Beer and Liquor License for Craig Martin, to serve beer and liquor by the bottle or glass at 111 W. Whitewater Street (Novaks Restaurant).
  • Consideration of a Conditional Use Permit for a Class B Beer and Liquor License for Kirk Rasmussen, to serve beer and liquor by the bottle or glass at 202 W. Whitewater Street (The College Pub LLC.).
  • Consideration of a change in the City of Whitewater Municipal Ordinance regulations, to enact the proposed amendments to the City of Whitewater Municipal Code: Chapter 19, specifically Section 19.09.520 Non-family household; concerning the limitation of the number of residents in a non-family household.
  • Consideration of a Conditional Use Permit for the proposed studio apartment to be added in the basement of the residential apartment complex located at 467 N. Tratt Street for Russell Walton.
  • Consideration of a Conditional Use Permit to change a former fraternity house at 1036 W. Main Street, into a 4-unit apartment building for Phi Sigma Epsilon Alumni Association (Tim Popp, representative of the Association).
  • Review the proposed construction of a rear yard parking lot (total of 20 stalls) for resident parking at both 152 S. Franklin Street and 451 W. Main Street for David Kachel.
  • Consideration of an amendment conditional use permit application to change the interior of the building at 451 W. Main Street from 8 two bedroom units and 2 one bedroom units to 3 studio apartments, 12 one bedroom apartments and 1 three bedroom apartment for DLK Enterprises Inc.
  • Review and recommendation to the City Council for the purchase of the Scott Gittrich Condo (/SMVK 00002) located at 261 S. Fourth Street.
  • Consideration of an amendment to the conditional use permit for exterior alterations to the north side (rear) of the building located at 174/176 W. Main Street. (The changes include the first floor apartment window, the rear patio area and exterior stairs, and the courtyard wall.)

In Wisconsin history today, according to the Wisconsin historical society, the first public school opened in Wisconsin, in what is now Kenosha. The school, like those today, was supported with a property tax.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread: Friday, June 13th, 2008

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Good morning, Whitewater

I’m not superstitious, but if I were, I would avoid black cats today.

The National Weather Service predicts a 50% chance of thunderstorms with a high near 80. The Farmers’ Almanac predicts that today will bring showers.

Again, there are no public meetings scheduled for our city today.

School students have been out of school for about a day, and most buildings in the city are still standing… Who knew?

City

Update: Go Nuclear!

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This morning, I proposed a bold new future of clean, efficient, safe nuclear power for Whitewater. Ordinarily, a proposal so visionary, so groundbreaking, might have to wait years for vindication and acceptance.

Not this time – only a few hours after I posted my proposal for an atomic age in Whitewater, the Reuters news agency published a story that confirms how compelling my proposal is.

Reuters reports that a devastating tornado struck a nuclear research reactor at Kansas State University.

Tragedy? Disaster? Not at all!

Consider this inspiring account of American engineering skill (emphasis added):

The tornado caused extensive damage to the building, but no damage to the reactor, which had been shut down properly earlier in the day

That’s right, Whitewater – the reactor was impervious even to the effects of a tornado. Everyone knows that the reactor’s the really important part of a nuclear power plant, anyway – the other buildings just have a bunch of technicians in short-sleeved shirts sitting around drinking coffee and watching computer screens.

Reuters isn’t even an American company, yet they acknowledge the greatness of American design.

We’ve probably spent a small fortune building a Whitewater municipal command facility in the event of a weather emergency. My plan for a reactor makes a separate facility superfluous. The Reuters story proves that there’s a better way.

In a tornado, hurricane, tsunami, mudslide, or volcanic explosion, our political leaders need not worry about their security within a hum-drum, conventional municipal shelter.

Instead, our political class could be assured of complete security merely by retreating to the protected core of Whitewater’s very own nuclear reactor. Once safely inside, they could wait out even the most ferocious storm in the toasty sanctuary that only cheap, efficient nuclear power can provide.

My proposal for a nuclear reactor will not only create jobs for technicians, construction workers, and nuclear engineers – it will simultaneously ensure the storm-proof safety of our political leaders.

Besides, what difference could survival mean to us, if they were not here afterward to govern so nobly and wisely? To borrow an expression from the oh-so-estimable editor of the Whitewater Register, ‘what would we ever do without them?’ Thanks to this proposal, you won’t have to go to bed worried sick about it.

Oh you clever, educated, well-traveled, sophisticated, town-faction skeptics — are you embarrassed now? This morning some of you were unconvinced. Reflect on, and rue now, your too-hasty dismissal.

Ye of little faith – doubt not the power of the atom.

Our better future is just a sustained, controlled nuclear reaction away.

City

Go Nuclear!

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America finds herself beset with two fossil fuel concerns. We worry that we are damaging the environment by using too much fossil fuel; we worry that there is not enough fossil fuel to use.

There are alternatives, including one we have foolishly ignored. America began the atomic age, but she has since abandoned a committed program of nuclear power that would produce abundant, cheap, clean electricity.

It was a huge mistake for America to turn away from nuclear energy at home to rely on foreign oil. We do not rely merely on foreign oil – we rely on expensive foreign oil from despotic foreign regimes.

Nuclear power has been, and could be again, evidence of our skill and ingenuity. The technology is cleaner, safer, and more needed than ever before.

If there were ever a proposal to construct a nuclear power plant in Whitewater, I would be that proposal’s strongest proponent.

I have even researched the idea. The average nuclear power plant in America would offer many benefits for Whitewater: four to seven hundred permanent jobs, over a thousand jobs during construction, over $430 million dollars in annual goods and services sales, and state and local tax revenue of almost $20 million dollars per year.

All this for a reactor core, main building, cooling towers, and control facility.

Woo Hoo!

We easily have that much space in Whitewater – we have land to spare.

Other communities would love to have their own clean, efficient reactor. We’d face stiff competition for the site of any power plant. The hundreds of workers needed to staff the plant would require housing, parking, etc.

One must, in a case like this, carefully review a map of the city, and consider all the possible locations for a fission nuclear reactor. That’s exactly what super-smart, well-dressed planning consultants would do.

I may lack a consultant’s keen insight and sophisticated demeanor, but I more than make up for it in my unbridled love of planning.

After careful consideration of every possible location in the city, I have determined that the best location for the reactor’s core is 42°49’55.52″N, 88°43’59.15″W.

Those unfamiliar with terrestrial coordinates likely know the location better as 312 W. Whitewater Street, the current location of our municipal building.

The shortsighted among us will say that placing the reactor at 312 W. Whitewater means that we’ll have no place for local political meetings.

Why, why are some among us so lacking in vision?

When you have a nuclear reactor in your town, you don’t need local politics.

Anyone who had studied the archives of the Fox TV Network would know that in the Simpsons’ Springfield, it’s the nuclear plant owner Mr. Burns, and not Mayor Quimby, who calls the shots.

That happens in different forms in different places. For example, in Whitewater, it’s Chief Coan, and not City Manager Brunner, who runs the town. (Runs it right into the ground, actually…)

Far as I know, Coan has no background in applied nuclear physics. The adverbial Chief Coan may yet say, however, that his senior officers are completely, thoroughly, amazingly, courageously, valiantly prepared to staff the reactor.

Go nuclear!

Daily Bread

Daily Bread: June 12, 2008

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Good morning, Whitewater

The National Weather Service predicts heavy rains with a high of 83. The Farmers’ Almanac predicts that today will bring showers — a match!

Again, there are no public meetings scheduled for our municipal corporation today.

In Wisconsin History today, according to the Wisconsin Historical Society, in 1899 Wisconsin saw its worst tornado disaster, in which over 300 buildings were destroyed in New Richmond.