I have written a few overview posts, these past two weeks, highlighting unusual and curious aspects of life here. I will resume a more conventional posting schedule, with a daily morning feature, beginning next week. In the meantime, I will finish highlighting some of the ways that we’re just not the rural town that the…
City
City
A Common Council and City Manager in Whitewater
by JOHN ADAMS •
Whitewater, Wisconsin has a common council form of government. There are seven members to the common council, five elected from districts across parts of the city, and two elected city wide, from across the town. Together, they are both the legislative, and executive, authority in town. We have not merely a common council, but also…
City
Stability and Stagnation, Differently Experienced
by JOHN ADAMS •
One of the attributes of many small rural towns is that they risk stagnation, and thereafter decline, either relative or absolute. For many in America, the idea of any decline seems absurd. Residents of a Maryland suburb may worry about too much growth, and crowding. Believe it or not, we have some who share the…
City, Libertarians
Neither More Nor Less
by JOHN ADAMS •
In my last two posts, Whitewater’s Best Hopes and The Invitation to Come to Whitewater from Contemporary America, immediately below, I discussed the opportunities that immigrants and students offer Whitewater. Although they’ve been met with acceptance in many quarters, they’ve been met with stubborn and self-destructive opposition from a few. Once here, and living and…
City
The Invitation to Come to Whitewater from Contemporary America
by JOHN ADAMS •
America is a dynamic and competitive place. The rise of America, from defeat of a haughty empire, her expansion across an entire continent, to her current prosperity owe to individual liberty, free enterprise, and a hope for peaceful commerce with the world beyond. A people with these values could not be expected to stand still,…
City
Whitewater’s Best Hopes
by JOHN ADAMS •
If you’ve read recent studies or articles about small town America, then you have read that many rural towns struggle to maintain residents. They find themselves shriveling and withering, unable to assure a prosperous future for the next generation of residents. It’s a hard problem, and efforts to overcome a decline in population – no…
City
From Early Whitewater’s Individualism to a Regulatory Status Quo
by JOHN ADAMS •
Walk around Whitewater, and talk to those who are elderly, lifetime residents, and you’re sure to catch their nostalgia for an older Whitewater. About the Whitewater of their youth, and how the town has changed, I will comment later. For now, I’ll describe how the present day residents, often Scandinavian-American and German-Americans, among our town’s…
City
Early Whitewater
by JOHN ADAMS •
City
Whitewater, Wisconsin
by JOHN ADAMS •
America began as a collection of villages and towns, of tribes, settlers, colonists, and later, citizens. We had no indispensable great city, no Rome or London, on which all depended. We still don’t. Yet, we have changed, so very much, and America is no longer a collection of small, rural towns. When we refer to…
City
The City Budget: First Pass
by JOHN ADAMS •
It’s the season, across Wisconsin, for municipalities to present and approve their 2010 budgets. The process varies by city – some finish quickly, some extend the discussion from October into November. We are among that latter group – although we are a small town, our municipal budget is a big matter, with considerable discussion. Last…
City, Innovation Center/Tech Park, Planning
The Next Big Thing
by JOHN ADAMS •
You may be sure that these days are scarcely ordinary – we are on the cusp of the extraordinary, the exceptional, and innovative. Nearly a month ago, Whitewater broke ground on a taxpayer-funded tech park, along a street renamed Innovation Drive, beside our existing business park. There was a brief ceremony, filmed for those who…
City
Attitude, Behavior, Programs
by JOHN ADAMS •
There’s more than one way to change an organization. I’ve thought, over the years, that there were two principal ways: begin by shaping the attitude of employees, or by shaping their behavior. (I see that it’s possible to begin with both, but my point would be that one typically begins by emphasizing one over the…
City, Poverty
Poverty in Whitewater
by JOHN ADAMS •
Before the budget, before the municipal administration, politicians, bureaucrats, and back-patters, is a city of fourteen-thousand. Most of these fourteen-thousand have, sensibly, more important concerns than the latest, supposedly extraordinary and exceptional (excuse me, exceptional! bureaucratic achievement. Little over a month ago, there was a rare mention, for Whitewater, of (child) poverty. Our poverty rate…
City
The Mild Political Weather in Whitewater, Wisconsin
by JOHN ADAMS •
It’s a chilly October in Whitewater, Wisconsin, but the political climate has never been milder. That must seem odd, in a time of economic hardship with rising unemployment. There’s a gap, though, between the condition of ordinary residents and their interest in the plans and schemes from our municipal building. The political climate in the…