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City

City, Culture, Local Government, University

Self-Defined Notables (in a Small Town)

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Over these years of writing, I have sometimes referred to self-important political and community figures in Whitewater as notables, town squires, etc. It should be clear (at least one hopes!) that these descriptions rest not on the basis of others’ actual talent as elites but instead on their overweening (ludicrous, unjustified) sense of entitlement. (Most…

Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economy, Employment, Foxconn, Government Spending, Open Government, State Capitalism, State Government, That Which Paved the Way, UW Madison

Foxconn’s Secret Deal with UW-Madison

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These last several years in Wisconsin have seen a politics of corporate manipulation of public spending and a retreat from principles of open government. Businesses and business lobbying groups routinely expect public money for business projects that should be wholly private. (Scheming development gurus often refer to taxpayer money as their ‘tools,’ as though the…

City, Film

Film: Wednesday, September 19th, 12:30 PM @ Seniors in the Park, RBG

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This Wednesday, September 19th at 12:30 PM, there will be a showing of RBG @ Seniors in the Park, in the Starin community building:

RBG (Biographical documentary)
Wednesday, September 19, 12:30 pm
Rated PG – 1 hour, 38 min. (2018)

A look at the life and work of US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, 84, who has developed a breathtaking legal legacy, while also becoming an unexpected pop culture icon. This engaging documentary is the final film in our Wednesday Summer series of foreign/art/documentary films.

One can find more information about RBG at the Internet Movie Database.

Assault Awareness & Prevention, Babbittry, Bad Ideas, City, Development, Economy, Local Government, Public Relations, State Government, Taxes/Taxation, University

On New Market Tax Credits for a Fairfield Inn and ‘Community Engagement’

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The use of government-issued New Market Tax Credits will bring Whitewater a Fairfield Inn and a building for the existing local campus to lease. Proponents of an ordinary hotel and a lease agreement for the university cannot offer any evidence that these projects will boost local individual or household incomes. What one can show –…

CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Culture, Distraction, Economy, Innovation Center/Tech Park, Local Government, Marketing, Planning, Politics, Poverty, State Capitalism, WEDC

The Two Questions that Haunt Old Whitewater

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Two questions haunt Old Whitewater (where Old Whitewater is a state of mind rather than an age or a particular person): What does it mean to be a college town? and What is meaningful community development? (There are other serious questions, but one can be sure – at the least – that these two have Whitewater…

Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economy, Employment, Foxconn, Gov. Walker, Government Spending, State Capitalism, State Government, That Which Paved the Way, WEDC

“Later This Year”

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One reads that Foxconn [is] planning to buy land for innovation centers later this year. Read a bit closer, however, and one learns that ‘later this year’ is about as undependable as ‘the check is in the mail’ or ‘I gave at the office’: A question regarding innovation centers was one of many from Democratic Assembly Minority Leader…

Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economics, Economy, Government Spending, Local Government, State Capitalism, Taxes/Taxation, That Which Paved the Way

A Tax Incremental Financing Review

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Today at four o’clock, the Joint Review Board is scheduled to review Whitewater’s tax incremental districts. Views of tax incremental financing – especially in a place like Whitewater – are a good test of someone’s basic understanding of economic development. Indeed, the test reduces to a simple relationship: the more one contends that tax incremental…

City, Film

Film: Tuesday, August 28th, 12:30 PM @ Seniors in the Park, Book Club

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This Tuesday, August 28th at 12:30 PM, there will be a showing of Book Club @ Seniors in the Park, in the Starin community building: Book Club (Comedy/Drama/Romance) Rated PG-13; 1 hour, 44 minutes (2018) Four lifelong friends (Diane Keaton, Jane Fonda, Candice Bergen, Mary Steenburgen) have their lives forever changed after reading the novel…

Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economy, Employment, Foxconn, Gov. Walker, Government Spending, State Capitalism, State Government, That Which Paved the Way, WEDC

Foxconn Deal Melts Away

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Rick Romell and Molly Beck report Foxconn now declines to say it plans to build type of factory named in state, local contracts: But in a shift from its stance of two months ago, the company on Wednesday did not offer assurances that it still plans to build the type of liquid crystal display panel plant…

Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Economics, Economy, Free Markets, Government Spending, Innovation Center/Tech Park, Local Government, Politics, State Capitalism, Taxes/Taxation, That Which Paved the Way

The Trump Tax Bill: The Illusory Pay Bump

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In the spring, before and after a local election, the Whitewater Community Development Authority issued two press releases praising a part of the Trump tax bill as good for Whitewater.  CDA executive director Dave Carlson presumably wrote the releases, and Larry Kachel, the CDA chairman, stars in one of them as offering gratitude for gerrymandered congressman…

America, City, Freedom of Speech, Law, Liberty, Local Government, New Media, Newspapers, Politics, Press, Resistance, That Which Paved the Way, Trump

‘A Free Press Needs You’

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Following Trump’s repeated attacks on the press as the enemy of the people, hundreds of publications across America are today uniting in a defense of their right to free expression. The editorial board of the New York Times, in A Free Press Needs You, describes our heritage and the threat to it: In 1787, the…