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The Price of Trumpism is Ruin

Craig Gilbert looks at the careers of Priebus, Ryan, and Walker: They led the “Cheesehead Revolution,” the GOP’s audacious conquest of Wisconsin. They offered a model for bridging Republican frictions between establishment and base. They became national figures. They ran into Donald Trump. They suffered. They bent to his rise. Now one (Priebus) has left…

Jefferson’s Dirty Dogs Turn Mangy

I’ve been critical of the so-called ‘Harry Potter Festival’ that last year migrated from Edgerton to Jefferson, Wisconsin. It’s left so many people disappointed, taxpayer-salaried city officials have only doubled-down on their support for the shabby event, and (predictably) the Daily Union‘s initial stories about problems quickly gave way to laughable boosterism. See Attack of the…

Local Results from the Spring General Election 2018

Wisconsin’s spring general election’s now over, and in the paragraphs below I’ll consider the local results for state, district, and city-wide races. These results are unofficial; online detail may be found for the counties of Walworth, Jefferson, and Rock (where Rock County’s detail applies only to the WUSD race). Contest/Question Candidates/Preference City Vote % WI Supreme Court…

‘Crony Capitalism and Social Engineering: The Case Against Tax-Increment Financing’

Whitewater’s residents may have heard, as I have, ignorant and false boasting about the benefits of tax incremental financing. It’s variously described as increment or incremental financing, but either way, it’s a plan to entice developers with taxpayer funds by segregating from the general fund, if any, the revenue generated from a development to pay…

A Sham News Story on Foxconn

About a month ago, a local business lobbying group in Whitewater invited an operative of the Walker Administration to the city to talk about Foxconn. The nearby Jefferson County Daily Union sent a stringer to cover the presentation. See Foxconn impact outlined in Whitewater. In the 38-paragraph story, the paper simply reproduces – without the…

A National Study on Big-City Economic Development

What’s the relationship, if any, between economic development and inclusion? A study from the Brookings Institution (Metro Monitor 2018) suggests that for large metropolitan areas, there may be one. (I’ll not try to fit these data into a local container. That’s why there’s no ‘The Scene from Whitewater Wisconsin’ logo attached to this post.) Here’s…

Owner-Occupied Housing in the Whitewater Area

During these years I have written, and long before, one has heard from local officials and residents that the City of Whitewater needs more single-family housing. Single-family housing is a kind of owner-occupied housing (e.g., one owner, two adult owners, a single-family). Indeed, one hears that the City of Whitewater needs more single-family housing the…

A Bit More on Examples

I’ve written about Milton as a bad example for Whitewater, and I’ve written about Jefferson this way, too. See Sunshine Week 2018 (The Bad Example Nearby), Attack of the Dirty Dogs, and Thanks, City of Jefferson!. The Milton-related post prompted two readers to ask about my connections to that troubled school district’s politics. I’ve replied to…

4 Points About the Work Ahead

  Whitewater’s in a time of transition. Those who have been here, who are here, and who are yet to arrive will face this truism: people make history, but not in conditions of their own choosing. Three key points stand out: ➤ The past sets the conditions from which one chooses in the present. Serial…