Embed from Getty Images Over at the City of Whitewater’s website, there’s a notice about a public meeting at which candidates for a city job will available to the public. Although the notice is formally correct (to meet the requirements of Wisconsin’s Open Meetings Law, Wis. Stats. §§ 19.81-19.98), as a community matter there’s something sad…
Culture
Charity, City, Culture, Good Ideas, Hip & Prosperous, Local Government
More on the Right Social Conditions in a Small Town
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
I posted yesterday that Gentrification Requires the Right Social Conditions, contending in part that a small city like Whitewater remains divided (and by consequence limits its own attractiveness to newcomers) because it remains divided by town and gown (and divided within the town, itself, too). Whitewater’s problem is not that different factions do not have a…
Charity, City, Culture, Development, Economy, Local Government
Gentrification Requires the Right Social Conditions
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
I’ve written that Whitewater faces a choice between decisive action now (to lessen government’s role) or years of stagnation and relative decline before eventual gentrification (at which point longtime residents will have almost no say in redevelopment). See, How Big Averts Bad. As I doubt Whitewater’s local political class has the will for near-term changes, the best…
Charity, City, Culture, Hip & Prosperous
An Oasis Strategy
by JOHN ADAMS • • 2 Comments
There’s a wide difference between believing that we’ve difficult national or local times ahead and losing confidence. I’m as confident today as ever that Whitewater has a bright long-term future. There’s simply hard work ahead between now and then, and more hard work now than we might have hoped (national trends being what they are). What to do?…
City, Culture, Local Government, School District, University
On Lake, McHenry, and Walworth Counties
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
In August, I wrote that dorm-construction wasn’t the big story at UW-Whitewater, but rather it was the federal lawsuit against former Chancellor Telfer and [then-current] Athletic Director Amy Edmonds. Even in her mundane story of residence-construction, the Journal Sentinel‘s Karen Herzog got it wrong: the bigger story was an increasing number of out-of-state students (now about…
City, Culture, Hip & Prosperous, Local Government, Marketing, New Whitewater, School District
How Big Averts Bad
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
If it should be true that small-town Whitewater faces a choice between difficult times now or an extended decline before an out-of-town-led gentrification, that her decline will otherwise be slow but no less signficant as a result, that stakeholder (special interest) politics grips the city, and that this stakeholder politics is really an identity politics…
City, Culture, Ethnicity, Liberty, Politics, Race
Philosophy or Identity?
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Imagine a choice between living in a universally free society where one was of the racial or ethnic minority, or living as a member of the racial or ethnic majority in a universally oppressive society. Which society should one choose? A man or woman, committed first to liberty, would choose to live in a free…
Culture, Politics
Anecdotes About Politics in a Small Town
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
I posted last week about how it’s mistaken to think that most leaders in a small town are direct, forthright (see Plain-Spoken in a Small Town? Not Most Leaders). Here are two stories about how politics sometimes works in a small town. At a candidates’ forum last year, I had the pleasure of seeing a…
City, Culture, Economics, Politics, School District, University
Plain-Spoken in a Small Town? Not Most Leaders
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
There’s a quaint – but false – notion that people in small towns are uncommonly plain-spoken, even blunt. One sometimes sees examples of this in films or books, where residents are depicted as folksy straight-talkers (“shucks, I don’t cotton to no one abusing nobody,” etc.). I’ve never heard anyone in Whitewater speak so colorfully, and I’ve…
City, Culture, Local Government, Politics
Twenty-Five Years On: School Board & City
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Alternative title: Culture Advances While Beyond Politics Far Lags Behind. Over at the Banner, there’s a new feature entitled, “A mini-look at local history – a new Banner Monday project!” The 10.10.16 entry is about two public actions from twenty-five years ago. I’m all for history (local or otherwise), but the entry is telling coming from a…
Art, Culture
Origins of the ‘Comic Book Font’
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Comic book culture is mass culture — even lacrosse moms and field hockey dads who’ve never been in a comic book store can recognize the “comic book font.” But calling it a font is a misnomer — as the above video shows, this distinctive style of handwriting is an aesthetic shaped by culture, technology, and…
City, Culture, University
Dorm-Construction Isn’t the Big Story
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
Karen Herzog of the Journal Sentinel has a story about delayed dorm construction at UW-Whitewater. At least, that’s how she’s framed the story, how many will understand the story, and how both UW-Whitewater and Herzog would, no doubt, like readers to understand the story. Here’s what’s more significant even than the need for additional sleeping…
Culture
Culture Without Grandiosity Works Best
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Whitewater’s best accomplishments are mostly social ones, and they are most effective when they’re held simply, without grandiose local claims. The Independence Holiday events, City Market, Farmer’s Market, Discover Whitewater Series, semi-annual Science Fair, Make a Difference Day, art fairs, and Christmas parade, among other events, are much to Whitewater’s credit in-and-of-themselves. They showcase…
City, Culture, Development, Economy
Culture, Economy, Fiscal
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
The approximate number of working age adults, from 25-64, in the City of Whitewater proper is 4,134. This working age population is nestled among a total, estimated population of 14,801. See, American Community Survey, 2010-2014, 5 year estimates http://factfinder.census.gov/bkmk/table/1.0/en/ACS/14_5YR/DP05/1600000US5586925. One can draw three broad but reasonable conclusions from these numbers. Culturally, local publications present a…