It’s odd and funny sometimes how a merchant will hear, from some on Whitewater, Wisconsin’s Common Council, how his or her business desires are not legitimate, not the right desires. Not from everyone in office, but from some.

This took two forms at the June 16th Common Council meeting. First, one heard from our oldest politician that, the weather being bad (one way or another) throughout the year, there was no point in a restaurateur establishing a sidewalk café in spring and summer.

Never mind that these cafés exist in other Wisconsin cities. They do – if only one would imagine a world beyond the westside Taco Bell.

What’s odd – and so smug it’s funny – is the idea that this or that politician is in a better position than a entrepreneur to assess risk in the market. It’s not that merchants always succeed, but that they’re more likely to succeed in market ventures than bureaucrats and politicians.

The second example of political conceit is the notion that regulations a politician proposed as somehow reasonable and easy to implement. The 30% food receipts requirement for an outdoor is like this.

Why 30%? It’s a requirement with no reasonableness behind it, as our conditions make it difficult to achieve. There’s no reason to think that 30% is more fair than 35, 31, or 41.3, for example.

One number pulled from the air is as good as another, beguiling rhetorical power being the only difference.

If it’s all just guesswork – and it is – I propose a different percentage.

0.

Our last Common Council meeting is available online.  (See, Whitewater Common Council, 6/16/09.)   Over half an hour into the meeting, there was discussion of sidewalk cafés for some establishments near the Cravath lakefront. 

The Council had a first reading of an amendment to the local ordinance application to these cafés.  There were two proposed changes to the ordinance: (1) remove a requirement that establishments with café have a minimum of 30% food sales to be eligible to operate a café, and (2) that the required plans for the cafés — the arrangement of tables, etc. — be simpler, less elaborate.    The proposed amendments passed first reading, on a vote of 6-1.  

It’s odd to listen to the discussion, because so much of it sounds like so much of Whitewater — overly-regulatory, with objections based on supposedly raucous behavior, but without a willingness to discuss how to manage or prevent that behavior (should it occur), short of prohibition.  

Prohibition is the dumbing down of policy, the lazy man’s way to try to prevent a problem, all the while ignoring the other problems prohibition causes. 

A few remarks — 

The 30% requirement for food sales — This was a foolish requirement, twice over.  First, it’s just too burdensome.   This only sounds easy to someone who doesn’t grasp how many other requirements a business faces.  One’s supposed to measure all this, so carefully?  This is a non-merchant’s idea of a good idea.  It would only sound sensible to someone who did not have to run a restaurant.  Anyone else would accept it only begrudgingly.  It’s a giveaway that advocacy of this requirement cries out — does not understand a merchant’s life.  

What’s a sidewalk café?  There’s a too-clever moment, when those who oppose that alcohol consumption at the cafés contended that they favored sidewalk cafés, or the “café concept,” but not “sidewalk taverns.”  It’s a seemingly clever attempt to distinguish between two kinds of dining experience, and marginalize the one that includes consumption of alcohol. 

The problem, of course, is that most people — in Whitewater, in Wisconsin, or elsewhere in America — will understand that cafés often serve alcohol.  The linguistic distinction — sidewalk cafés vs. sidewalk taverns — only seems clever to people who don’t (or won’t) try to understand how ordinary people think about cafés like this.  It’s the kind of rhetorical distinction that seems so powerful in a room of a few people, all of the same view, but fails to persuade ordinary people, with a broader perspective.  Whitewater’s an echo chamber, and its leaders talk mostly to themselves and a like-minded few.   

(It’s why, when outsiders look at Whitewater, and point out simple local mistakes, there’s shock and indignation among the town’s elite.  These town squires have not thought half these issues through, using only each other as sounding boards, tell each other what they want to hear, and then express shock when others point out how ill-conceived actions here often are.  Huh, what, me?)  

The more extreme version of this view is when residents pretend Whitewater’s a magical place, unique from the rest of America.  That’s a magical notion, because it’s not at all reasonable  It’s also a dangerous notion, as rights common to all are either ignored or interpreted wrongly, in the most politically and bureaucratically self-interested way.  

Safety and security.  There’s a worry that sidewalk cafés will lead to patrons passing alcohol to those under drinking age, creating disturbances.  The cafés would operate at low volume times in Whitewater, but there’s a fear that all of this will lead to the raucous, the disorderly.   Other cities with universities operate cafés that serve alcohol, and we’re not — and will not be — Singapore, in any event.   If the answer to ordinary life is not prohibition, then it’s not raw numbers, crude increases in government personnel, either. 

We have a municipal leadership that uses all the language of modern business — every catchphrase ever coined — but recoils from even simple consideration of efficiencies.  

If it should be true that we’ve not the staff to monitor a few cafés near our municipal building, then we should adjust our staff.  If we need more staff, to do what other cities do routinely, then we should consider more staff, but also — no less — how present staff are allocated.  Both matter, but we never talk about allocation of staff in Whitewater, just headcount across the board. 

If the City believes that more officers are needed, and is prepared to offer detailed reasons for it, including when demand is highest, and show how personnel are used now, then that’s a debate those advocating more personnel should be prepared to entertain, received openly.

I see no reason, by the way, why there should only be sidewalk cafés.  If, as was once true, some people want to sell hot dogs, or have a push cart here or there. I’d be for that, too.  Deciding against hot dog sales was a bad idea — we should allow as much, and give others outside a small zone the chance to sell, too (for commericial or civic purposes, either).  It won’t be, at every moment, the most orderly scene, but we’ll not descend into Lord of the Flies, either.   As it is, the possibility of a cafe does not a cafe make.

I’ve some catching up to do on our last Common Council meeting.  The last Police and Fire Commission meeting had a posted agenda so short that it was easy to tease about it.  The agenda crammed item after item, including two police officer interviews, into a proposed 20 minute window.  (See, Whitewater’s Latest Police and Fire Commission Meeting, of May 2009.) 

Well, at the latest Common Council meeting, there was a quick — but futile, I think — discussion that the meeting was longer than 20 minutes.  In fact, there’s was quick mention that it lasted past eight o’clock.  There now, everything’s better – move along, nothing to see, here.  

Predictably, Chief Coan can’t explain why the agenda allotted only 20 minutes for so much.  No one at the meeting noted who wrote the agenda, and that’s the problem, of course. The agenda’s not a perfunctory matter, not a clerical obligation, but an official announcement that should have come from real oversight from the Police and Fire Commission.  I don’t know where the agenda comes from, either.  

One need only look at the agendas of Whitewater’s PFC over the years, improved only by a colorful logo on recent ones, to see that they look like a spare, half-hearted effort.   

That’s the problem with the whole Police and Fire Commission, though.  We’ve had problem after problem with leadership in this city, and anything that involves department public notice (not involving self-congratulatory announcements) resembles little more than a reluctant child’s homework — as few words, and as much white space, as possible.   

If we were Camelot, where all was well, maybe it wouldn’t matter. 

This, however, is not Camelot, Jim Coan’s not a legendary king, the PFC’s not a knights’ roundtable, and we’ve not a class of nobles presiding over an idyllic kingdom. A few hundred want to believe as much, but believing does not make it so.  

Real work, a thorough agenda, for a meeting in a suitable chamber, televised, would be a start. 

Just a start, but something.  

I’ve contended previously that, whatever the trouble with the State of Wisconsin’s budget, municipal and school district declarations that cuts made were forced as a consequence of declining state aid masks the responsibility and accountability for choosing one cut over another. 

(See, Inbox: Reader Mail — Budget Cuts, General and Specific,  Inbox: Reader Mail — Options for School District Budget Savings, and Dr. Steinhaus vs. Student: Student Wins!)

One sees now, not so long after the District declared that layoffs were inevitable because of the Wisconsin budget impasse, that layoffs are rescinded, an administrative salary freeze is possible, and other budget options may yet be available. 

Good for those involved and affected – one need not succumb to a false inevitability.

Contending that specific cuts in Whitewater’s public school district were inevitable because of Governor Doyle, the Democrats in Madison, etc., was false.  That responsibility, for the result, was always a local responsibility. 

I’m not a Democrat, but a libertarian.  Yet, for that difference, I’ve not thought to blame Governor Doyle for choices we make here, as we do have choices before us.  

It may come that local politicians and bureaucrats of the City of Whitewater will be tempted to take this same tacking, and blame Madison for choosing between alternatives in Whitewater. 

It will be no more true for our small town than it was for our small district.

Over at the City of Whitewater’s website, visitors will find links to Common Council agendas, minutes, and video recordings of council sessions.

The links sometimes run behind the postings of the recordings, available online at Blip.tv.

Here’s the page for the City of Whitewater’s videos on Blip.tv:

City of Whitewater on Blip.tv

Japan’s response to her own deep recession of the 90s shows how many mistakes even an advanced nation may make in trying to restore prosperity. America is making some of those same mistakes now.

Over at the Reason.tv, there’s a three-minute video that summarizes the findings of Reason Foundation policy analysts Anthony Randazzo, Michael Flynn, and Adam Summers.

Where Japan went wrong then, and where we’re going wrong now…

The full study is available at Avoiding an American Lost Decade.

Whitewater’s Fourth of July weekend has its own website, at www.ww4th.com.

Events run from Friday, July 3rd through Sunday, July 5th.

Concluding the 17 part series today, it’s Prisoner Monday here at Free Whitewater. Why? Because a longtime reader previously suggested to me that being in Whitewater sometimes felt like living the plot of The Prisoner.

It’s a great British series, that tells the story of a secret agent who resigns from his agency, only to find himself in a mysterious place called The Village.

AMC has the full episodes of the original series online, and also offers one-minute summaries of those original episodes. I’ve previously posted the first sixteen videos.

Here’s the seventeenth, one-minute summary, of an episode entitled, “Fall Out.” (“The Prisoner comes to the end of his nightmarish adventure, in which all members of the Village must stand trial and receive the President’s verdict.”)

The full video is also available at AMC.

Enjoy.

The Prisoner is a fantastic British series, and these one-minute videos came at the kind suggestion of the Phantom Stranger.

Good morning, Whitewater

There are no City of Whitewater public meetings scheduled for today. There is a school board meeting scheduled for tonight, and summer school begins today.

Here’s today’s almanac —

more >>

Well, thanks, Whitewater (and points far beyond, too)!  I very much appreciate your suggestions for a name to recommend to the German scientists who recently discovered a new, super-heavy element  (See my earlier post, Whitewater, Wisconsin — Name that New Element! 

I’ll list your suggestions, and later today I’ll post the email that I send to the lead German researcher, an email that I will send in both English and German.  (I have no German, and will use Google’s Transalation Tool to translate my English into German.)   

First, I have omitted from consideration any references to the Second World War, although Pattonium has a certain appeal.  References to Germans, from the war years or afterward, didn’t meet the criterion that our suggestion was something of America, to recommend to the German physicists.    

There were a few celebrities suggested, but I didn’t include them either.  It’s also not true, as someone suggested, that Vin Diesel is German — he’s American, for goodness’ sake.  I saw Pitch Black — twice! — and Diesel’s not German.  

Here are the suggestions that I’ll pass along, with a bit of comentary after each.  

Whitewaterium or Whitewateronium  — By far the leading suggestions.  Just the name of the town.  Simple, no puffery needed. 

Obamium — A tribute to the new president, and someone who did, after all, win the city’s vote handily.  I really like this one, actually, Libertarian though I am! 

Chenium — In honor of the former vice president.  I don’t think he ever visited here, but if he did, I am sure he would love it. 

Dreamtonium — The idea of Whitewater as a dream town, based on the erroneous — nearly screwball — reliance on a survey that labeled the entire county of 100,000 as “Whitewater.”  (See, Municipal Exaggeration — Dream towns.)

Coanitonium — I’ll pass along this reference to Whitewater, Wisconsin’s police chief, but it would not be — as you can guess — my first choice.  I’d save this for an element that vanishes, and then reappears a few weeks later, looking for its former place in the Periodic Table.     

Prattnium — Named in honor of the Pratt Institute, a center of spiritualism formerly located in Whitewater.  This was a serious recommendation, by the way.  

There were no suggestions involving any other local politicians or bureaucrats.  Not one.  

Finally, someone suggested Madsenium, in honor of actress Virginia Madsen.  Why?  in November 2008, I posted Smoking in a Nanny State, about a Wisconsin smoking ban.  

I don’t smoke, but I opposed then as a proposal, and oppose now since enacted, a smoking ban. 

In that post, I included a photo of actress Virgina Madsen, with a cigar and  glass of wine.  She’s not connected to Whitewater, and so I won’t pass the suggestion along, but any excuse to make a reader happy by posting the photo’s fine with me, and I agree that Wisconsin’s smoking ban is a too restrictive. 

From Free Whitewater