FREE WHITEWATER

Law, Laws/Regulations, Liberty

Winona, MN faces lawsuit over ban on renting one’s own home

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The Institute of Justice, a civil rights public-interest law firm, is challenging municipal regulations that prevent people from renting out their own homes:

“The rule is a rental ban on renting out your home,” said Anthony Sanders, an attorney with the Minnesota Chapter of the Institute of Justice, a libertarian non-profit based in Virginia.

Sanders and co-counsel Katelynn McBride are representing four homeowners in Winona for free, in a lawsuit challenging Winona’s rental cap. The rule prevents homeowners from converting their houses to rental units if there’s already a concentration of 30 percent rentals on that city block.

Under a rule like this, any renting might be prevented, even if one were hoping to rent to a single tenant. It is, in effect, a law against the rental of private property triggered only after others have lawfully rented their private property.

These restrictions hurt both owners hoping to rent (they’re denied an otherwise lawful use of property they own, for income) and renters (there’s a reduced supply of available places to live, leaving remaining options more expensive).

Via KARE 11.

Comment Forum

Friday Poll and Comment Forum: Texas or St. Louis in 2011 World Series?

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One game’s left in the World Series, after which winter begins. Having arrived at a seventh game in the most improbable way, how will this series end?

Fan video from Game 6, bottom of ninth:

Below is a poll that will remain open until game time, and a form for comments that will stay up through Sunday morning (for predictions now, and post-Series observations thereafter).

I’ll say Cardinals 7, Rangers 5, leaving Texas close yet again, but not close enough.


Comments will be moderated against profanity and trolls; otherwise, have at it.

Music

Premiere of Ben Sommer’s Deo Gracias Anglia from Super Brain

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The best moments of blogging aren’t in the writing, but in reading of others; not in saying, but in listening. It’s more than a treat to discover, and now to premiere, the sharp and compelling — here’s the FW premiere of Ben Sommer’s Deo Gracias Anglia from his latest album, Super Brain.

Readers know and have enjoyed songs from reviewed (highly recommended) Ben Sommer’s first album, america’d. If you’re new to this blog, and are yet unfamiliar with Ben’s work, there’s no better time to become acquainted than now. Ben’s as a prog rock composer, performer, writer, and in his words, a “pent-up curmudgeon.” His music combines political and social commentary from an edgy, libertarian angle.

I have embedded Deo Gracias Anglia below. Enjoy!

Afterward — visit Ben’s official website at BenSommer.com, and the album page for Super Brain for more great music.


Deo Gracias Anglia
more >>

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 10.28.11

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Good morning –

It’s a day of afternoon showers ahead for Whitewater, with a high temperature in the mid-fifties.

Today at 9 AM, a genuine and special treat, no tricks involved – the premiere here on FW of Deo Gracias Anglia from Ben Sommer’s second album, Super Brain.

It’s Halloween season, and on Halloween morning 10/31, I’ll offer FW’s Boo! Scariest Things in Whitewater (2011), a fifth edition. This year, time for expansion, too: I’ve had requests for a Wisconsin or national version of the list, and so the Whitewater edition will have a companion this year.

The Wisconsin Historical Society recalls a Milwaukee tragedy, on this day in 1892:

Disastrous Fire in Milwaukee’s Third Ward

On this date an exploding oil barrel started a small fire in Milwaukee. It spread rapidly and by morning four people had died, 440 buildings were destroyed, and more than 1,900 people in the Irish neighborhood were left homeless. It was the most disastrous fire in Milwaukee’s history.[Source: Historic Third Ward]

Business, Food, Free Markets

The Charitable Power of Food Trucks

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There’s a story at the Los Angeles Times about schools’ use of food-truck nights as fundraisers. Angel Jennings reports that

Outdoor food courts are popping up in the parking lots of at least a dozen high schools across Southern California with more on the way. Financially strapped public schools – hit hard by budget cuts, new fundraising guidelines, and fewer donors – have found a way to capitalize on the food truck craze.

Schools typically earn up to $50 per food truck nightly. It’s small change that quickly adds up, said Bryan Glonchak, assistant principal at Whitney [High School]. Since school opened, Whitney has made a total of $2,000 on the fund-raiser.

In most cases, schools host weekly food truck events, in which up to 10 vendors gather at dinnertime. Facebook and Twitter help spread the word.

The money is then used to fund scholarships, pay for equipment and school projects.

The story offers proof of food trucks’ popularity. They’ve become trendy.

Cities’ occasional efforts against food trucks are not merely bad for consumers and hardworking small-business vendors; those hostile efforts are also ignorant of the positive reception now-fashionable vendors find among discerning customers across America.

See, previously, Visit to a Food-Truck Paradise, with links to posts about efforts to defend street vendors’ and consumers’ rights.

City, Development

On the Search for a Community Development Authority Director

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Small-town Whitewater, like so many small towns, has a community development authority. For several years, Whitewater’s city manager has overseen and directed that authority in the absence of a director responsible to the CDA alone. One can leave aside a detailed critique of the CDA’s past performance (performance that I consider often misguided), and still think about whether a dedicated director is a good idea.

I’d say that a full-time director would be a good idea.

I’m not sure, though, what to make of the job description for the position. The full description is available as a .pdf document, and there’s also a summary on the city’s website. Below is the summary description:

Community Development Authority Director: City of Whitewater, WI is seeking a dynamic professional to lead its economic and community development efforts. This position reports to the Community Development Authority and is responsible for the planning and implementation of economic development programs related to business development, neighborhood improvement and downtown revitalization as well as the development and marketing of the Whitewater Business Park.

Qualified applicants should have 3 years of progressively responsible experience in community economic development along with a bachelor’s degree in Business or Public Administration, Planning, Geography, Economics or a closely related field, Grants Administration experience a plus. A master’s degree is preferred, as is designation as a Certified Economic Developer (CEcD). Residency required.

Annual salary: $55,000-$60,000 DOQ plus possible incentives.

Application Deadline: The deadline for submitting applications is December 1, 2011.

The City of Whitewater is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

There’s a gap between hiring authority and reporting authority here, of course. That kind of gap may be found elsewhere, in other cities, but it remains the CDA’s problem of these last years: that we’ve not had a more independent leader. As we’ve blurred so much before, we’re well-overdue for being clear and definite now. If all of this amounts to the CDA director believing that the true lines of reporting run to Whitewater’s city manager, we’ll find ourselves with the same organizational (and practical) problems we’ve had before.

Beyond all that, the concern that an applicant have, for example, “designation as a Certified Economic Developer (CEcD)” is an unnecessary concern. There’s formal schooling and there’s practical experience. A supposedly prestigious and ‘international’ certification (CEcD) like this is worse than preoccupation over credentials: it’s just silly.

Consider a description of the certification from a group that charges for awarding it:

You have the experience, skills, and knowledge of a great economic developer. Now get recognized for your achievements through the Certified Economic Developer (CEcD) program.

If one has the experience, skills, and knowledge of a great economic developer, then should one not be recognized already — even now? Those experiences, skills, and knowledge are all the recognition one should ever need, or seek.

(For more about these ersatz standards, see Whitewater’s Innovation Center: Good for Producing Innovative, ‘International’ Fairy tales.)

It should be enough — more than enough — to find a formally educated person with significant experience in attracting and retaining businesses. If one should seek only one accomplishment of an applicant, by the way, it would be the latter, not the former: attracting and retaining business is the heart of the job.

Smart and sensible, active and accomplished, wins the day.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 10.27.11

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Good morning –

It’s a chance of rain and a high temperature of around fifty-four for Whitewater today.

On this day in 1864, a Wisconsin resident did the Badger State proud:

1864 – Waukesha Soldier Sinks Confederate Ship

On this date William Cushing led an expedition to sink the Confederate ram, the Albermarle, which had imposed a blockade near Plymouth, North Carolina and had been sinking Union ships. Cushing’s plan was extremely dangerous and only he and one other soldier escaped drowning or capture. Cushing pulled very close to the Confederate ironclad and exploded a torpedo under it while under heavy fire. Cushing’s crew abandonded ship as it began to sink. The Albemarle also sunk. Cushing received a “letter of thanks” from Congress and was promoted to Lieutenant Commander. He died in 1874 due to ill health and is buried in the Naval Cemetery at Annapolis, Maryland. [Source: Badger Saints and Sinners by Fred L. Holmes, p.274-285 via Wisconsin Historical Society.]

Even from our vantage, the Albermarle looks formidable, I think:

Libertarians

The Libertarian Party’s HQ at the Watergate Building

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I’ve read that the national LP is looking at new digs, as their current lease in the mostly vacant, rat-infested Watergate Building expires soon, and they’ve no interest in renewing. (They’d like to buy something and pay it off quickly.)

The Watergate, meanwhile, has a better future as an historical reference and a term for countless, subsequent scandals than as suitable office space.

Via LP.org.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 10.26.11

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Good morning –

A mostly cloudy day with a high temperature of about fifty: Whitewater’s meteorological Wednesday.

The City of Whitewater’s Zoning Rewrite Steering Committee meets this afternoon at 5 PM (agenda online). These are the early steps in a long process. There’s sure to be some worry that, if there are any changes to any zoning anywhere within the city limits, the sky will fall. It won’t. One could safely surmise that changes are likely to be mostly commercial rather than residential. If I’m right, then the benefit to neighborhoods would be a more liberalized economy, rather than direct alteration of residential regulations. Expect occasional worry and posturing nonetheless.

The Wisconsin Historical Society records that on this day in 1818, long before statehood, we had our first counties in Wisconsin:

On this date Lewis Cass, governor of the Michigan Territory, declared the first counties in Wisconsin. The counties included Michilimackinac (all areas drained by Lake Superior tributaries), Brown, and Crawford counties, which were separated through Portage. Michilimackinac County is now part of the state of Michigan. Govenor Cass later became the Secretary of War under President Andrew Jackson, as well as the Minister to France and a Michigan Senator. Cass, a Democrat, also ran for President in 1848, but lost to Whig Zachary Taylor due to factions within the Democratic Party and the formation of the Free Soil Party. [Source: Iowa County Genealogical Society]

There’s a story over at Wired about how tasmanian devils – now facing an infectious cancer plague – might survival after all. Some devils many be resistant to the disease, and their immunity many enable naturalists to repopulate other tasmanian devil colonies. (The animals’ situation is far worse than literal decimation: rather than 1 in 10 dying, stricken colonies have closer to 9 in 10 dying, and only 1 in 10 lingering on.) Brandon Keim writes that

The disease marched across the island; where it hit, up to nine in 10 Tasmanian devils were killed in the first onslaught. They were declared endangered. Scientists said extinction, except for a few individuals kept on species-level life support in zoos, was possible within 25 years.

Researchers didn’t know what to do, or even if anything could be done. But they didn’t give up; they set about gathering information, basic facts that meant little at the time but might someday come in handy. One such project was a genetic characterization of Tasmanian devil population structures.

In Tasmania’s far northwestern tip, in a 10-square-mile patch of remote mountain forest area called West Pencil Pine, biologist Menna Jones found hints of a genetically distinctive group. More research showed the West Pencil Pines devils had unique immune systems. This was no guarantee of immunity to the cancer, but it was reason to monitor them and hope.

See the full story for more information about these distinctive marsupials; I’m certainly pulling for their recovery.

City

A Debilitating, Lower Standard Needn’t Be Ours

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America is a place of countless success stories, some the product of luck, but most of talent, insight, and skill. Those talents, insights, and skills require (and also create) high standards in art, science, technology, etc. They’re not standards of – or for – only a few, but ones that a person from any place might embrace (just as we can learn from so many talented people who live in other parts of the world).

We need not settle for a lesser standard, when a national and international standard is accessible to us, to most peoples, in most places.

And yet, we settle for lesser standards all the time, the fault being our own. In writing these few years, I’ve heard more than once that one shouldn’t expect expect too much of officials, as they’re not able to do better than they are doing. (Astonishingly, this is meant to be an apology of their performance, as though by defending them in this way they should be paid a compliment.)

I don’t believe that better methods are beyond our community – on the contrary, better methods are all around us. I don’t believe that some local officials can achieve no better than they have – on the contrary, it’s most often not lack of talent but unwillingness that holds people back.

Whitewater is more than able to meet a true national standard. (It’s laziness, impatience, and pride that causes officials to fabricate false honors rather than taking the time to achieve real ones.)

Of that official laziness, impatience (and pride) we have too much. We have much too much.

When bureaucrats and politicians advocate a course of action, it’s not enough to declare nebulously that some problems occur ‘on occasion,’ or that a study about injuries in one place must and necessarily apply in our case.

What number constitutes ‘on occasion?’ How is the study’s subject similar to our city’s conditions? Without showing these simple things, one cannot make an informed, reasonable calculation. I understand that those few who are ill or disabled may not be able to calculate this way, and I would never expect them to do so.

Those who voluntarily take leadership posts and offices, however, should and can answer these questions, if they would only try. They owe it to others (including those who are ill and disabled) to make that effort. It’s unfair – lazily and selfishly so – for officials to expect an easy pass from solid efforts and sound reasoning. It’s especially wrong for officials to expect an easy pass while there are so many less fortunate people among their constituents.

Officials are not owed acquiescence in the low, debilitating standard of sloppy and flimsy arguments. Many among them hold to a higher standard; those who do not have ill-served our community, and are without entitlement to a waiver from solid standards.

City, Crime, Police

Meet the New Press Release, Same as the Old Press Release

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Just about a year ago, Whitewater’s former police chief authorized a raid on a drinking party; this year, almost to the day, the city’s new police chief did the same. Scores were cited a year ago; scores were cited this year.

Needless to say, last year’s raid did nothing to stop the underage drinking in a different house this October.

Unless one were to believe that in the last year no underage age residents drank from the former party until the latter party, one can reasonably conclude that there were intervening house parties during the last year, and even riskier circumventions as underage drinkers drove outside of town. How many, I cannot say; that there were none defies believability.

For a few – an unthinking or foolish constituency – these raids are an accomplishment. Yet, know this: they’ve not stopped underage drinking, and not a single proponent can even show they’ve made a statistically meaningful contribution to reducing that behavior. Whitewater’s chief has the power to act, but does not — and cannot — show persuasive progress. On the contrary, the formulaic nature of these raids suggests dumb show, not reduction in underage drinking.

All the opportunities for community awareness and education programs are lost by undertaking a dim, predictable, cookie-cutter approach like this. Once one goes down this road, leaders should not expect a closer relationship with underage residents. Nor should they expect any progress with so rote an enforcement effort.

We many be thankful for word processing as a time-saver: Except for the year and address, this year’s announcement might as well have been last year’s announcement.

That’s true for me, too. What I wrote last year about these raids is still true:

A Problem Unsolved. Whitewater’s cited, as the story correctly notes, more underage drinkers at a single time than this, previously. And yet, here’s another house party, with underage drinking. There were likely many parties between the last major house party citations (2002) and this recent one. Most were probably smaller, but add them all up, and this seemingly impressive raid looks like water on sand.

It’s odd to hear someone talk about ‘zero tolerance’ when all these efforts amount to so little behavioral change. It doesn’t matter how little one tolerates something if there’s no change in overall behavior.

There’s a mediocrity to these enforcement efforts, leaving real problems to fester beneath the headlines, and that’s not changed from last year, either.