The City of Whitewater’s 2013 Budget: CDA & Bus

Whitewater’s Common Council considered four budget items at length during her 11.13.12 session.

I’ll address now the first two of those four, immediately below.

The Community Development Authority Budget.

Someday, one hopes, Whitewater’s Community Development Authority won’t require tens of thousands from the City of Whitewater’s general fund, as it does now, since the CDA no longer has funds available after the Tax Incremental District 4 debacle that the last municipal administration brought on.

Whitewater’s general fund now has to commit over $60,000 toward the Community Development Authority that it wouldn’t have had to commit had TID 4 not slipped into distressed status.

A burden is imposed against our fellow residents’ more pressing needs. This inescapable truth puts lie to the former city manager’s insistence that TID 4’s distressed status would make no difference to our city.

How to fix this? Adhere to open government requirements of law and good policy to assure that all the community is aware of CDA proposals and commitments. Only this adherence will make certain that the CDA undertakes due diligence in evaluating projects and concurrently allow for the beneficial input of the many talented residents of our city.

A closed, rushed process tends only toward mediocrity.

The So-Called Innovation Center Express.

I’ve written about this exercise in crony capitalism for a single large, cash-flush corporation before. See, along these lines, A Local Flavor of Crony Capitalism, A little consistency would be in order, A Generac bus by any other name, The Generac Bus and Bottom-Shelf Messaging, The Innovation Express Generac Bus: ‘Public Transit Is Not Expected to Make Money’ and The City of Whitewater’s 2013 Draft Budget: Crony Capitalism.

The discussion during the 11.13.12 meeting only confirmed what a mistake continued funding for multi-billion-dollar Generac’s bus would be. That’s Generac, a company with a market cap as of this post of over $2,300,000,000, that is, two billion, three-hundred million dollars.

Yet, for it all, private Generac still wants public money from the City of Whitewater (as well as the state or federal government), at the same time our small city is struggling to juggle line-item expenditures to fund pressing local needs.

Let’s be clear:

Changing the Description at the Last Minute. First, this was supposed to be a bus (as it still really is) to support Generac’s workforce. Then it became an Innovation Center Express, in a transparent, but futile, attempt to boost another public project and conceal a particular private benefit. Now, at the last minute, it’s called the Janesville-Milton-Whitewater transit bus.

Oh, brother. Let me ask: does anyone foolishly believe that mere renaming changes the true nature and purpose of this project, or does someone think instead that others will foolishly believe it does?

The Existing Service is Specifically Tailored to Generac’s Needs. By its own admission, the municipal administration concedes that all three daily bus trips are scheduled based on Generac’s schedule. That’s not been a community bus, for goodness’ sake. It’s a public benefit extended to Generac and her private employees.

How is it possible — or even remotely believable – that one heard that this bus began as a broad-based community effort, and then only minutes later that all the three shifts “correspond directly with shift changes at Generac?” One would have to have an attention span of less than four minutes, three seconds to believe this.

A Real Problem Describing Costs. There’s a problem with how the municipal administration has described the costs for this bus. Repeatedly, throughout the introductory presentation, one heard that this bus would cost $61,000 for a year, all the while this cost was described after a “grant” or “strap [Supplemental Transit Rural Assistance Program] grant” from the Department of Transportation.

Describing the transportation cost this way hides the true public cost of the project, and inflates the actual, fractionally-small contribution Generac makes.

Federal and state grants are ‘public money’ toward the total cost. They’re not separate from the total cost. City of Whitewater funds are public money toward the total cost. Other municipalities’ contributions (although Milton has yet to make any contribution!) are public money toward the total cost. University of Wisconsin-Whitewater funds are public money toward the total cost.

The much smaller remainder is what Generac gives toward the large total cost.

As I’ve described before, here’s the truth about 2012 funding:

The total cost is $128,310. The actual public cost to support Generac is $68,005 in state and federal money, and $15,000 in funding from the City of Whitewater and UW-Whitewater. That’s a total of $83,005.

It’s simply not true that Generac’s portion of $26,058 is a majority of the cost — it’s not even a match for the public portion of the cost. Reporting the ‘local sponsorship cost’ (Generac, Whitewater, UW-Whitewater) conceals the true burden on taxpayers to support Generac.

One can argue whether this is a worthwhile or necessary project, but describing the total cost deceptively, by couching the (federal/state) ‘grant’ as something separate from the stated cost is wholly unpersuasive, and a bad practice.

Cagey descriptions like these were a hallmark of the last municipal administration. Whitewater should pursue a better standard.

Generac Didn’t Send a Representative. Everyone else who wants public money from the taxpayers of this community has to come forward, but there must be an exception for really big businesses. The city manager admits Generac has benefitted greatly from this service, but not so much it seems that they’re willing to attend the meeting that would extend a public benefit for a single big company.

It’s surprising to hear that Generac, with a plant in our very city, can’t bring itself to send a single representative, because they’ve been ‘busy with Hurricane Sandy.’ It’s not a believable excuse.

Dave Mumma, from Janesville Transportation. It’s more than funny that a representative of Janesville Transit did make an appearance. A big business won’t bother, but the bureaucrat from another public entity is happy to stop by and hit up Whitewater for his agency‘s public project.

So there he stood, a man who previously acknowledged that ‘public transit is not expected to make money,’ asking Whitewater to fund the money-losing project he’s hawking.

One notes that Mumma’s account directly contradicts the current city manager’s description (from this same 11.13.12 meeting) of this bus as a general community effort. Mumma openly declared that this project came about after express interest from Generac, and after a meeting with Generac and the former city manager, Kevin Brunner. So much, again, for trying to re-frame the project at the last minute.

Chance after Chance after Chance. It’s risible that Janesville’s Mumma asks Whitewater for more funding, to keep the Generac project going, to give the project just one more chance. What does he think the last eight months were?

There’ll be request after request, for funding year after year, beacuse it’s just ‘not had a chance,’ etc.

Who Rides? All this money, for several Generac employees and a few others, per day. Mumma can’t even offer a projection about how many additional riders would take advantage of 2013’s ‘enhanced services.’

If an ordinary applicant in Whitewater couldn’t produce this information, he’d likely be sent away empty-handed. Does the leader of Janesville Transit think he’s different?

Mumma’s Anecdotes About University Student Support. It’s presumptuous – and just talking out of one’s hat – to say that there’s student support for this project. Not really: university students voted against funding this program in a proper representative vote.

So take your pick: middle-aged Mumma’s theories and anecdotes about what students want, or how the students actually voted.

The Alternatives. What’s the price of funding this bus for Generac? It’s the cost of alternative local projects that might have been funded, or more robustly funded, but were not.

The price of subsidizing multi-billion-dollar Generac’s bus would mean less money available for small local businesses.

The price of subsidizing multi-billion-dollar Generac’s bus would mean less money available for our food pantry.

The price of subsidizing multi-billion-dollar Generac’s bus would mean less money available for public safety.

One could list dozens of greater needs, that will not be met so that Generac gets what it wants, but does not need, in public money.

Throughout the coming year, when others’ needs go unmet, and they’re told there’s no money, one may in consolation recall that at least a company with hundreds of millions in net annual income got what it wanted.

How to fix this? Describe costs fully and accurately, consider all alternative needs in response to an expenditure (rather than simply rationalizing additional support a failing effort).

There’s an unfortunate set of priorities at work here. Just about any other local spending would be better than this.

Next: The Emerald Ash Borer.