click on underlined text for...
Alliance 2001-2002 Issues & ResolutionsAlliance 2001 Meeting Schedule
| Update: Kettl, Alliance in Janesville Alliance Joins Campaign Reform Fight |
Subcommittee Named on Boundary Bill |
Alliance Responds
Kettl Commission Tackles Education, Municipal Aid
By Rich Eggleston
The Kettl Commission Nov. 16 endorsed the concept of a foundation plan for funding education but struggled with the question of how municipal aids should be funded. Wisconsin Alliance of Cities members weighed in at our general membership meeting the next day on three key issues in the municipal aid debate.
Alliance members defined the goals of all state aid programs and endorsed that concept for aid programs affecting cities, villages, towns and school districts.
"We believe that the current playing field is not level," said Green Bay Mayor Paul Jadin, Alliance of Cities president. "We don't want you(the Kettl Commision) to exacerbate that, we want you to reduce it."
Members also urged the commission to dump the "marketbasket" approach for defining municipal aids.
"Municipal services will never be consistent across the state," Appleton Mayor Tim Hanna told fellow Kettl Commission members Nov. 16. At the commission's public-input meeting that night, town spokesmen were especially critical of being required to offer a specific marketbasket of local services to their citizens.
Finally, the membership urged adoption of a Local Government Institute to research the state-local partnership and generally carry on the work of the commission after the commission becomes history. See the details here.
| The commission's municipal workgroup is to meet Nov. 21
in Madison to develop a funding alternative that recognizes that historic spending
patterns reflect the mix of services citizens desire in their communities and that
equalizes tax effort required to get there. The meeting is at 1 p.m., at 1 West Wilson Street (the old Wilson Street State Office Building, now the Department of Health and Family Services Building) in Room 650. Parking is available at the Monona Terrace Convention Center, behind 1 West Wilson St. As outlined by commission chair Don Kettl, the commission has agreed to seek a plan that focuses on combined property tax rates, reducing those rates and preventing additional community-to-community disparities in those rates. In addition, the commission wants to remove spending incentives in current formulas, create a system that is predictable and stable, and substitute fees for taxes wherever it can. Further, the commission is heading toward elimination of double-whammy taxation, regional local-option taxes and TIFs and partnerships that will contain health-care costs. |
Revised Bugher Plan killed Former Revenue Secretary Mark Bugher's plan for full state funding of K-12 education was killed with a minimum of ceremony and scant mourning as the Kettl Commission went to work Nov. 16. Instead, the commission is headed toward an as-yet vaguely defined foundation plan. Proposals on how to adjust for poverty, define special needs that warrant extra funding and level school spending regionally were to be submitted to commission chair Don Kettl or education guru Allan Odden by Nov. 21. The now-dead $2.8 billion Bugher plan would have raised overall tax rates in 35 municipalities even with $407 million in hold-harmless money Bugher spliced into the plan. Most of the 35 have significantly lower-than-average per capita values, the Department of Revenue said. To see the agency's analysis of the now-dead Bugher package, click here.
|
To see Kettl's summary of the Nov. 16 meeting, look here. Comment to the Kettl Commission by clicking here.
Alliance Joins Campaign-Finance Fight
At the general membership meeting in Janesville, Alliance members endorsed the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign's "Voters First" campaign finance reform package, plus a ban on soft money expenditures independent of a candidate.
The vote came after members related shenanigans that occurred around the state
Gail joined representatives of other local government groups at a Nov. 20 news conference on behalf of the Voters First plan.
"We think Voters First will make a difference, and we'll work to get it passed in the coming session," she said.
League executive director Dan Thompson called the package "a sterling compromise...the best vehicle for moving ahead with comprehensive campaign finance reform."
Rick Stadelman, executive director of the towns association, said the conference committee version of the last budget included three items motivated by special-interest campaign contributions: wholesale liquor provisions, the school start date; and decriminalization of video poker machines.
"Elected officials are as much victims of the system as are voters and taxpayers," said Craig Thomson, legislative director of the Wisconsin Counties Association.
The Voters First package mirrors the Alliance's 1999 position on campaign finance reform in many respects, but goes beyond our 1999 position in many others. For details of Voters First, look here.
Weigh 500-pound Gorilla, Members Ask
The state Department of Transportation removed a "Welcome to Brown Deer" sign from state right-of-way in that village. It removed a handsome "Welcome to Greenfield" sign from a light pole in Greenfield and replaced it with one of those uninspired green signs that give the municipality's name and population. It does more than that for McDonalds. Also, DOT put up "No Parking" signs (which aren't enforceable because they're not supported by ordinance) along Highway 100 in West Allis without consulting local officials.
Those were some of the examples of DOT bureaucratic hubris that prompted members of the Alliance of Cities, meeting in Janesville Nov. 17, to vote to conduct a survey of local-government complaints against the agency -- as well as examples of exemplary DOT conduct in its relations with local government.
Alliance members will be receiving a questionnaire soon. And we will be working with other groups that share our concerns. Anyone who needs to vent frustrations beforehand and help phrase the questionnaire should e-mail Alliance surveymeister Rich Eggleston by clicking here.
Members at the Nov. 17 meeting voted to establish a subcommittee to take a final look at the boundary agreement compromise hammered out with the League of Wisconsin Municipalities and the Wisconsin Towns Association. Representatives from Manitowoc, Janesville, Green Bay, Madison and Kenosha will serve on the subcommittee. The group is to report back to Alliance members by Dec. 15. Members authorized Alliance support for the bill if the subcommittee OKs it.
Right-of-Way Problems Prompt Huddle With PSC
By Rich Eggleston
Increased requests for for use of public rights of way in southeastern Wisconsin, chiefly by telecommunications companies -- and sloppy restoration of rights of way after cable is buried or conduits installed -- brought a delegation of local officials to the Public Service Commission Oct. 30.
Greenfield Mayor Tim Seider; Wauwatosa City Attorney Dave Brettl; Regional Telecommunication Commission Chair Bob Chernow; Elm Grove zoning administrator Bob Simi; and Ron Kuisus of Milwaukee's telecommunications office met with more than a half dozen PSC staff members. The League of Wisconsin Municipalities' Curt Witynski, attorney Anita Gallucci of the Boardman law firm and Rich Eggleston of the Alliance of Cities sat in.
"How much is enough? When can you stop providing access to rights of way?" Chernow asked PSC staff. He said communities in southeastern Wisconsin not only foresee access problems, but are having increasing problems getting rights-of-way restored adequately today.
An Ameritech proposal would provide much more capacity in cable conduits than the phone company currently needs, and Ameritech is likely to lease out that right-of-way area to other companies at a profit, the PSC was told.
With respect to right-of-way restoration, PSC staff said local officials can set tough standards as long as they are reasonable and nondiscriminatory, and that they can require cash bonds to guarantee restoration.
"You've got to get off ad-hoc standards," PSC attorney Michael Varda said. (The model Right of Way Ordinance developed by the Wisconsin Alliance of Cities and others may fill that bill. We'll post a copy on the web soon.)
Members Pass Resolutions on Alliance Issues
Superior and De Pere are the first Alliance members that have let us know they have passed resolutions urging adoption of one or more of the planks in the Alliance's 2001-2002 proactive legislative agenda.
In addition, Superior, De Pere and Marinette passed resolutions opposing restrictions on "greenfield" tax incremental districts and boundary agreement changes advocated by some members of the Governor's TIF Working Group. (The Alliance prepared that resolution at the request of Marinette Mayor Doug Oitzinger. To see it, click here.)
Also, Marinette passed a resolution urging the Legislature to amend the Expenditure Restraint Program to reward rather than penalize municipalities that reduce local expenditures. Please send us your resolutions as soon as your common council passes them -- it will help our lobbying efforts immeasurably.
League Issues Local Government 'Report Card
Sixty-two percent of Wisconsin residents in a September survey by the League of Wisconsin Municipalities said their local government was doing a good or excellent job. Thirty-seven percent said their local government was doing an only fair or poor job.
What's more, by a nearly 2 to 1 margin, respondents said their local government provides them with more cost-effective services than state government. The random telephone survey of 801 state residents was conducted by CSG Research, a national opinion research firm.
"These survey results make a very compelling case that more, not fewer resource-allocation decisions should be left to local governments," said Dan Thompson, League executive director. For Dan's report on the findings (at least until the next issue of The Municipality comes out), look here.
Economic Summit Nov. 29-Dec. 1
The UW, in cooperation with others, is sponsoring an "economic summit" Nov. 29 to Dec. 1 at the Midwest Express Center in Milwaukee.
The effort is aimed at creating a strategic plan for Wisconsin in the
"New Economy." The UW says it's an attempt to identify opportunities and
strategies for
strengthening Wisconsin’s place in the emerging global economic framework, drawing
upon partnerships and expertise in the business community, education, labor, and
government.
The conference website is http://www.wisconsin.edu/summit
On-line registration is available at http://www.uwm.edu/universityoutreach/registration/summitform.shtml.
Oregon Voters Pass Takings Measure
By a 53.4% to 46.6% margin -- about 96,000 votes -- Oregon Voters Nov. 7 approved ballot Measure 7, which would require state and local governments to pay landowners for any loss in property values that are caused by new regulations. Supporters said it is only fair that someone, whose land loses half its value because of a change in the law, be compensated for that loss by taxpayers.
Opponents countered that a civilized society requires a balance between the common good
and individual rights.
Measure 7 would remove the requirement that Oregon landowners have to file a series of
applications to prove they’ve actually experienced a loss in value.
Still, state budget analysts said Measure 7 was potentially the most expensive initiative
on the Nov. 7 ballot. The official estimate of the fiscal impact of Measure 7 was $5.4
billion a year -- about the amount of Oregon's general fund budget.
We'll keep you informed.
Nov.
28 First Arrowhead-Weston power
line hearing, Rhinelander
Nov. 29
Leg.
Cncl. Navigable Waters Recodification Committee
Nov. 29
Economic Summit,
Milwaukee, through Dec. 1
Dec.
1
Power line hearing,
Wausau
Dec. 4
DOR Utility Tax Wking
Group, Madison
Dec.
4-5
Power line hearing,
Superior
Dec.
5
Kettl Commission, Madison
Dec. 14
Kettl
Commission, Madison
Internet sites are monsters that keep growing. Even the Alliance of Cities' web site fits that definition. Here are the initial features that we're trying to incorporate to manage that growth:
Newsletter Archive
Kettl Archive
General archive
Edward J. Huck |
Gail E. Sumi |
Richard A. Eggleston |
