Milwaukee Rising

A study suggests that men, the gender dominating Wall Street, may be screwing up Wall Street because they think with their…testosterone. According to the Daily Mail:

The way male testosterone leads to risk-taking behaviour means stock market dealing would be more successful if there were more women on the trading floors, a Cambridge scientist claims today.
Research by neuroscientist Dr John Coates, a former Wall Street trader, has revealed that testosterone and cortisol - associated with high stress levels - can cloud the judgment of the men paid to make big-money deals.

Dr Coates said the traders he tested in the City of London were caught in ‘feedback where levels of the chemicals rose so high they affected their judgment.

Men are just are soooo emotional – you know how they can be when it’s that time of the market.

Ald. Jim Bohl said yesterday the city should consider seeking the autority to levy its own gas tax of a couple of cents per gallon to fund local street repairs. Bohl, during a meeting of the Common Council’s Judiciary and Legislation Committee, said that an audit to be released this week will say the city should be spending about $35 million a year on street repairs instead of the $5 million and some it actually is spending (caution:  your correspondent is relying on memory for the numbers).

Bohl made his comments after Paul Vornholt, city intergovernmental relations director, said the city would seek more funding for local road aid in the upcoming state budget. Bohl argued that the state was not going to help the city, and that the road builders, generous to both sides of the political aisle, realized the real money was in building new lanes that eventually will have to be reconstructed, generating more revenue and profit.

The Wisconsin Department of Transportation is seeking just a 1% increase in funding for local road aids in the 2009-11 state budget. Very little of the projects that qualify for the aid actually get it. Last year, general transportation aid (local road aid) paid for just 22.5% of eligible costs for counties and 18.4% for municipalities.

The $393 million oil company assessment Gov. Doyle says he will propose for his 2009-11 budget should go to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, according to WisDOT’s budget request.

The money would help pay for major spending in the next two years including, according to the agency:

•  $63 million in state funds to continue work on Interstate 94 from Milwaukee to the Illinois state line to meet the scheduled completion date of 2016 (a total of $571 million is proposed for the project is proposed in the budget request);
• $181 million to begin work on the Zoo Interchange in Milwaukee County so that construction can begin by 2012 and meet a completion date of 2016;
• $17.0 million to continue implementation of REAL ID;
• $100 million in General Obligation bonding, with annual debt service payments funded from the Transportation Fund, for transit in SE Wisconsin;
• expanding Hiawatha passenger train service; and
• inflationary cost increases for all highway-related programs and local aid programs.

“In addition to these initiatives, rising fuel and utility costs have made it more expensive to maintain current levels of customer service department-wide. For example, higher fuel costs have contributed to a need for additional funding for highway maintenance and for the Division of State Patrol,” WisDOT said. “As demands for transportation funding have increased, revenue growth has not kept pace. ”

Sales of taxable motor fuel declined this year, according to WisDOT.

Source: Wisconsin Department of Transportation.

Doyle said last week that the state is facing a $5 billion deficit. The governor has not said whether he would propose that the oil company assessment go to WisDOT.

The proposed oil assessment would include a provision prohibiting oil companies from passing the cost along to customers, WisDOT said.

Patrick McIlheran’s pre-publication sharing of a column with a generally right wing bunch of bloggers was a mistake that shouldn’t have happened and shouldn’t happen again, according to Journal Sentinel managing editor George Stanley (previous posts here and here).  

Thank you, George.

I don’t think McIlheran is particularly ethically challenged, journalistically speaking, although his political views are wacko, but his sharing of the contents of a column in advance of it being posted or published just screamed of potential pitfalls that any credible newspaper should avoid.

Do I think McIlheran should have been more aware of that potential and not done what he did?

Yup.

Should he have his butt kicked up between his ears if he ever does something like this again?

Yup.

Should we all read each McIlheran musing the JS publishes?

No. Fricking. Way.

Congratulations to the Regional Transit Authority for doing what’s needed and recommending a 0.5% sales tax to fund transit in Milwaukee, Kenosha and eastern Racine counties. Scott Walker’s representative, George Torres, cast the lone vote against the proposal, demonstrating again that the Milwaukee County executive’s office is clueless about the needs of anything beyond Scott Walkers right-wing-based political aspirations.

The RTA also recommended giving municipalities the power to levy a 0.15% sales tax to fund public safety services, but that recommendation — a Milwaukee appeasement — is so far beyond the RTA’s charge that it may well die before it gets very far. Mayor Tom Barrett really wants to get public safety services off the property tax. While that is a worthy goal, public safety funding is not really any of the RTA’s business. 

The RTA also voted to recommend maintaining its current board structure, with one member each named by the Milwaukee, Racine and Kenosha county executives and mayors and the governor. While it’s politically expedient not to change the structure, why should Racine County get a full vote when half of it is missing in action and revenue contribution? If all of Milwaukee County were to drop out except Shorewood, would the county get a full vote?

Finally, the RTA should hire its own staff sooner, rather than later. It now is staffed by the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, which has repeatedly broken faith with Milwaukee residents and cannot be trusted to serve them well in any significant (or even minor) capacity.

My sister and I stopped in a West Allis pet store yesterday so she could buy a teddy bear dog (anyone looking for a pet can get a really good deal now because economic distress had led a whole lot of people either decide not to buy a pet or to give up the ones they had).

Anyway, as we were checking out with Harley the teddy bear, the clerk asked us if we liked the new president.

I said yes, I did, and she said she preferred President Bush, that she did not like the new president. I told her I did not want to have this conversation with her. She said the new president wanted to take away everyone’s guns and she especially did not like that he wanted to ban all hunting totally.

Yup, Bush still has backing among people who do not know what the hell they are talking about.

Milwaukee and the region deserve something better than the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission.

SEWRPC, the special interest / suburban handmaiden, is up for recertification as the region’s Metropolitan Planning Organization. SEWRPC not only doesn’t like Milwaukee, as demonstrated by its anti-urban planning studies, it fears Milwaukee and Milwaukee residents, as demonstrated by th craven, cowardly effort by SEWRPC and its enablers at the Federal Highway Administration to eliminate the public hearing from its recertification effort. That effort clearly was aimed and shutting up the Milwaukeeans who dominated the public hearing four years ago. That effort was more or less stymied when those testifying refused to go quietly into that censored night. Jim Rowen has the details.

SEWRPC, as its top dogs — make that top curs — will repeatedly tell you, does not make decisions. It only hires consultants whose findings are apparent from the get-go to conduct land use and transportation studies with pre-determined outcomes. Those studies, as slanted and corrupt and anti-Milwaukee as they are, have a great deal of influence on federal and state officials.

SEWRPC is up for recertification again this year, and it’s not too late to weigh in. Written comments are due Monday.  You can fax them to FHWA at 608-829-7526 or email them to wisconsin.fhwa@fhwa.dot.gov

Here are a few things you might want to mention:

Inclusiveness, Process, Hiring:
 
• SEWRPC does not have any voting members who are elected officials from the City of Milwaukee. In fact, the City of Milwaukee has no representation on the 21-member SEWRPC commission, which has contributed to the disregard of urban needs and City of Milwaukee issues, residents and potential hires.
 
• None of SEWRPC’s 11 core staffers (senior managers) live in the City of Milwaukee.
 
• SEWRPC rejected requests of its own Environmental Justice Task Force to conduct a diverse and inclusive search for impending vacancies in the executive and/or assistant director positions.
 
• SEWRPC  has no office in the City of Milwaukee where most of the region’s people of color live.
 
• SEWRPC chose to move from downtown Waukesha, which at least was accessible by transit, to a more remote location in a Pewaukee industrial park that is not served by transit.
 
• SEWRPC frequently creates “advisory committees” -  with significant decision-making roles - that lack meaningful (or any) representation of persons of color and persons with disabilities.
  
• SEWRPC has failed to adequately comply with its federal obligation to diversify its staff.  SEWRPC  has 49 professional staff, only three of whom are people of color.  Not one of SEWRPC’s directors or “chief,” “senior” or “principal” professional staff members is a person of color. Yet SEWRPC insists on promoting from within - an action that only reinforces the segregated nature of its staff. If SEWRPC is to maintain its status as MPO, FHWA and FTA should require that SEWRPC immediately cease this practice and engage in affirmative action for all staff and consultant hires and promotions.
  
• By a vote of 8-1, SEWRPC’s Environmental Justice Task Force recommended that “every SEWRPC plan, i.e. housing, land use, water, etc. will incorporate socio-economic impact analyses by a reputable, independent source other than SEWRPC before the plan may be adopted…”  If SEWRPC is to maintain its status as MPO, FHWA and FTA should require that SEWRPC immediately implement this recommendation.

 Transportation:
 
• SEWRPC’s transportation planning routinely approves highway improvements that are sought, without consideration as to who bears the benefits and burdens of highway improvements - especially in light of declining transit service.
 
• SEWRPC knows that transit services is being reduced and that communities of color and low income communities are disproportionately harmed by transit cuts.
 
• SEWRPC rejected multiple requests to develop its 2035 Regional Transportation Plan with elements that would seek to enforce actual implementation of its transit recommendations.  SEWRPC also refused to allow community groups representing communities of color to participate on the 2035 transportation plan advisory committee.
 
• SEWRPC recently approved the fast-tracking of a $25 million I-94 interchange to serve a western Waukesha shopping mall at Pabst Farms, an area not served by transit. The mall has been delayed, but rather than delay or kill the interchange - - which is, like Pabst Farms, on prime agricultural land that SEWRPC itself had recommended for preservation as Primary Environmental Corridor land - - SEWRPC put the interchange on a list of approved projects and approved accelerated construction of it.
 
• SEWRPC has not taken the same kinds of urgent, affirmative steps to ensure transit expansion, nor has it utilized its authority to seek to require transit improvements to occur concurrently with highway improvements.
 
• SEWRPC proposed the $6.5 billion freeway reconstruction and widening project for Southeastern Wisconsin - - even as it knew that transit recommendations were not being implemented and that transit service was being cut.  The plan calls for the disproportionate loss of homes, businesses and tax base in Milwaukee County, and was opposed by a majority of the Milwaukee Common Council and Milwaukee County Board. SEWRPC’s commission nevertheless recommended it, and its subsequent transportation planning all assumes this massive construction and expansion will occur.
  
 Land Use:

• SEWRPC’s land use plan “serves as a guide for growth and development in the seven county SE Wis. Region.”
 
• The 2035 Regional Land Use Plan (the most recent one) simply recites principles and concepts of the plans going back to 1966.
 
• The 2035 land use plan does not address the fact that many low and moderate income working families and unemployed persons, who reside in the older urban communities of the region, are harmed by the lack of affordable housing in the outer suburbs of the region. The plan also does not address the racial import of this problem.
 
• The 2035 land use plan does not address the harm and racial disparities caused by the fact that new and expanding employment centers are increasingly locating in the outer rings of the region - and access to those jobs is only available by automobile, making them unavailable to many low income persons and persons of color.
 
• The 2035 land use plan fails to adequately address or seek to remedy the negative environmental impacts of pushing new development onto prime farmlands and open space, or factor in the added costs of new infrastructure and utilities such as highways, water supply and waste water treatment facilities. It fails to address who benefits from this growth, and who is burdened by it.
  
 Housing:
 
• Milwaukee is the most racially segregated region in the country - with the least diverse suburbs - and our region also suffers from a tremendous lack of affordable workforce housing, and accessible housing.  

• SEWRPC has not conducted a regional housing study since the 1970s.
 
• In 2004, SEWRPC’s Executive Director stated, in writing, that he expected the housing study to begin in the spring of 2005. Three and one-half years later, that study still has not begun.
 
• Even though advocates repeatedly suggested that SEWRPC conduct its housing study BEFORE moving forward on local Smart Growth plans (so that the housing study information could be included in those plans), SEWRPC refused to do so.
 
• Earlier this month (Oct. 2008), SEWRPC said it didn’t know when the regional housing study would begin - because it refused to ask local governments to help pay for the study (In contrast, SEWRPC was more than willing to get hundreds of thousands of dollars from local goverments to support the water supply study requested by Waukesha county communities.)
 
 Water Supply:
 
 • The SEWRPC water supply advisory committee had 32 members, 31 of whom were white non-Hispanic, and none of whom was African-American.
 
• From the outset, the advisory committee and SEWRPC staff excluded from the study nearly all factors related to water supply except supply and demand.  In particular, the study failed to evaluate any socioeconomic effects of diverting Lake Michigan water to suburban communities, a particular problem given the residential and employment segregation in this region.
 
• SEWRPC failed to include projected socio economic impacts, such as impacts on the location of job growth, housing and transportation, in the study, yet moving water across the region will have an impact on these and other matters directly affecting low-income communities and people of color, particularly those who live in the City of Milwaukee.
 
• SEWRPC failed to meaningfully evaluate who would benefit from, and who would be burdened by, a water supply expansion, or whether there would be a disproportionate harm to communities of color and low income communities in the city.
 
• The water supply plan takes as a given the assumptions of where and to what extent growth will occur as projected in the 2035 Regional Land Use plan, a plan that is also quite flawed. Rather than tie growth to water availability, the study seeks to find as much water as needed to support suburban growth.
 
• Despite the fact that two of the alternatives proposed by the study involve Milwaukee’s Metro Sewerage District (MMSD) (i.e., sending “return flow” to MMSD or sending it to the Menomonee River, for which MMSD is currently creating a restoration plan), SEWRPC did not request MMSD’s input in the creation of the water supply study.
 
• The water supply plan fails to adequately account for water quality and ecosystem impacts that would occur with discharging large new volumes of wastewater into tributaries of the Lake Michigan basin.

President-elect Barack Obama won 59.2% of votes cast on election day in the ward that includes Story Hill, according to the City Election Commission.

Results of absentee ballots cast in Ward 282 were not available late Wednesday afternoon because absentee ballots still were being counted.

Barack Obama, left; Ward 282, right. Click on the images to see larger versions.

Obama, the Democratic contender, won 394 election-day votes in Ward 282, while Republican challenger John McCain won 259 votes, or 38.9% of the vote.

Libertarian candidate Bob Barr and independent candidate Ralph Nader won four votes each. Constitution Party candidate Chuck Baldwin won three votes, and there were two write-in votes, according to the Election Commission.

There were a total of — weird, spooky music, please — 666 votes cast in Ward 282 on election day.

A huge sigh of relief.

Can we have our Constitution back now?

Here’s an idea for a little betting pool: who will George Bush pardon on his way out? (An art semi-perfected by Bill Clinton.)

The JS letters editor and first vice president of the local Newspaper Guild, Sonya Jongsma Knauss, tells readers of Blogging Blue that the JS’ ethic policy does not apply to columnists.

“First, the ethics agreement refers to articles, not columns,” she writes.

So it’s OK for Patrick McIlheran to disclose the contents of his column well in advance of publication to his conservative buddies, plus Jay Bullock?

So then columnist Dan Bice can ship his stuff around town ahead of publication? Columnist Jim Stingl can do that? Columnist Tim Cuprisin? Really? That’s news to me. If I, a subscriber, request that McIlheran and the rest of JS columnists provide to me their columns in advance of publication, can I do that in the name of equal treatment? Or are they allowed to pick and choose who gets an advance look? Is Paddy Mac giving non-subscribers preferential treatment (or punishment, depending on how you view his writings) over people who plunk down cash for their papers?

And is a column really not an article? Generally, but not always, a column is not a story — but to argue that a column is not an article doesn’t match the definitions of “article” that popped when I Googled. And are average readers are supposed to be able to slice that finely the semantic pie Sonya has laid before them?

Sonya suggests that Paddy Mac may have sent his column out after the 7 p.m. day-before posting at JS online, but he actually sent it out several hours before that.

Sonya also writes that the Newspaper Guild doesn’t officially recognize the ethics policy, something else the average reader would have no clue about. By the way, is the right wing Paddy Mac a Guild member?

The explanations are not good enough. If the JS exempts certain staffers from its ethics policy, it needs to clearly say so so readers can understand — with no hidden caveats — what they are getting.

“It is a permitted practice for Journal Sentinel editorial board members and columnists to disclose the contents of their work in advance of publication to a select few most likely to support their points of view.”

Something like that. But is that really something the JS wants to live with?