Since this is the holiday season, it’s a fairly big deal, as boxes and paper and recyclable materials accumulate rather quickly. I planned it all carefully. Fill the recycling container carefully almost up to the very top, and set aside the very last items to take outside last night for collection today. That way, I get rid of a lot of paper and ensure enough room in the cart for post-holiday inflow.

Except that I got home and the recycling crew already had come and gone — on Dec. 21.

$*^@)(&%$

How hard is it, really, to collect the recycling on the very publicly announced GUARANTEED day?

Look out, because here comes the sarcasm: Maybe the Department of Public Works guys had to collect the recycling early so they have enough time to rest up to put down two inches of salt on the street the next time we have 1/100th inch of snow.

Ouch. The numbers don’t cover every dollar that flows from the state to local taxing units, but do provide an apples to apples comparison of the change in the main sources of state aid.

The figures are on property tax bills sent out last week and appear to be reported correctly. (The city messed up the 2010 net property taxes levied on individual properties.)
Every local taxing unit took a hit, according to the property tax bill. Here’s the scoop, per the tax bills and our good friend, Microsoft Excel.

The bill has bipartisan sponsorship and the support of the City of Milwaukee, according to city and state records. It’s main author is State Rep. Josh D. Zepnick, and Assembly co-authors are David Cullen and Jason Fields, both Milwaukee Democrats, and Richard Spanbauer, an Oshkosh Republican. Senate co-sponsors are Tim Carpenter (D-Milwaukee) and Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin).

Milwaukee Ald. Joe Davis asked during a Common Council committee meeting last month whether the proposal could inspire Republican legislators to cap the amount the city could charge. City lobbyist Paul Vornholt said fees already are capped at 100% of costs, but added that the deduction proposal could draw attention to the fee issue.

“I’ll just tell you that municipalities across the state are turning to fees right now and Milwaukee is going to be joined by a whole choir of support in maintaining fees,” he told the Judiciary and Legislation Committee.

Under the proposal, the deduction would apply only to state income taxes and only to residents’ primary homes.

And now even Columbia-St. Mary’s spankin’ new Milwaukee flagship — open just a year — is already showing signs of wear. The facade (paint job?)  on the the north building — the curvy one — is either badly discoloring in spots or is chipping away. This cannot be the lifespan Columbia-St. Mary’s thought it would get out of the exterior aesthetics when the checks for the new place were being written.

Yup. And the paper should give away its content on the Internet, on the theory that some people will still subscribe to the dead tree edition.

Oh, wait!!! The JS did that! We can all be relieved that there are still some subscribers to the paper paper and that the JS suffered no negative consequences from the change. It’s all about freedom! People should be totally free to take what they want from the paper and give absolutely nothing in return, just like city employees should be able to take their paychecks to the suburbs and give Milwaukee nothing in return!

The JS also opines that an MPS teacher won’t be any less dedicated if he or she lives in a suburb.

Yup, and those Internet JS readers are no less dedicated, either. It’s just that they also no longer have any responsiblity for paying the costs of staff, newsprint or anything else that goes into making a newspaper. They have absolutely no skin in the game and are able to totally externalize the the newspaper’s costs of doing business — isn’t that great for the paper? Everyone’s happy! Except maybe those newspaper staffers who lost their jobs, or the Journal Communications shareholders who have been financially ruined, or newspaper readers who see their favorite daily spiral downward in both quantity and quality.

Wow. It’s a great deal, isn’t it?

It’s odd how folks argue that working stiffs should pay more and more of their health care costs because it gives them some economic interest in keeping their health costs low and so they are more likely to use medical services only when they are really needed. Yet, when it comes the city, there is apparently no need for the folks who earn their living from it to make any sort of investment to keep it healthy.

Go figure.

Then I think of Gov. Scott Walker’s proposed 2011-13 budget and I think, “Oh, never mind.”

A cut of a cool $74 million.

Ald. Michael Murphy, meanwhile, said that his very rough, very back-of-the-envelope estimate is that the governor’s budget will be a $30 million hit to the city.

Ald. Robert Bauman: “What’s the remedy if all our forestry and sanitation workers strike with the next big snowfall?”

City Labor Negotiator Troy Hamblin: “The new law says if they’re gone for three days we have the ability to terminate them.”

Bauman: “Then what’s our remedy?”

(Laughter)

Committee Chairman Ald. Ashanti Hamilton: “Cause the snow is still there.”

Hamblin: “I don’t know. I just — I don’t know.”

City lobbyist Jennifer Gonda: “That is exactly the point I was making. There are some practical implications here that, frankly, weren’t well thought out in the drafting of the bill.”

“Is that whole arrangement subject to an equal protection challenge?” he asked. He was referring to the way Gov. Scott Walker’s union-busting bill treated the police union (which would be able to arbitrate on an issue-by-issue basis under Walker’s bill) is treated better than even the firefighters’ union (still with collective bargaining rights, but no issue-by-issue arbitration under the Walker bill) and every other city union (totally screwed under the Walker bill).

Bauman’s question is met with a momentary silence that said it all.

“Very good,” he said then.

“Closed session,” Committee Chair Ald. Ashanti Hamilton told him.