Tag Archives: Murphy

Applause for DOT; more for Sen. Sullivan and Ald. Murphy

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The Wisconsin Department of Transportation is planning to extend the Hank Aaron bike trail from Miller Park to 94th Pl. next year, according to WisDOT official Donna Brown.

Kudos to WisDOT for that smart move. The trail should help spark development of some of its neighboring properties, which are now in “far from ideal use” category. It also will provide an alternative transportation means during reconstruction of the Zoo Interchange.

The trail is supposed to head further west, but the Zoo Interchange project will involve reconstructing several overpasses that run directly over the trail. It’s possible that the western section will be opened as a crushed limestone trail, but no decision has been made yet, officials said at the quarterly Story Hill Neighborhood Association meeting.

Hats off to State Sen. Jim Sullivan (D-Wauwatosa) and Milwaukee Ald. Michael Murphy, who pushed hard to get the state to take on this important project.

City tags lenders with property upkeep duties

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Banks and financial institutions that file foreclosure actions against properties must maintain the properties if they have been abandoned by their owners, under a new ordinance adopted by the Common Council.

“This is a very important piece of legislation,” said Ald. Michael Murphy, who sponsored it with Aldermen Jim Bohl, Robert Bauman and Willie Wade. Murphy said the ordinance is being eyed as a nationwide model.

Under the legislation, lenders must inspect a property once a foreclosure action is filed and register the property if it appears to be abandoned. Lenders must reinspect occupied properties every 30 days.

The ordinance also requires lenders to assure that:

•    Buildings are secured and inaccessible to unauthorized persons.
•    Litter, trash, debris and graffiti are removed.
•    Grass is mowed, noxious weeds are removed, vegetation trimmed.
•    Immediate risks to health, welfare and safety are eliminated.
•    Public walkways are kept free from ice, snow, mud and other debris.

Violations can bring fines of $100 to $2,000.

Many banks and lenders support the ordinance, which was modified in draft form after lending institutions objected to some of its original provisions, according to testimony before the Common Council’s Zoning, Neighborhoods and Development Committee.

The city has 1,700 foreclosed properties, with another 4,500 “on the waiting list,” Murphy told the council.

In some instances, owners who can’t make their mortgage payments are simply walking away from the properties, he said.

As a result, “the snow is not shoveled on the sidewalks, the grass is not cut, the garbage is not picked up, these properties end up becoming attractive nuisances, they become problems with gang members, solicitation. They also become fire traps, they also provide further decline in property tax values of the properties adjacent to them.”

The new ordinance, he said, is “not a silver bullet in terms of addressing all of these issues.”

The ordinance gives the city one way to deal with an issue made more difficult by the securitization and sale of loans between institutions. Murphy singled out Deutsche Bank, based in Germany. Deutsche has more than 400 city properties that have been foreclosed upon and 14 servicing agents.

“None of them can be reached,” he said.

The ordinance, he said, “is not a panacea, but I think it’s the right direction.”

Summerfest to pay for police services?

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Ald. Michael J. Murphy says he is he may try to get Summerfest to start paying for the police and fire services that have always been provided to the festival for free.

“They do have several million dollars in their reserve account and we’re in a very difficult situation where we’re literally paying overtime for  officers in district stations to staff theis type of large event,” he said during a meeting of the Common Council’s Finance and Personnel Committee. “If we charge the Milwaukee Brewers and we charge the Milwaukee Bucks and these other large organizations, one has to ask himself, why do we not charge them?”

The Milwaukee Brewers pay the city more than $1 million a year to for police services, he said. The Milwaukee Bucks also pay for police, as do other organizations. Milwaukee World Festival Inc., which operates Summerfest, does not pay, he said.

“We do receive a payment for the rent of the the land to World Festival — over a million dollars….That never had taken into consideration the costs of both police and fire services,” he said.

Police Chief Edward Flynn said the true costs of policing special events previously had been hidden because of the way the Police Department tracked them. Regular-duty personnel were assigned to the events, then officers on overtime were assigned to cover some of the regular-duty assignments in various police districts.

“THe Police Department overtime was jacking up in the districts,” he said. ”In the meantime, you didn’t see that the real cost wasn’t the police districts, it was the special events.”

Flynn said he revised the way special event assignments were tracked to better monitor the costs. So far this year, he said, the price tag was $575,000.

“This is how much the city spends to police these special events,” he said. ”Whether you decide we want to recover those costs some day is ultimately your call. You should know, as we look at Police Department expenditures, that a large percentage of those expenditures go to special events at which other people make a profit.”

Barrett right on veto

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Mayor Tom Barrett likely will get overridden on his veto of the $20 wheel tax, but it was the right thing to do.

On the other hand, kudos to Ald. Robert Bauman and his allies for pushing this issue, which so badly  needed to be addressed for so long. which the mayor declined to do for too long.

A wheel tax isn’t a bad solution — it just should not be the only solution. Ald. Michael Murphy had a better idea when he proposed the combination of a $10 wheel tax and significantly reduced special assessments for street repairs. That would ensure that non-profits and land-heavy businesses and absentee landlords share in the cost of street repairs. As it stands now, those entities may well escape paying their fair share.

The council also should have done more to protect itself from pent-up demand. The wheel tax-only funding source for street repairs removes any incentive for homeowners not to insist that their wrecked — or even mildly imperfect — streets be repaired immediately. People who pay the $20 and don’t get the repairs they feel they deserve will be angry; people who rejected repairs under the assessment system will want the repairs now that the assessments aren’t attached to them.

If aldermen think liquor licenses can be a problematic pain — they ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

And, of course, if the state provided adequate local transportation needs, the entire wheel tax debate would not even be necessary.

Wheel tax vote and unintended consequences

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My prediction about what aldermen will be hearing now that there is a $20 wheel tax instead of special assessments for street repairs:

The street in front of my house sucks. It’s got all sorts of potholes and it is a really, really, rough ride. Now that the wheel tax has been adopted and my neighbors and I don’t have to worry about special assessments, we’d like the street rebuilt. Now. No? If we don’t get services for the money, why the hell are we paying that wheel tax? And why does street X get rebuilt before my street does? My street is just as bad.

I also wonder if the folks who rejected street projects because of the onerous special assessments will get another chance now that there aren’t going to be those assessments. The rules have changed, after all.

The assessments, as outrageous as they were, at least functioned to moderate folks’ desire to have their streets repaired so the Department of Public Works wasn’t overwhelmed with demand. Now that those special assessments are gone, it’s doubtful that will be the case. There still is not enough money to repair all the streets that need repairing, but there is no motivation any more for residents to limit their demands for street repairs.

Watch out, aldermen, you got what you wished for. By the way, Ald. Murphy, Pinecrest Street really is in sad shape….