Now that we’ve been here for about 4 weeks, we’ve had the opportunity to attend some local government meetings and a managers’ conference. Student reactions to these meetings provide insight into the learning that’s taking place during our program. The students certainly pull no punches in their assessments and reactions.
Chippewa Falls City Council Meeting–June 5th
Eau Claire County Board Meeting–June 19th
6.19.2007
After work/class today, our group attended the County Board of Supervisors meeting. Beginning at 7 p.m., the hot item on the agenda for this meeting was to determine whether or not the county would adopt a resolution to build a new jail; this expenditure could cost them well upwards of $100,000,000.00. With such an expenditure on the table (for a county with no large cities), it was assumed there would be much discussion. There was. What shocked me the most were the apparent inefficiencies surrounding this process. The persons who likely knew the most about the issues were the County employees (i.e., County Administrator, Purchasing Agent, etc). These people did not participate in the discussions, unless addressed to answer a question or clarify an issue – this was rare. Instead, the Board members, addressed as “supervisors,” debated and argued well into the night.
Their arguments were passionate in nature, but largely uninformed (or so it seemed). These elected officials had clearly not done their homework, as some of them even needed clarification and explanations on things they had already passed! This was likely a result of the typical nature of these Board members, as they were not full-time employees, but rather elected representatives, serving on a part-time basis. Particularly bothersome to me was all the discussion pertaining to the county’s programs designed as alternatives to incarceration. These people seemed to hold the belief that expanding these programs would eliminate the need to build a new jail. The jail is already 50-70 persons over capacity and this number will only increase; ATI’s will do no such thing. Even if the county were able to divert a large number of persons into a “mental health court,” there would still be a need to house these persons, as a number of them will still have committed offenses meriting jail time. It took all of my strength to keep from running up, snatching a microphone, and breaking it down for these people. I felt that compared to them, I was an expert on the topic – and I’ve only been here for a week! The meeting left me with a feeling of unease, as it seemed like this method of representative democracy leads to a lot of procedural hang-ups, uninformed decision making, and overall bureaucratic red tape problems! –Posted by Clark Disney
June 14, 2007
Today we had a conference at the Wisconsin Dells. The first speaker was Patrick Ibarra and he was presenting succession planning. Succession planning is going to become very important as the baby boomers start to retire. He threw out statistics that around 45 million or more of baby boomers will retire and only 21 million will be ready to move into their spots. He also made it clear to the WCMA that young people job shop these days, so local governments need to start becoming active in the career fairs at Universities or otherwise they will be overlooked. I really thought Patrick was an inspirational and motivational speaker who presented the material well. He is from the ICMA which is a proud sponsor of our Local Government Management Internship Program.
The second half of the conference dealt with Brownfield Redevelopment. It was really hard for me to stay focused on this session right after lunch. The speakers presented ways which local governments or municipalities can get grant money to help take care of contaminated or dilapidated buildings. They named several benefits in participating in Brownfield Redevelopment such as economic and community revitalization.
During dinner is when I really began to feel as if we are doing something good for the City of Chippewa Falls. We met Eugene Hackbarth who used to be the president of project Main Street, which is the downtown redevelopment project. He was very amused about the various projects we are working on. He was quite curious about Clark’s cable access ordinance and my telecommunication ordinance. He gave me tips on how to improve the ordinance and was just a delight to be around during dinner. The one tip that I kept in mind was to make sure the AT&T bill would not allow them to put cable boxes anywhere they please because they are unattractive for the city. Networking as interns was also another great experience. Overall the conference was fun. With the three-hour break during the afternoon I enjoyed the resort’s water park. This is just one of the many water parks in Wisconsin. The meals they served were an added bonus. Also, the awards program in the end resulted in Wittenberg really racking up the door prizes from the various sponsors! –Posted by Tricia Wendt
6-20-07
Last night after class, we went down the hall to watch a county board meeting, where the hot-button issue was the potential endorsement by the board of a plan for a new jail, and possibly new courts, along with a general remodel of the current courthouse. First, let me say that the
board ended up making the decision that I probably would have made in their position. However, I was really surprised that the board did not discuss land use and neighborhood impact issues at all. This should be a really big concern, frankly. The jail would replace a number of fine private homes,
and the jail will be directly across the street from the Chippewa Valley hiker-biker trail and the beautiful Chippewa River. Sure, giving prisoners a view of the river and the old downtown across it might help them with their rehabilitation, but what will the view of the jail do to riverfront
land values in the historic riverfront zone of Eau Claire?
I was also bothered by the plan to level the majority of a city block to create surface parking lots, including a row of historical storefronts adjoining the main pedestrian gateway to the old downtown. This would destroy a number of highly viable and useful businesses, including an
organic food co-op and a cleaners. What would replace this really nice-looking set of brick storefronts? Just a mere surface parking lot, with 50-some parking spaces. This does not seem like a smart trade for me.
But the debate did not include any of these issues. All that was considered was what was needed in terms of criminal justice, which I admit is the most important issue here. The debate was usually quite eloquent, despite some really stupid and false statements scattered in between. Supervisors Bates and Clark made the excellent point that alternatives (to incarceration) have not been fully developed. Towards the end, I was really surprised at the number of supervisors who voted against the jail-only concept. I felt that it had been demonstrated beyond a doubt that a jail was necessary, as unpleasant as that might be. What was more obvious is that no clear reason was expressed in discussion for why so many people would vote against that alternative. Not enough people expressed a negative opinion in debate on the jail-only option to explain such a close vote. –Posted by Seth Morgan
6-20-07
Last Night’s County Board Meeting: At first glance I was surprised at all of the items on the agenda since the board was scheduled to discuss which proposed option for the jail they would approve. Once the board had reached this topic in the agenda I found it interesting that the first motion to be made was one that would give citizens the right to advise the board on the decision via an election. I felt that this would have been brought up at least a year earlier in the process. The election would ask for advice and not a decision so I thought that it was a moot point since the board was elected to make decisions that are in the best interest of their constituents. I found myself getting frustrated with members of the board because they would bring up points that should have been addressed earlier in the process (e.g., prevention programs) or budget issues that were to be addressed in the next item (relating to the jail) on the agenda. I did not agree with the final decision because I felt that the court house should have been included but I was glad that the board decided to proceed with the project. Since, I had the opportunity to tour the jail and speak with the Chief of the Jail I saw the need for a new facility and I was baffled by the number of board members who were opposed to the jail. Based on state mandate it is apparent that there is an immediate need for more space, and I would have thought that an overwhelming majority would have been in support. There were a number of repetitive points, but in the end I think that they have made a good decision for their community. –Posted by Zoe Monahan
6/14
The trip to the WCMA Conference at the Wisconsin Dells was an experience that I have never had before. My first professional conference was pretty interesting. I was especially interested in Brownfield redevelopment, something that the city government in Springfield, Ohio is dealing with currently. After the afternoon lecture sessions we took a “Duck” boat ride. Duck boats were used in World War II and can go on both land and water. We returned to the conference for dinner and thanks to the urging of Dr. Baker we spent the early part of the evening “networking” with other people who came to the conference. Overall, it was a very good experience and I learned a lot. –Posted by Kris Boppel
6/20
I attended my first county board meeting tonight, and it was intense. I was shocked at how many different opinions people actually had about a single topic. Some of the people shared half opinions while others were on the complete opposite page. When they brought up the building of the new jail, everything went haywire. It was so frustrating that I did not have the ability to state an opinion on what the members of the board thought. It was so irritating that elected members of the board could not see what the need of the county jail and court system actually is. When the jail was brought up one of the supervisors (an elected member) spoke about how a seven-year-old child was in the court and one of the inmates was bringing brought downstairs for a hearing and scared the little girl. So if they had a new jail they wouldn’t need to deal with those types of interactions. In my opinion, I believe they should have a new court but keep the old ones as well. They could make the old court rooms civil courts and make the new ones attached to the jail criminal court. But since they approved just the new jail and not the court house, the county will be spending money on the transportation on inmates to the courthouse. More money would be spent in the short term if they built the court houses, but now it seems more money in the long run will be spent transporting inmates. –Posted by Katie Tallman
6/21/07
The Eau Claire County board meeting on June 19th was one for the ages. After finishing up a 10 ho ur day, the last thing any of us wanted to do was attend this meeting. When I first walked in, I was surprised by the order of it all. It seemed like it was very well organized and I was quite impressed. After going through the usual opening with the pledge and so forth, the board jumped right into it. The first hour seemed to go by very quickly and they went through close to ¾ of the agenda in no time. There was hardly any discussion and I thought we were going to luck out. But, then came the
issue of the new jail. These two parts of the meeting took forever. All members felt it was their duty to speak the maximum amount of time either for or against it. After going to a vote, the proposed plan failed and that was it. Next, they decided to change it and vote again. This time, it narrowly passed. Although they finally got through all of their business, it seemed like it took forever. To make it worse, not all of the board members were particularly good at public speaking which made the arguments less convincing. This meeting was something I will always remember, but not necessarily in the best way. –Posted by Dylan Owens
6/20
Tonight we attended the Eau Claire County Board meeting. The main focus of the Board meeting was the approval of the new jail that the county is going to build. This new jail has been under discussion for the past 3 to 4 years and is a very controversial subject. We knew that this was going to a very interesting meeting and we knew because the topic was so controversial, that it was going to be a very long meeting. When the meeting started the County Board Chairman proposed moving the new jail agenda to the very end of the meeting so the meeting could flow until discussion began on the jail. The beginning of the meeting went extremely smooth up until the point the new jail agenda began, this portion of the meeting took 2 hours finish. The reason this was such a controversial topic was there were several different initiatives for the proposed jail. One initiative dealt with not only building a new jail but also enough room to have the new County Courts there as well, and the majority of the Board members were against this. In the end they found that the last initiative, plan D, was to be approved for only building a new jail and no new courts. Following the approval of this part the Board then had to approve the budget, which actually did not take too long. The whole discussion over the jail was extremely interesting to me because it shed some light on how local governments deal with major budget projects. It really showed me how politics work and it was a great experience. –Posted by Chris Martin