WFB is on a precipice - choosing to embrace a hopeful future and being brave enough to begin a process of exploration and discovery about what can make us a stronger community. A Community Development Director is one of the few ways we have to do this at a pace quick enough that our kids will actually see the results.
We recently informed you about a town hall for the Community Planner role. If you attended, or sent in comments in support, it’s sincerely appreciated! It was a mix of frustratingly inaccurate fear-mongering, brought back up by passionate, well-researched support. Later, an article in the Journal came out that attempted to summarize the meeting. It missed the scale and composition of the feedback, and the less-engaged resident might read this story or otherwise hear about the meeting and assume it’s rife with controversy and peril. Quite the opposite!
The following will provide a fresh accounting: one that’s rooted in an intense desire to make Whitefish Bay a better place to live - even better than it already is - by people who have been paying attention and working on these issues for years!
Let’s walk through some key parts of the Journal Sentinel article. Every bit of it won’t be commented on so do read it yourself, but we’ll extract the more notable parts here.
A Whitefish Bay town hall seeking public input on a new village government position drew passionate speeches from residents about the village's future Monday night.
Yes.
The new position, a community development director, would develop projects in Whitefish Bay that would promote sustainable growth, enhance the quality of life and foster economic development in the community, according to the job description.
Yes. The job posting has been online since Oct 1, and the Village has been accepting applications since. Read it yourself, it’s pretty detailed. We know that at least 2 people have already applied. We’ve also spoken with Urban Planners who know exactly what the role is about, and it’s pretty typical in that regard (note: Urban Planner is another common name for this role). It’s not mysterious what this role does, to people in the field.
Here’s what the UWM School of Architecture and Urban Planning has to say about the role:
Planners work to enhance quality of life and social equity for all, whether working on revitalizing an older neighborhood or developing a regional transportation plan that enhances opportunities for people of all incomes, ages, and physical abilities. Planners address the diverse needs of community members to build a better future.
The JS article continues:
Throughout September, various stakeholder groups, including the Business Improvement District Board, the Community Development Authority and the Plan Commission, considered the position.
For around a month this has been making the rounds in a very prominent way. The Plan Commission has been operating under the all-but-assumed creation of this role. Going as far as discussing what projects they might have them tackle, or what business relations should be cultivated (see timeline for a link to the September minutes). Discussions about zoning changes we might consider were also discussed (ie. allowing changes to zoning to allow more viable business development).
Around 20 residents spoke at the meeting, split evenly between those who supported the position and those who criticized it. Trustee Raisa Koltun, who proposed the position, said the city received 11 emails in support of it ahead of the town hall.
Our count was about 14 total spoke, not 20 (though some spoke multiple times). “Split evenly” seems unfair and too uni-dimensional - people against it usually emphasized a variant of a couple themes:
Whereas people supporting highlighted it’s positive effects on:
Other residents supportive of the position spoke to the need for more resilient environmental infrastructure, traffic and public safety improvements and a change in the slow pace of village bureaucracy.
Residents who criticized the position noted its lack of a clearly defined objective and overlap with other existing roles in village government.
Keep an eye on the dissent themes, again.
There was some final back and forth, which seemed like those against the role used as one last opportunity to inject confusion where there was none with comments like:
The WFB BID had a representative there who spoke earlier, and had negative things to say about the process. In the waning moments, he spoke a second time to reaffirm that they (the BID) will happily and cooperatively work with a planner if hired. As if he was concerned his original take might have been too harsh or over-emphasized his few complaints.
At the close of the meeting, Board President Buckley said, "We've heard a lot of differing opinions. It's a matter of public record that this position was not a unanimous vote, and there are upcoming votes for the hiring of this position but also for the funding of this position," he said. "I won't wager to guess how that will turn out.”
This final utterance requires a closer examination. Earlier in the year (May), the position creation was voted on 4-3. Note that unanimous consent isn’t required, and one might admit it would be a silly way to try to govern - many Village votes are not unanimous and the President doesn’t spend much time reminding us of those cases. Sometimes people strategically vote no, especially when they know it will pass as they can tell people they were against it and did all they could, while perhaps silently supporting it themselves?
An ad-hoc committee formation was voted immediately afterwards at that aforementioned meeting and passed 7-0. One meeting later, a vote to lock in the final job description, salary range, and hiring process passed 5-2 which would lend some credence to that possible theory of someone taking an inconsistent stance. It’s not clear why someone was against the role at first, but supported the creation of a committee, and the pay range, job description, etc. To, nearly 4 months later, be willing to entertain the notion that this process has been rocky, full of disagreements, and ill-considered is just mind-boggling.
It’s hard to convey the place we’re at without having experienced the bizarre route this last few weeks has taken. Attending this meeting left us feeling as if someone simply wanted this position to be killed off, and the entire point of the meeting was to create an environment of “confusion” and grassroots “frustration.” Those against it seemed to be coming perilously close just saying that they don’t want younger people in our community, or that any attempt to be a more welcoming and forward thinking community would cause a disruption in some rigid order the Village has established over decades. An effective gatekeeping of who can live here, and who gets a say in what “matters.”
While the prospect of change is rightfully scary sometimes, the people who want to improve the Village are exactly the people the dissenters are proclaiming to want!
We’re people with kids of many ages, with an intense desire to make WFB a place our kids remember fondly and also want to raise their family in. We want us and our kids to be able to safely move around the community, support our excellent local businesses, meet face-to-face with neighbors, work on solving our hardest problems as a team, have the best school district in the state, be vigorous protectors of the beauty of our natural resources, lift up our Village staff, promote involvement in civil life, and to find a home in WFB for everyone who shares these values.
That some of us left this meeting feeling like we aren’t sufficiently meeting some lofty vision of the ideal WFB citizen or family was disheartening to say the least. We’ve spent countless hours working on the problems that we see and experience, and we confront them with a desire to make the community better for everyone. We are the opposite of disengaged and selfish. We want a community that is taking on the challenges of the 2020’s and beyond with a clear-eyed view of the problems we need to get ahead of before they have escaped our ability to adapt to them.
So, here’s the call to action. We ask the Village to fully fund this position, and treat it with the utmost sincerity and respect. Attempts to sink the position by being uncooperative and confrontational will be duly noted, and only energize those of us who appreciate expertise guiding us into the future and learning new ideas and information that pushes our our own personal worldviews forward.
From a bike and pedestrian safety lens, we believe we can make significant progress on strengthening our town with a planner. We want our kids to have a youth of freedom, and be able to go to the mall, or local shops safely with their friends like many of us did as children. We can do this through a comprehensive planning process that examines and creates safe routes to schools, places of business, and elsewhere while increasing the predictability of driving by creating safer street designs that reduce the chaos that happens when mixing kids, bikers, pedestrians and drivers in the same space.
Numerous people generically stated that we couldn’t afford this role. It’s not clear that this statement is rooted in anything other than a desire to scare people away. Let’s take a look at where your tax dollars go, currently, and what this role would impact.
It’s important to note a couple major tax categories (you can see them on your tax bill): Village, County, MATC, MMSD and the School District. This role only impacts the Village one but the impact of this role on your total bill requires considering them holistically.
The Village is also seeing a 30% increase to (perhaps due to state shared revenue formula changes this year) which amounts to around $400k. This is money we probably didn’t know we had until mid-2023.
The 2024 Budget is currently being finalized, and you can view it’s current state and if you’re interested, the 2023 version is also available. Here’s some highlights of where your dollars go:
The planner role would be in the General Government category, which is where wages and benefits for employees are categorized. Public Works employees are categorized, likewise, under Public Works.
It appears that the 2024 expected expenditures reaches around $13 million. It’s a bit tough to pin down the precise change as a result of this role, but let’s say it’s around $300k all-in (which is probably a bit on the high side). This comes to about 2% of the Village tax bill. Here’s the projected dollar increase for a few example tax bills:
Recall that WFB Village taxes are one of 5 major categories. They break down to something like (based on a recent bill):
So, you can expect a 2% chunk of the WFB bill (25% of the total) to go to this role, or a 0.5% increase in your tax bill.
North Shore Fire Department is growing concerned (rightfully so) with rising costs due to equipment and an increasing call volume. Many calls per month are for vehicle crashes within the Village. Anything we can do to simply reduce the amount and severity of crashes will directly benefit the emergency services viability. It’s a bit harder to pin down, but study after study has shown that people are healthier in every possible way when they are able to walk and bike more frequently. This also puts more people in touch with their neighbors and other community members, which increases mental health and feeling of “belonging.” A planner that can help us better utilize our public spaces, and make our roads safer will have tangible effects on health, which would reduce the burden on NSFD medical services.
Likewise, if people are able to replace car trips with biking and walking more frequently, the wear on tear on roads is reduced. As noted above, simply keeping roads smooth is a significant expense each year reaching into the hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.
Milwaukee County is finding that it’s far better use of money to convert roads to pedestrian/bikers-only spaces because the cost of maintenance almost evaporates. Keeping roads in a high-quality state when utilized heavily by cars costs a ton of money and the expenses are never eliminated. A planner can help us examine key areas where simply reducing traffic could delay street repaving costs for years.
Something else lost in all of this is what NEW revenue a planner can bring in. A planner told us that they likely could pay for their salary on day 1, presumably with grants just waiting to be applied for, or something to that effect. There are many federal, state, and private grants available for countless initiatives we’d likely be a fit for (safer streets, better water management, a robust urban forest, new green spaces and gardens).
Additionally, one would expect a stronger and healthier town to take in much more tax revenue from successful and flourishing businesses, which can be rolled back into Village projects to further enhance their viability with revitalized and pedestrianized public spaces, for example. A strategic plan of attracting businesses and understanding why many fail or never start in the first place could drastically improve the competition for our limited retail space.
So, should this role become revenue generating: we can’t afford NOT to create it! This is not an unlikely scenario.
We asked an actual urban planner, here’s a summary of that exchange:
A planners role is one of seeking out inefficiencies, a well-informed backstop to other primary roles, and having a broad view that extends well past the current budget or election cycle. For example, they are the next best-informed after the Village attorney, or finance director and can assist those roles in their daily work. They're also doing extensive community outreach and having regular conversations with stakeholders and know what matters most to people. They have an intimate understanding of the local zoning code, and any problems it's creating, or opportunities that are going untapped to raise property values or demand for local business services as a result. They will use their experience in those discussions to streamline zoning and permitting issues to reduce uncertainty, and the time/cost/effort required to open or alter a business. They have a long-term view of the Village issues, are helping to make sure the Comprehensive Plan is actually being implemented, and do this all without being overly focused on daily administration, the next budget cycle, or an election that's months away.