The Quality of Life Alliance, a group I’m a part of, released the following press release today asking for the Joint Finance Committee to include the voter approved 1% sales tax for Milwaukee County in the upcoming budget.

For the sake of our Park System, Transit, and Emergency Medical Systems, we are asking the Joint Finance Committee to include in the next State budget what the citizens of Milwaukee County have already approved: a one percent sales tax increase that will provide sustainable, dedicated funding for Parks, Transit and EMS.

“Please don?t continue to allow the voices of the 400,000 people who voted in November?s referendum to be ignored”, remarked Cheri Briscoe of Sierra Club-Great Waters Group and Quality of Life Alliance member. The referendum was advisory and requires action from the state to be enacted.

“Our Milwaukee County Park System, once proud and strong, is now limping along with an ever decreasing staff to perform daily maintenance and a log of deferred maintenance for its facilities of nearly $275 million,” added Jim Goulee, a QLA member who is also on the Board of Directors for Preserve our Parks.

This group’s attempt to gain local legislative support for enabling legislation from our state legislators was unfortunately, a tough sell. The Governor instead inserted the creation of RTA for Milwaukee, Kenosha, and Racine and funded by a sales and use tax in his proposed budget, leaving out any support for Milwaukee County Parks.

It is now becoming apparent that the proposal for the creation of the Southeastern Wisconsin RTA is not finding the necessary support from the Joint Finance Committee and may not be included in their version of the state budget. Instituting the sales tax increase in Milwaukee County would, in fact, provide the source of funding needed for a Milwaukee County RTA and could easily accommodate a broader RTA if and when it is created.

“Milwaukee County needs property tax relief and we need a solution to our looming transit and parks crisis,” commented County Supervisor Chris Larson, Quality of Life Alliance spokesperson. “Milwaukee County needs the 1% sales tax that was passed in referendum nearly months ago. Property tax payers can?t wait any longer, transit riders can?t wait, any longer, and all our neighbors who love our parks shouldn?t have to wait any longer to see these problems fixed.”

Quality of Life Alliance (QLA) is a grassroots organization made up of representing a wide swatch of Milwaukee County?s concerned citizens set out to improve our community for a stronger future. Members of the Quality of Life Alliance include transit riders, union leaders, parks supporters, and business men and women, and everyday citizens who are deeply concerned about the future of Milwaukee County and all of Southeastern Wisconsin. Quality of Life Alliance provided the advocacy effort that led to the passage of the sales tax/property tax relief referendum last November. The Quality of Life Alliance is a registered political action committee based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

It’s important the members of the Joint Finance Committee understand the importance of this dedicated funding source to the regions well being for decades to come. All we’re asking is to let the voices of the people of Milwaukee County be heard on this issue.

If you know any of the members of the JFC from the Milwaukee area like Rep. Tamara Grigsby, Rep. Pedro Colon, Sen. Lena Taylor or Sen. Alberta Darling, please contact them to voice your support.

Another major business leader in Southeastern Wisconsin is advocating for improved mass transit in the region, including a KRM line:

Ready to go is the KRM commuter rail project, which can provide access to a more talented workforce, a larger base of successful and growing businesses and a competitive position in the growing global economy. Public transit also offers advantages for low-income families, reducing their costs of commuting by as much as 65 percent. This not only lifts a major burden from property tax payers and citizens, but also strengthens the local economy through these families’ increased purchasing power. – Robert Mariano, CEO of Roundy’s Supermakets

I’ll point it out again, but the number of people who are opposed to mass transit in the region is steadily decreasing as more and more people start to see the benefits that a solid mass transit component bring to the overall well being of a region.

I’m also glad to see others are starting to catch on to something I’ve been talking about for yearsnow: the need for Milwaukee to be prepared for the 2016 Olympic games being held 70  miles to the south. We need to be prepared to take advantage of the once in a lifetime economic boom and attention to all that Milwaukee has to offer that the Olympics would bring.

Efficient and reliable mass transit is a big piece of that.

Support for the KRM line between Milwaukee and Chicago has been growing for years and is starting to expand beyond political parties and traditional “conservative vs. liberal” boundaries.

Three prominent Southeastern Wisconsin business leaders – Tim Sheehey, Todd Battle and Roger Caron – write about the need to move forward on the KRM line in today’s Racine Journal Times:

Our organizations are responsible for increasing the economic vitality of the surrounding community, and while each city faces unique challenges, we share a common goal of fostering business development, job creation and capital investment.

None of our cities is unique in its work to support the efficient and continued operation of transit systems at a time when state and federal funds for transit are stagnant. We all agree that frequent, reliable transit is critical to ensuring that all residents can access jobs. Conversely, reliable transit is critical in assuring businesses that they are accessible by employees.

Timothy Sheehy represents the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, Roger Caron represents Racine Area Manufacturers and Commerce and Todd Battle is with the Kenosha Area Business Alliance.

The business community is on board in support of mass transit and they’re a welcome passenger in the push for economic development, connecting workers to jobs and connecting Milwaukee to the global marketplace.

I’m so old I can remember when the Phoenix light rail system was held up by anti-rail zealots as a prime example of how light rail in a city designed for cars would be a massive, monumental and cataclysmic failure.

Guess not.

So much for the notion of light rail’s novelty wearing off.

The average passenger count for weekdays in February, the second month of the cross-Valley line’s revenue operations, jumped 15 percent from January and was well over projections for the first year.

Almost 35,300 people rode trains on the average weekday, Metro announced Thursday. That figure exceeded Metro’s target of 26,000 by more than one-third. – MSNBC

Not only is their new light rail system – which I should point out, is located in an area that’s hardly considered “liberal” – meeting expectations, it’s exceeding them.

I also recall reading a lot about how anti-rail conservatives in Arizona were predicting nothing but doom and gloom for their “choo-choo train” and that no one would ride it even if it was ever completed. They were wrong again.

It’s the same thing we’ve been hearing from the same types of people here in Milwaukee. I believe that like Phoenix, a new commuter rail or streetcar option in Milwaukee will be met with much the same success as Phoenix.

And everywhere else it’s been deployed for that matter.

I’ve been pointing out the success stories of commuter and light rail in city after city for almost a year now and not once during that time have I heard of, nor has anyone sent me (which believe me, they would) the counters to those stories during that time. Just lots of, “Well it sure has heck won’t work here!” speculation and scare tactics.

Good job Phoenix, and congratulations on your success.

Because County Executive Walker’s stonewalling and unwillingness to work with anyone on the $92 million in transit money we had coming from the Federal government, Milwaukee County now will only get 40% of the money.

As recently as last year, Mayor Barrett was offering to split the money with the County and Walker 50/50. Walker refused, stomed his feet, and said he wanted all of the money for his project! His project , ironically, was to replace the aging County bus fleet that he’d starved of funding for years so he could claim he was “holding the line on taxes”.

So how’s that for leadership folks? I know the usual suspects will be patting him on the back and saying he stuck to his principles, but at the end of the day Milwaukee County has $10 million fewer dollars because our top elected official refused to even consider a compromise or what was best for his constituents. It was all about him, and that’s not leadership by any stretch of the word.

So yeah, of course he’s “upset” and “lashing out”. His political stunt backfired. Again. And when you’re just about to (finally) announce your candidacy for Governor, that’s kind of bad timing.

Beyond how this affects Walker though, I think it’s important to focus on the real issue here: Milwaukee County now has less money to work with as a result of the decisions of our County Executive.

That’s shameful.

For several reasons, not least of which was the embarassment that after 17 years we couldn’t agree on how to spend $100 million, I’m happy that some resolution has come to the saga of how to spend federal tax money from the early 90′s.

Ending a 17-year-long dispute, Congress has thrown its support behind a modern streetcar system in downtown Milwaukee.

With local officials deadlocked over how to spend $91.5 million in long-idle federal transit aid, Sen. Herb Kohl and Rep. David Obey quietly inserted a provision in the massive federal budget bill to hand 60% of the money to the city for a downtown rail line and 40% to Milwaukee County for buses. President Barack Obama signed the budget into law last week.

That’s a victory for Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, who has championed a downtown streetcar loop, and a defeat for County Executive Scott Walker, who has fought the idea. Kohl and Obey, both Wisconsin Democrats, acted at the urging of Barrett, their former congressional colleague. – jsonline.com

Great news for Milwaukee, I’m very excited about the potential for progress to our mass transit system here in the City and County.

The number of people utilizing mass transit continues to swell:

Despite job losses and falling gasoline prices, record numbers of Americans rode subways, buses and commuter rail last year, boosting public transportation ridership to its highest level in 52 years, according to a survey to be released today by the American Public Transportation Association.

Advocates say the ridership figures show growing support for public transportation. They hope to use that support to push for federal funding beyond the $8.4 billion in stimulus money set aside for transit. More investment in transit not only helps the economy, advocacy groups say, but also helps the environment and fosters energy independence. – Washington Post

Yet just this morning on my local AM radio station I heard a lot of mocking rhetoric that “NO ONE WILL RIDE IT@!$!” if and when we get improved mass transit here in Southeastern Wisconsin.

So on one hand you have professional talk show hosts who oppose mass transit and claim no one will ride it, and on the other hand you have record numbers of Americans who apparently aren’t listening to local AM talk radio shows.

At any rate, a positive sign for mass transit. It’s encouraging to see that the record number of mass transit users we saw during the high gas prices last Summer wasn’t a temporary thing, and that once people tried mass transit, they appear to be sticking with it.

The Wauwatosa Common Council voted to reject the recommendations of a Regional Transit Authority by a vote of 7-6 tonight after a good 70 minutes of debate.

The entire argument against any kind of regional transit from Alderman who oppose the RTA was based on so much misinformation, scare tactics and flat out falsehoods that I was shocked some of these people were able to get elected in the first place.

At the end of the day though, they won out, at least in Wauwatosa.

On a side note, Ald. Dennis McBride was impressive in his advocacy of the RTA tonight and although I’ve heard from acquaintances in Tosa that he’s a wonderful public servant, I hadn’t seen it in person until tonight.

Since the City of Wauwatosa is light years ahead of other local government entities in terms of technology and puts video of it’s meetings on Google within a year of the meeting, I’ll be able to splice together some highlights and lowlights shortly.