Sales Tax « Milwaukee County First

Milwaukee Buses Are In For A Bumpy Ride

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported some really scary news the other day regarding the Milwaukee County Transit System:

An estimated $10 million shortfall in the Milwaukee County Transit System’s 2011 budget is fostering renewed worries about possible route cuts, fare increases or trims to the county’s paratransit service for people with disabilities.

Higher operating [...]

Walker Misleads About Parks Award

This is from a press release issued by County Supervisor Gerry Broderick on April 26, in response to what County Executive had written in his Executive Update newsletter the previous week:

Milwaukee County Supervisor Gerry Broderick is responding to recent comments from County Executive Scott Walker regarding the Milwaukee County Parks system.

“Based on comments made last [...]

The Bleak Future of MCTS

With Scott Walker showing indifference to the Milwaukee County Transit System (unless he thinks he can score some cheap political points), and the state legislature playing politics with our livelihoods, the future of MCTS looks very bleak indeed.

How bad is it?

BizTimes.com did an article on this. It’s going to be very bad:

Some officials say the [...]

Scott Walker: A Sudden Interest in Mass Transit?

In this week’s version of the Executive Update that Scott Walker sends out, it appears that his focus is suddenly on our transit system. Here is what he had to say:

As you can see, his focus is indeed on our transit system, but his motivation is obvious. The only reason he is showing any sort [...]

Walker Won’t Commit to the Airport or the Zoo

Today was the first of Scott Walker’s non-listening sessions. There were about 50-60 people there. At least a third of them were Walker’s staffers. The other large majority were senior citizens. The rest of the crowd consisted of social advocates, union members as well as Supervisors Larson, West and Borkowski.

To my surprise, for the first [...]

Large Turnout In Favor of Transit Sales Tax

Courtesy of our friends at SERTA, we find a column by Charlie Rosenberg, who describes the turnout and reaction of the crowd at Monday nights listening session:

A West Allis resident who introduced herself “You can call me Mrs. Taxpayer” firmly told a listening session in a packed West Allis Library meeting room April [...]

Will Our Parks Be Saved?

Milwaukee Newsbuzz has a good article about the efforts to save Lake Park despite Scott Walker’s neglect.

The article talks about the Friends of Lake Park, citizens from the neighborhood who have invested thousands of their own dollars and uncounted hours of their own time to preserve the park where the County has fallen short.

However, there [...]

Two Important Transit Dates

Keep the dates of April 8th and April 12th open on your calendars for two important meetings.

Again, from our friends at CAT (Coalition for the Advancement of Transit):

APRIL 8

Coalition for Advancing Transit MEETING: Thursday, April 8, 2010 at 5:30PM at Manpower International, Downtown Milwaukee. Registration & Refreshments begin at 5:00PM. [...]

The Transit Bill Passes Committee, Now The Real Work Begins

Good news, indeed!

A sales tax of up to 0.5% could be levied in Milwaukee County to fund public transportation, under a regional transit authority bill endorsed by an Assembly committee Thursday.

By a 8-2 vote, the Assembly Transportation Committee supported a bill that would allow the creation of interim transit authorities in [...]

Don’t Let Milwaukee County Become Clayton County!

Clayton County, one of the counties in Georgia that houses the fair city of Atlanta, is now without mass transit.

Needless to say, the voters aren’t happy:

Angry riders and advocates of C-Tran, the Clayton County bus service that is scheduled for shutdown March 31, berated the county’s commissioners Tuesday night at their final meeting before [...]

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