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10/29/2007
A coincidence of headlines?
Appleton Mayor Tim Hanna is seeking re-election for a 4th term in April, 2008. FoxPolitics News included a link with the announcement last Friday morning, and the Post-Crescent printed the news in their Saturday morning edition. And then yesterday morning, in the Sunday edition, 1st section, the lead headline reads “Water plant fix nears $14M.”
“Ultimately, expenses to fix the six-year-old plant, built at a cost of $54 million, could push total costs as high as $75 million, said Alderman Edward Baranowski, the [finance] committee’s chairman…..
“The facility, billed as state-of-the art when it went online in summer 2001, has yet to produce as much water as designers promised, particularly during cold-weather months.”
Do those two headlines, coming so close together, say something?
The water plant article continues to mention problem after problem. And Tim is quoted as saying “’Was it designed wrong? I don’t know if that’s the right word. With any kind of a process like this you are going to look to make improvements.”
Was it designed wrong? What do you think $14 million worth in improvements to a brand new plant means?
What the article doesn’t say is that Appleton water rates are the highest in the county and almost the highest in the state (of the 74 plants in its class, only 2 have higher residential charges).
Another thing the article doesn’t tell you is that Mayor Hanna was in office the entire time the plant was being built. And it doesn’t tell you that his Director of Utilities in charge when monumentally misdirected decisions were made in building the new Water Plant is the same Director of Utilities the Mayor wouldn’t fire (having been begged to do so by several of us for years) and who ultimately resigned in anger, asked to have his job back, found he couldn’t have it and was urged (and paid) to exit quietly. Funny thing… that occurred just before the last mayoral election.
And while we’re talking about articles in the paper, a Saturday stream-of-consciousness-type column written by John Stoeger included this paragraph:
“A wise man coined the phrase, ‘Lead, follow or get out of the way.’ With the Appleton Yacht Club, water plant, College Avenue bridge and Mason St. homeowners in mind, our City Council has adopted a derivative phrase of ‘Be indecisive, follow or send it back to committee.’”
Having been there, Council members bear responsibility to make good decisions, yes. But in the “strong mayor” form of government used in Appleton, the process is, must be, driven by the mayor. A mayor who makes timely decisions, communicates regularly with Council leaders, isn’t afraid of confrontation, and is willing to lead, day in and day out. I’m not sure the Council has had that.
The continuing water plant debacle – only one (the most expensive one!) of many – is the very obvious canary in the mine shaft. Tim Hanna is a very nice man. But perhaps it needs to be asked if he’s the best Appleton has to offer.
COMMENTS
JO:
I read the article covering the interview that Rick Sense had with the mayor concerning the future of Appleton and whether he was going to run or not. Not once in the interview did Rick bring up any of the problems that have plagued Appleton under the Administration of Major Hanna.
Not one mention of the $14 million that will be overspent for the Water Treatment system, the Richmond Terrace fiasco, and the Big Picture Show. Why were these major issues not addressed in the interview? Someone is trying to gloss over the obvious errrors that were made and Tim's comment of "Were there design errors? I don't know." flys in the face of logic.
If a CEO in the private sector were to preside over these types of errors and then say he didn't know, he would no longer be the CEO. I think we need better business leadership in the mayoral office and at least have someone that admits he made a mistake instead of giving us steady diet of convoluted answers to some very basic questions.
Mike Thomas (Mon Oct 29 15:43:19 2007)
These points are well-taken, Jo. But there are so many more.
I read the Rick Sense piece posted at FP in the news section. What the interview with Hannah shows is a complete misunderstanding of a viable future for the Appleton area.
For most observers of the development process, "build-out" has become a dirty word.
What the interview piece shows is that for Hannah, more of the same is the wave of the future represented by the 5 year plan and manifest in a multitude of new sprawl projects and condo developments. The condos will be down in Riverheath and at Foremost. A new tract development called the Purdy project (purchased farmland, no doubt) is on track for new subdivisions. I've seen nothing about his project which apparently has been in negotiations for 2 years and more.
To hear Hanna tell it, Appleton is running out of space to expand without additional annexation and 'sprawl' is defined very narrowly. This is also evident in the interview.
For those reading this before tomorrow, a more accurate picture of the future will be presented by James Howard Kunstler at the Wriston Auditorium in the Art Center on the Lawrence campus at 7 pm Tuesday October 30.
Hannah's remarks to Rick Sense represent what I can only describe as a complete disconnect between perceived trends of energy usage and traffic patterns for build-out development and what would be a more conservative-- yes conservative -- plan for land use and development in the future.
This is even more surprising since Hanna is a supporter of the New North association of businesses striving for sustainable growth as part of their model.
If this is what is considered a strong mayoral administration then that strength should be in the hands of someone with a better grasp of what progress will mean in the coming years.
Lon Ponschock (Mon Oct 29 11:39:46 2007)
Mssrs. Ponschock & Thomas are right on! And they express it well. Appleton needs and should have someone who is fully connected, fully able to manage, guide, and excite developers, department heads, Council members AND constituents. We need to end this ho-hum, ghost mayorhood!
lkp (Tue Oct 30 09:19:03 2007)
Quoting:
"Mssrs. Ponschock & Thomas are right on! And they express it well. Appleton needs and should have someone who is fully connected, fully able to manage, guide, and excite developers, department heads, Council members AND constituents. We need to end this ho-hum, ghost mayorhood!"
Well, I think the developers have been excited enough. That's the issue here: who holds hands with whom and over what.
Lon Ponschock (Tue Oct 30 23:49:42 2007)
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