Posts Tagged ‘Spending’

State of Wisconsin Cash Flow Vastly Improved from Last Year

MacIver News Service | January 25, 2012

[Madison, Wisconsin] As Governor Scott Walker prepares to deliver his annual State of the State address Monday night, one area of improvement to which he could point is the status of the state general fund’s cash flow.

Compared to this time last year, the projections are much rosier. The Walker Administration does not anticipate the General Fund balance to dip into the red in the next several months, a practice that happened often in the final years of the Doyle Administration.  The Administration did not need to rely on inter-fund transfers/borrowing to keep a positive balance in the General Fund in December and does not anticipate having to do so for at least the first quarter of 2012.

2011′s  Q1 forecast:

Forecast for 2012 Q1:

In December of 2010, the Dolye Administration offered the following warning to lawmakers:

“The General Fund may experience low balances intermittently from December 13th through January 3rd. During this time it may become necessary to exercise the authority granted under s. 20.002(11)(a), Wisconsin Statutes, pertaining to the temporary reallocation of certain eligible surplus moneys.”

One year later, Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebch wrote:

“It is not anticipated that the authority granted under s. 20.002(11)(a), Wisconsin Statutes, pertaining to the temporary reallocation of certain eligible surplus moneys, or the authority granted under s. 16.53(10)(a) , Wisconsin Statutes, pertaining to the delay of payments will be utilized.”

The data comes from the quarterly reports the executive branch must submit to the legislature’s Joint Committee on Finance, per state statutes.

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Posted in Breaking news, News | January 25, 2012 | | 2 Comments

Wigderson on Earmarks in State Budget

By James Wigderson
 Special Guest Perspective for the MacIver Institute

State Senator Rich Zipperer’s committee is again considering his bill to make budget “earmarks” transparent in the state budget process. Zipperer’s bill would not end budget earmarks, but legislators would have to defend the earmarks for their districts in the budget.

Earmarks are budget provisions for a specific beneficiary that would not be generally applicable, whether it’s expenditure or a benefit in the state tax code. Earmarks are often included in government budgets to win the support of legislators for passage of the budget bill.

Zipperer’s bill, SB 114, would end what he called “airdrops.” These are provisions inserted by the conference committee after the budget bill’s passage by the Joint Finance Committee and both houses of the legislature. This would stop last minute deals outside of the public eye. The conference committee would still have the ability to reduce the amount for a particular earmark.

The bill would also change the rules in the Joint Finance Committee regarding earmarks. Instead of requiring a majority to take an earmark provision out, the bill would require a majority vote to keep an earmark in. This would be especially important in those years when control of the legislature is split and there is equal representation of both parties.

The most important part of Zipperer’s bill is a requirement that the legislative fiscal bureau would create an “earmark transparency report.” The report would contain a list of all earmarks in the budget bill and the cost of each earmark. The bill would also identify the beneficiary of each earmark, including the Assembly and Senate District of the earmark beneficiary.

Both parties are guilty of including earmarks in the budget process. Zipperer says that the last state budget was better than most.  “It certainly wasn’t at the level of the previous budget.”

But there were still earmarks. For example, “There was $25,000 for Copper Falls with no explanation.” Zipperer explained, “It was not enough to make me oppose the budget,” but it showed that earmarks continued even under Republican control.

In the last budget under Governor Jim Doyle, perhaps the most infamous example of an earmark was $46,000 for recycling containers for Wrightstown, a town of 2000 people.

Other examples of earmarks in the last budget under Doyle include $5 million for the Bradley Center (part of which was spent on a new scoreboard) and $500,000 for the Oshkosh Opera House.

The argument for earmarks is that it allows the legislature to specify and set priorities for government spending. Zipperer says the higher the level of government, the more potential harm there is for earmarks.  Earmarks distort the real priorities for spending. They also mean that the state is making a spending decision that should have been made locally.

However, “Even if you support earmarks, you can still support this bill,” Zipperer said. After all, the bill does not stop earmarks, it only makes members of the legislature have to defend them.

Earmark transparency has been an interest of Zipperer’s since he was first elected to the Assembly and saw his first budget process. He says what makes this year’s bill more likely to pass than his past attempts is that the bill has been simplified to identifying the earmarks.  That way the legislature and the public will know about them before there is a vote on the budget.

Zipperer also claims bipartisan support for the bill this time. Senator Tim Carpenter of Milwaukee is a co-sponsor of the bill.

The bill has been through a public hearing and will soon be getting a committee vote. Despite the recalls that threaten to overshadow any work the legislature does, Zipperer is optimistic there will be enough floor time for his bill to pass.

If it passes, voters can expect to hear more about state grants for soybean crushers and climate change classrooms. Not because there are more or less earmarks like them, but because the legislative fiscal bureau will be required to list them before the legislature votes to approve them.

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Posted in mi perspectives | January 13, 2012 | | Comments Off

$3 Billion in Savings Eyed

MacIver News Service | January 10, 2012

[Madison, Wisc…] Governor Walker hopes the initiatives identified by a state panel will save taxpayers nearly three billion dollars over the next decade.

A year after it was first created by an executive order, the Governor’s Commission on Waste Fraud and Abuse released their final report Wednesday.

“Based on months of review and discussion it is clear that the state’s budgeting and financial systems are antiquated,” wrote Commission Chairperson Craig Rakowski. “To eliminate waste, fraud and abuse there needs to be a clear understanding on how budgeted money is actually being spent. In other words, we need to do a much better job following the cash.”

Overall the Commission believes its recommendations can reduce spending by local units of government by $82.6 million and state government by $373 million for a total annual savings to taxpayers of $445 million.

In addition to specific recommendations, the report outlines five general, big picture areas of concern:

  1. Wisconsin’s accounting and financial information systems need to be brought up to date. According to DOA personnel the accounting system currently being used by them is almost 20 years old. There obviously has been a significant change in technology during those 20 years, technology that Wisconsin is not taking advantage of. It is impossible to make sound financial decisions without timely, reliable and accurate information. Many times these systems have already been developed and implemented in other states and would be available to us.
  2. The traditional method of budgeting being performed needs to be challenged. While zero based budgeting appears to be extremely hard and time consuming some modified form needs to be put in place. We cannot continue to roll forward previous budgets without accepting that there is cushion and waste built into them. The fact that agencies have been required to lapse certain percentages of their budgets and that many times the same items are being lapsed for the second or third time shows that this cushion exists.
  3. One of the report recommendations is to make a certain dollar amount of lapsing permanent. I think we should take this a step further and say that if something is lapsed more than once it should be removed from the budget altogether. Why, for instance, is an agency that has relocated to reduce lease cost by $500,000 not required to reduce their budget by that same $500,000 but instead allowed to use it towards their lapses budget after budget?
  4. The State of Wisconsin should be doing business on a GAAP basis. In my opinion the modified cash basis currently in place allows for cutoff issues and could be used to circumvent the State’s balanced budget requirement.
  5. Once information systems are put in place which provides timely accurate financial information, agency’s budgets and cash flow should be tracked on a monthly or at least a quarterly basis. This would allow expenditures in the last quarter of the year to be reviewed for appropriateness. Any possible “using up” of the remaining budget could easily be identified with this type of information.

“Many times questions asked by members of the commission remained unanswered because we were told that information was just not available,” Rakowski wrote in the final report. “This needs to be remedied.”

Rakowski wrote that based on conversations the commission had with individuals familiar with the state’s public assistance programs, waste fraud and abuse in those programs range from two to 15 percent of budgeted funds.

“The most common opinion is around 10%,” Rakowski. “This is unacceptable as it is keeping assistance from the individuals in our society that really need it.”

From the report:

Public comments and suggestions focused on Wisconsin’s public assistance programs more than any other topic discussed by the Commission. Wisconsin has well over 1 million beneficiaries and Medicaid expenditures alone are expected to eclipse $7 billion this fiscal year.

What the Commission found was an explosion in public assistance spending and program expansions over the last decade with no corresponding investment in program integrity. Actually, program integrity spending went down, reduced by 76% at the same time FoodShare enrollment more than doubled and Medicaid enrollment grew by 50%.

In part, because of the discussions of this Commission the Department of Health Services has created an Office of Inspector General and has invested in cracking down on fraud in public assistance programs. Results have already been seen. Benefits saved due to fraud in FoodShare alone climbed 46% in October and payments recouped 80% compared to the first month of 2011.

As we previously reported,  Deputy Administrator Andrea Reid of the UI Division of the Department of Workforce development told the Commission last year that unemployment benefit fraud in Wisconsin has skyrocketed over the past few years.  Between 2008 and 2010, the amount of overpayments shot up from $21 million to $78 million. The number of cases increased 130 percent. The amount of overpayments over $1000 that were intentionally concealed went from $9.25 million in 2007 to $40.5 million in 2010, a 338 percent increase.

Even with the cases of fraud increasing, few people have been successfully prosecuted for it.  In order to face punitive action, a person must have fraudulently received more than $5000 in benefits and committed 5 acts of concealment. In 2010, 2,169 people met those requirements, yet only 31 of them were prosecuted. That resulted in 11 convictions.

In 2011, the Wisconsin legislature passed a one-week waiting period before would-be recipients can receive UI benefits. This move, criticized my many legislative opponents as cruel, is expected to save the state up to $50 million a year as the extra time will allow the state to investigate the validity of claims.

Reid told the commission in August that the state’s ability to root out fraud is limited, in part, because the data processing equipment was more than 25 years old.

“This application is inefficient, does not meet our business requirements, and can not be modified quickly enough to respond to program modifications or law changes,” she said.

In their final report the Commission found that DWD is working to correct the above issues and upgrading its information technology which is expected to improve its efficiency.

Administration officials also noted that the Commission’s work has also led other state agencies to already begin implementing some cost saving measures because of the discussions they had during 2011.

  • The Department of Health Services has created an Office of Inspector General and has invested in cracking down on fraud in public assistance programs. Results have already been seen. Benefits saved due to fraud in FoodShare alone climbed 46% in October and payments recouped 80% compared to the first month of 2011.
  • State employee compensation plans were modified in an effort to reduce the amount of unnecessary and costly overtime.
  • Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs (WDVA) found that they could accommodate their agency staff in office space soon to be vacated by the former Wisconsin Department of Commerce, which is estimated to save WDVA between $300,000 and $400,000 annually.

“The recommendations by the Commission will help state government operate more efficiently and effectively,” said Governor Walker.  “Moving forward I will work with members of both political parties to implement the remaining recommendations made by the commission.”

Read the entire report, here.

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Posted in News | January 10, 2012 | | 2 Comments

Obama Continues the Trend of Deficit Spending

Click here for the full article from the Heritage Foundation

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Posted in mi fast facts | January 2, 2012 | | Comments Off

Walker Looks to Expand Family Care

MacIver News Service | December 28, 2011

[Madison, Wisc...] Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker said Wednesday he will ask lawmakers to lift enrollment caps for Family Care and expand the program to all counties in the state.

The current state budget included a $1.2 billion increase to Medicaid.  Walker’s new proposal would cost $80 million for the remainder of the biennium. He said with the funding increase included in the 2011-2013 budget and recent efficiencies implemented by the Department of Health Services, his proposal would require no additional funding.

Gov. Scott Walker

“It was really built off the fact that we put an unprecedented amount of new funding into Medicaid, more than $1.2 billion was added this budget,” said Walker. “That’s one of the largest increases of any state in the country,” Walker said at a press conference Wednesday.

Family Care is a program that provides long-term care focused on helping senior citizens and disabled individuals stay in their homes.

Earlier this year an enrollment cap was placed on Family Care in response to a Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB) evaluation which found a number of areas the program could be improved and made more efficient.  After a briefing on the work done by DHS over the past couple of months Walker announced a plan to lift the Family Care cap. Governor Walker’s plan also calls for Family Care to be expanded to additional counties.

“I am confident that Family Care can continue to be implemented efficiently and cost effectively,” said Governor Walker.  “Lifting the cap will be done in a way that respects taxpayers and is mindful of their investment, while at the same time providing care for those who are truly in need.”

The Governor’s hopes for legislative action and DHS implementation  of the Family Care expansion by this spring. He said the pause in the wake of the audit helped stabilized the program for the future.

“It really put us in a position where we could support many of the other programs we have and through these changes and improvements, ensure that not only we could lift the cap for Family Care, but also to do so in a way that is sustainable long into the future, long beyond just this current budget cycle we’re in,” Walker said.

About 14 counties currently do not offer the program, mostly in the northeastern part of the state.

Walker hopes the legislature will take up his proposal in the coming weeks, and expects broad bipartisan support.

Also at the announcement today to support the lifting of the enrollment cap was Lynn Breedlove from Disability Rights Wisconsin, Heather Bruemmer Executive Director of the Board on Aging and Long Term Care, Kim Marheine from the Board on Aging and Long Term Care, Beth Sweeden from the Board for Persons with Developmental Disabilities, Maureen Ryan with the Wisconsin Coalition of Independent Living Centers, Michael Blumenfeld representing several MCOs, Teri Buros from Southwest Wisconsin Family Center, State Senator Terry Moulton (R-Chippewa Falls), and State Representative Dean Kaufert (R-Neenah).

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Posted in News | December 28, 2011 | | 1 Comment

ABC’s Debate Series Topic: There’s Too Much Government in My Life

Earlier this month Wisconsin’s First District Congressman and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan joined columnist George Will for an hour-long debate with Rep. Barney Frank and former Labor Secretary Robert Reich. The four took part in the inaugural event of the ‘Great American Debate Series’ on ABC’s This Week program, and focused on the topic: “There is Too Much Government in My Life”

See the video.

Congressman Ryan’s opening remarks:

Is there too much government in our lives? Yes. Ask most people and they will agree. It’s no coincidence that government spending has hit record levels while people’s trust in government has hit record lows. So the longer answer, why is this, is pretty simple.

Too much government inevitably leads to bad government. When government grows too much and extends beyond its limits, it usually does things poorly. Our founders put limits on government because they knew the limits of government.

The left usually likes to advance what I would call a strawman argument or a false choice, that those of us who believe in the constitutional principles of limited government somehow favor sort of a Hobbsian state of nature, or a social Darwinism, where people are left to fend for themselves completely, only to be exploited by the few who are powerful, and that the only alternative to this cruel society is a vision of a society of total security and total outcome, results guaranteed by government.

Fortunately, this is not the case. Those of us who believe in limited government also believe in effective government. A good and popular government is one that respects its limits. Is one that fulfills its goals and its functions well.

But look at where we are today. Look at our economy, look at our debt. Crony capitalism where government is picking winners and losers. Where you have big government and big business exchanging favors with one another while the entrepreneur and the small-business person is left struggling to survive.

The last few years have shown us that a truly effective government is impossible without limits. A government that focuses on equalizing the results of our lives is one that does damage to the American commitment of equal opportunity. If we reclaim our founding timeless principles, we’ll have a government that we have faith in, that we are proud of, and the question surrounding the size and the proper size of government will take care of itself.

Read the entire transcript.

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Posted in News | December 27, 2011 | | Comments Off

Medicaid Showdown Looms

This weekend, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published a column by MacIver President Brett Healy.

In part, Healy wrote:

With Wisconsin stuck in the middle of the highly charged “recall season,” those on the left immediately seized upon this waiver in an attempt to maximize political damage. But what they conveniently forget to mention in this attack is that the program is broke and in need of a fix. What is their plan? Is it the plan suggested by the Obama administration?

In a February 2011 letter from Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, the Obama administration suggested the option of ending eligibility for 53,000 non-disabled, non-elderly and non-pregnant adults on Medicaid with income above 133% of FPL. This, the feds say, would save the state over $60 million of general purpose revenue a year. While I personally agree with this approach, the left in Wisconsin would certainly be apoplectic if DHS attempted this one-size-fits-all remedy.

If Wisconsin is granted the waiver, only individuals who refuse to pay the 5% premium, who have access to affordable employer-sponsored coverage, who fail to prove they are Wisconsin residents or who make too much money to qualify would be kicked out of the program.

In between when the column was written and when it was published, the Federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services preliminarily approved parts of Wisconsin’s waiver request.  However, CMS said “it is unlikely we will be able to meet the State’s requested approval date of December 31, 2011, for all the proposed changes.”

They did approve e the following proposals as applied to non-disabled, non-pregnant adults with income above 133 percent of the Federal Poverty Level

  • Application of the 9.5% affordability test with respect to employer sponsored insurance that meets minimum benefit standards;
  • Premium increase for the adult family members up to 5% of family income (this item, as proposed by the State, would be for non-disabled, non-pregnant adults with income above 150% of the FPL); and
  • A 12-month restrictive re-enrollment period for Medicaid eligibility for the adults who fail to make a premium payment.

The Walker Administration continues to push for the full waiver application, but if the feds reuse to budge, the stalemate will likely force their hand to disenroll individuals in the manner by which the Obama Administration is suggesting.

Read Healy’s whole column, here.

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Posted in mi perspectives | December 12, 2011 | | Comments Off

Freed from Union Contracts, School Districts Able to Shed Costly Sick Leave Conversion Programs

MacIver News Service | December 8, 2011

While many school districts across Wisconsin have taken steps to protect themselves against unpredictable sick leave policy expenses, others have been hit hard this past year by an unusually high number of retirements.

Thanks to changes in the state law governing public employees, districts can make changes in these programs without having to negotiate with local teachers’ unions.

The MacIver News Service has been conducting research on how different levels of government are impacted by sick leave policy across Wisconsin.  Some policies allow retiring employees to convert unused sick leave into either cash or insurance premiums upon retirement.

We reached out to school district officials across the state, enquiring about their sick leave policies. Almost 80 responded to our requests for information.

Like all levels of government, school districts tend to be generous with sick leave when compared to the private sector. Teachers typically earn 10 to 12 sick days a year, and are allowed to accumulate anywhere from 50 to 160 days. Some districts do not have a limit on how many days can be banked.

What happens to those days when a teacher retires varies greatly. Some districts allow teachers to convert them to cash. Others allow the days to be converted into credits for post-retirement health insurance. And in more than a quarter of the districts that responded, those days are lost upon retirement.

Two superintendents stated their districts view “good health as it’s own reward.”

There were a handful of districts that do not cap the number of days a teacher can bank.  In most of them, those days are lost at retirement anyway. However, two districts, Tomorrow River Schools in Portage County and Sun Prairie school district in Dane County, convert those days into insurance credits. A three year breakdown shows how unpredictable this expense can be.

In 2008-09 TRS paid out $74,970 and SP paid out $27,981. In 2009-10 TRS paid out $102,166 and SP paid out $38,839.  Finally in 2010-11 TRS paid out $118,809 and SP paid out $46,402.

As for districts that pay out sick leave in cash, Palmyra and Sauk Prairie got hit the hardest. In 2009-10 Palmyra paid out $41,331.  In 2010-11 it paid out $109,322.  In 2009-10 Sauk Prairie paid out $45,000.  In 2010-11 it paid out $193,000.

By the way, Palmyra serves a total of 1,152 students and Sauk Prairie serves 2,718, according to DPI.

With Act 10 now in effect, many districts are replacing labor contracts with employee handbooks.  Some districts, like Eau Claire, are moving away from these policies that allow unused sick leave to be cashed out upon retirement.

This is the latest in a series of articles on public employee compensation in Wisconsin.The MacIver News Service earlier reported state employees who had retired in 2011 to that point had converted more than $340 million of unused sick leave into insurance credits. MNS also reported on local governments’ sick leave pay out policies, which also cost millions of dollars annually.

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Posted in News | December 8, 2011 | | 1 Comment

The Milwaukee County Board: Much Ado About Nothing

By James Wigderson
 Special Guest Perspective for the MacIver Institute

But soft, what through county budget breaks? It is for youths, 65 grand the sum. Now is the budget of some ill content, made glorious spending by this son of Abele. To be, or not to be? That is the question on December 15th.

Put money in thy purse, Milwaukee County. For in Milwaukee County when an agency spends money slower than anticipated, members of the County Board consider it found money rather than an already-obligated expense.

Milwaukee County’s judiciary committee voted 5-2 to spend $65,000 to start a new program to take some juvenile offenders and sentence them to perform in plays written by William Shakespeare. The money comes from a new intake program that was slow in implementation. The obligation isn’t gone, but the money hasn’t been spent yet. So why not whip a little Shakespeare on the urchins? That other bill will just be dealt with later, just like other bills in Milwaukee County.

The program is modeled after a Shakespeare in the courts program in Massachusetts. It was the idea of now-retired Judge Paul Perachi. Claims of the program’s success may be much ado about nothing. When Perachi was asked about the program’s success rate by Voice of America news, Perachi said, “Even if we only have a few, it is worth it.”

That might not live up to the public’s expectation of success for dealing with juvenile offenders. Far from the comic exploits of Jack Falstaff as a thief, the prospective participants will have committed such crimes as assault, breaking and entering, and even assault with a deadly weapon. These stories are less about unfortunate thieves named Pistol than they are about thieves with pistols.

Taxpayers might wonder, along with Sheriff David Clarke, just what the youthful offenders might learn from Shakespeare? Jealousy and spousal murder from Othello? The proper way to organize a gang stabbing from Julius Caesar? Suicide and mass slaughter in Hamlet? Gang loyalty and violence from Romeo and Juliet? Rape and mayhem from Titus Andronicus? Lord, what fools these mortals be!

It will make the program participants’ future court appearances interesting.

“Your honor, my client would like to say a few words in his defense.”

“Gentles, do not reprehend:
if you pardon, we will mend:
And, as I am an honest Puck,
If we have unearned luck
Now to ‘scape the serpent’s tongue,
We will make amends ere long;
Else the Puck a liar call”

Clarke’s wrong, of course, about complaining about the Eurocentric nature of Shakespeare. “If some conservative or Republican came up with an idea like this for black and Hispanic delinquents the Left and their elitist ilk would cry  `racism.’  They would say that forcing that old white guy Bill Shakespeare, or any English Literature or other Euro-Centric arts, on minority urban kids is culturally insensitive and doesn’t take into account their urban upbringing or experiences.  What next, teaching them Latin?”

All the world’s a stage and Shakespeare is a great teacher in any culture, as anyone who has spent time immersed in his works would know. I hereby sentence Clarke to several hours of community service to be spent watching and discussing Akira Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood as “punishment.”

The commitment to new spending comes at an odd time for Milwaukee County, where conflicting priorities actually means the layoff of county sheriff deputies. As Clarke said in his press release criticizing the idea, at a time when the county is cutting back on deputies on the county buses, the $65,000 could mean an additional deputy back on patrol.

While Supervisor Gerry Broderick has indicated to the media that he hopes to secure private funding for the program, as of now the obligation appears to be solely on the county and the taxpayers. Perhaps Broderick should have lined up the private money first.

Then again, perhaps instead of sending juvenile delinquents to act out Shakespeare, we could send a few Milwaukee County Board members. Who among them couldn’t use a little, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be?”

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Posted in mi perspectives | December 5, 2011 | | Comments Off

Wigderson’s Take on: Proposed Hoan Bridge Bike Path

By James Wigderson
 Special Guest Perspective for the MacIver Institute

It’s the $9.4 million question, or possibly we could be playing for ten times that amount. The Wisconsin Department of Transportation (DOT) will stop taking comments this Wednesday on whether the planned rehabilitation of the Hoan Bridge on Milwaukee’s lakefront will include a pedestrian and bicycle path. They will make a decision by the end of the year.

Design Sketch Courtesy of WisDOT

The Wisconsin DOT has actually come up with five different proposals for the proposed bicycle path. The most expensive idea is to build an additional path to accommodate bicycle and pedestrian traffic above the existing bridge. The price tag on that idea is $95 million.  Even the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin is not in support of that idea.

Other alternatives include building another elevated bridge to accommodate bicycles and pedestrians for $84.4 million, widening the existing structure for $76.4 million, or closing down one of the north bound lanes to create the bicycle and pedestrian path down the center of the bridge for $27.5 million.

The least expensive plan has drawn the endorsement of the Bicycling Federation of Wisconsin for practical political reasons. This plan would shut down the right northbound lane on the bridge, construct a concrete barrier to protect bicyclists and pedestrians from automobiles, and would cost $9.4 million. The price tag is practically a bargain considering the proposed alternatives.

Connecting a bicycle trail from Chicago to Sheboygan, and possibly as far as Door County, over one of the most iconic landmarks in Wisconsin, is a long time dream of bicycling fanatics. You thought Cubs fans were obnoxious before, wait until we’re spending tax money just to allow them to slow down traffic.

That’s exactly what the two less expensive plans would do – slow down traffic. According to the Wisconsin DOT, using their growth models they anticipate traffic flow would deteriorate to an “F” rating by 2035. Just like in high school, an “F” rating isn’t very good.

Bicycle path proponents like to point out that the average speed would be reduced to 50 mph, the current speed limit on the bridge. While this may be correct, they act as if the times when the traffic does not achieve the average is not a big deal. As the Wisconsin DOT points out, the drop in average speed is because of the increased density of the traffic, creating more unsafe conditions for motorists and decreasing the reliability of the Hoan Bridge as a connection for commuters to the larger interstate traffic system.

The commuter that finds the traffic route unreliable may have to make more drastic considerations than the recreational bicyclist who enjoys bicycling the Hoan for the view. A person who depends on the Hoan to connect to I-94 for a job in Wauwatosa or Menomonee Falls is not going to feel good about watching bicyclists occupy an entire traffic lane if their daily commute may be severely curtailed randomly, or if they themselves are the subject of the morning accident reports.

Commuters placed in such a situation may have to consider whether living in Bay View and points south is worth it, or if there is a preferable alternative that promises an easier commute.

The ease of commute is not just a hypothetical situation for the Wisconsin DOT to consider. As the draft executive summary of the bicycle path feasibility study says of the “F” rating, “The latter result is below WisDOT’s acceptable design year standard of LOS ‘D’ for Milwaukee County freeways. These conditions would worsen over the 50+ year life of the investment.”

Making matters worse for commuters dependent on the Hoan Bridge, the creation of a combined pedestrian/bicycle path on the Hoan Bridge will actually add to the period the bridge is being repaired.

The Wisconsin DOT also notes that response times by emergency vehicles using the Hoan Bridge will get worse as a result of the higher traffic density.

The traffic impediment would be below the DOT’s standard, and would only get worse. The bicycle and pedestrian path would defeat the entire purpose of having the Hoan Bridge in the first place. This is what is considered the politically feasible plan.

Let’s also put the price tag of the proposed bicycle and pedestrian path into some perspective. The cheapest plan is $9.4 million. That one bicycle project would cost nearly as much as the city of Milwaukee intends to spend ($11.3 million) on it’s entire bicycle infrastructure plan for the next ten years. The $9.4 million only sounds reasonable when compared to the fantastic numbers of the other options. Remember, we’re talking about a 2 mile bike path here.

In addition to the infrastructure costs of adding a bicycle lane, the Wisconsin DOT will also be responsible for the ongoing maintenance of the bicycle path, including snow removal. Unless, of course, the bicycling enthusiasts in favor of the path across the Hoan Bridge plan on volunteering to shovel the snow from the bike path themselves. (Remember kids, no shoveling salty snow into the lake!)

The maintenance of the bicycle and pedestrian path across the Hoan Bridge will also require periodic shut downs of the remaining right lane of traffic. Let’s face it, only a very few of the most avid cyclists will endeavor to scale the windy incline of the Hoan during the (generously) four months of Milwaukee’s harsh winters.

Of course, it’s not like there is not already an alternative to bicycling the Hoan Bridge. Bicyclists are already expected to use nearby 2nd street to get to and from downtown. Granted, the view from 2nd street isn’t nearly as impressive as it is from the top of the Hoan Bridge, but at least on 2nd street you get a nice view of the bridge.

Proponents of the bicycle path love to point to other iconic bridges that have mixed use. However, the Hoan Bridge was not built for mixed use. It was built for automobile traffic. The Wisconsin DOT has a responsibility to defend the bridge’s primary function, especially given the price tag for the proposed recreational use and it’s hindrance of vehicular traffic.

It’s unfortunate federal and state requirements of considering mixed use traffic for transportation projects except in extraordinary circumstances cause the state to have to go through this exercise. However, it’s hard to imagine that extraordinary circumstances are not readily apparent in the case of repairing the Hoan Bridge.

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Posted in mi perspectives | November 29, 2011 | | 5 Comments
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