Subject to Change

Milwaukee Ranks Fourth Worst in Poverty.

You’ve read the headline. Do you notice what’s missing? What’s going unsaid?

People Starving to Death.

Wouldn’t you expect the two to go hand in hand? What is poverty if not an inability to meet one’s basic needs? What does it say if poverty ranks high, yet true human suffering is minimal? My theory, based on second-hand knowledge of “the system,” is that we have one hell of a social safety net.

While it’s a good thing that few (or none) are actually starving to death, I also see that this safety net functions as a snare. Perhaps one reason the poverty rate is so high is that it is too difficult or enticing to break the cycle once you’re caught up in it.

Imagine a hypothetical (not really) single mother on Welfare or unemployment. She is required to document her efforts to find work, with signatures from prospective employers, in order to recieve payments. In effect, her job for the time being is finding work. That’s good, right? She’s being encouraged to get off the system.

But, there’s a problem. Others in the system don’t want to work. They find it easier to attend a couple of interviews each week in order to continue recieving money from the government. So, when our single mother finishes the interview and hands over her unemployment forms to the employer she’s already being written off. Of course, an educated person might think to withold these forms if they want the job. They might interview elsewhere, to get the necessary signatures. On the other hand, even if you could talk some sense into our hypothetical (not really) single mother, is it really in the spirit of things to ask that she take extra interviews for jobs she doesn’t want? There’s a problem here. All the bad eggs are screwing it up for the people who want to work. I’m not sure how I would address this, because I simply do not understand the motivations of someone who would play this game of faking job searches. It seems like too much work to me. They may as well get a job which pays good money for scamming people: lawyer, salesman, politician, artist, etc.

There’s another problem with the welfare system, which I have considered an approach to. Imagine another (the same) hypothetical (not really) single mother. This time she is weighing her ability to earn against the cost of daycare because she knows that once she crosses a certain threshold the state will cut her off. Cold turkey. She needs a serious boost in wages to overcome the gap. What’s the incentive to achieve or take a better job?

I’ve pondered this one several times, because there seems to be such a simple answer. Why cut the daycare benefit all at once? This amounts to a pay cut for working harder. I wonder what would happen if the penalty for promotion were removed. Let’s say the recipient gets a raise of $50 per month (above the current cutoff point). Rather than stripping away all daycare benefits, only $50 is cut. Eventually, the employee is (admittedly, hopefully) paying all of their own daycare costs out of pocket because they have not been punished for advancing their career. I’d be willing to bet that you could even increase the incentive and still cut costs to the government. What if we used a ratio less than 1:1? Take away $25 when the employee earns $50 over the cutoff point. This should remove any feeling that a raise is for nothing. Of course, there would still be scammers. It’s just that I imagine the result to be a net positive. Perhaps I’m naive.

People respond to incentives. What’s the incentive to get off of welfare and/or out of poverty in Milwaukee? Something tells me it’s not all that great.

I want to talk about a public nuisance in Milwaukee. This is something you may not notice unless you’ve traveled outside the city. I’m talking about golf carts, the ones we have at every festival, event, and especially the zoo. The zoo ups the ante on obnoxious with empty pickup trucks and the Zoomobile.

I’ve always accepted them as a necessary evil, the way they dart through the crowds every five minutes, first one way and then the other. When I had a child of my own I began to realize just how annoying and careless that traffic can be. Then one day my family traveled to the Columbus zoo and marveled at the fact that we had NOT ONCE needed to clear a path for vehicles. Near closing time is when we finally spotted a cart, that was actually hauling garbage. We began to take note. The phenomenon repeated itself all over: the Toldeo Zoo, Cleveland Zoo, Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo, Indianapolis Zoo, Nashville Zoo, Brookfield Zoo, and Central Park Zoo. At the Philadelphia Zoo, billed as the oldest zoo in the nation, we did not see one car in the pedestrian traffic. The same applies to festivals, such as Dublin Irish Fest in Dublin, Ohio.

The Bronx Zoo is the only other place which comes to mind where traffic has been a concern. They run a Zoomobile type shuttle, and it does use the walking paths. Often, however, the path splits to make room for the people. Given the size of the Bronx Zoo, it’s an acceptable compromise. It is worth noting that at this giant zoo the groundskeepers were always seen on foot, sometimes pushing carts.

The ultimate ridiculousness of the Milwaukee way became obvious to me one day in February, at the zoo. The temperature was minus insanity and the zoo was a ghost town. Yet, not less than three times we were forced aside by empty pickup trucks. These trucks couldn’t have been hauling garbage, because there wasn’t anyone there to produce it. They obviously weren’t hauling animal feed, either. I could see no rational explanation for all the rushing about.

I finally decided to blog about this after being in New York City all summer, where pedistrians have proper right of way, only to return to Irish Fest and State Fair. I became so disgusted with seeing ENT1 at Irish Fest that I nearly jumped in front of him to ask why he always had to be on the opposite side of the park from where he was at that moment. One of the times he passed us I had to scoop my three year-old up as they dashed toward each other in a game of chicken. The driver shot me a cute little smile that I wanted to swat with a brick.

The point is that other places have this figured out. Much larger and busier facilities than ours have found ways to deal without the ridiclous golf carts or trucks. What are we doing wrong? There certainly seems to be enough staff everywhere around that garbage and maintenance could be handled in small zones. Do all the other zoos in the country have a tunnel system, or what?

Now that I’ve pointed this out, you too will begin to notice how often you’re clearing a path for cars. If you’re traveling, take note of how different places handle the same situation. When you start to agree with me, keep a few copies of this blog post handy. The next time you visit an event here in Milwaukee, leave a copy on every golf cart you see. You may run out of copies shortly after you arrive.

I thought I might play nice for a while, until I got back on my blogging feet. Then, I went to Irishfest.

We look for street parking whenever we go to the festival grounds. Yesterday was no different, except that we noticed some new signs: Temporary – No parking 9pm-12am, Fri-Sat. My wife asked what’s with the signs and I sarcastically responded, “revenue generators,” speculating that the parking checkers would be out at precisely 9pm.

Even though I was joking a little I couldn’t have been more right. When we walked past the line of cars at 10pm there was a parking ticket on every one. I saw a woman entering her car and finding the ticket neatly placed under her wiper blade.

Me: Are you surprised by that?

Her: Yes.

Me: They put up temporary signs back there. We almost fell for it, too.

She walked back to the sign post, gave a look of disgust, and returned to her car. No doubt, this process repeated itself hundreds of times throughout the night.

But, this sort of thing happens all the time, you say. What’s the big deal? Well, it occurred to me that this was an attempt by the city government to generate revenue: Tom Barrett’s city government. The man who would be governor finds this an acceptable tactic to make up a few dollars in the city budget. What do you suppose he would invent or allow as governor? And, the hypocrisy given that he’s been operating his campaign headquarters without a permit.

Tom Barrett, I challange you to forgive the parking tickets issued in the Third Ward this weekend. Admit that this was a shameless money grab and apologize for your city government.

We’ve seen the Milwaukee Public Museum’s “corpse flower” twice. On Friday night we went to see Titanic, which was nice but over-priced. Afterward I dragged Kelly and Cole over to the butterfly atrium to see if we could catch a whiff of the flower. A botanist was watching the flower and we had a chance to ask questions. I found out that this flower is a different type from the model we saw at the Columbus Zoo. We had no idea that we were seeing the flower right before its top would collapse. When I checked the webcam on Saturday morning I thought that it was dead for sure.

Of course we rushed to the museum last night when I heard the corpse flower is blooming.  What does it smell like? The odor is really close to the smell of a dirty diaper pail, and it’s present throughout the museum.

Neat!

… you’re going to love what they’ve done to WKTI.

Add me to the list of bloggers who’s excited about a stinky flower. If I worked for one of the schools I’d make sure the kids got a field trip to see this when it blooms.

The Columbus Zoo had a plastic copy of one of these flowers that you were supposed to be able to smell. I was always disappointed that it wasn’t really scented somehow. But, you can smell the komodo dragon’s breath, which is probaby just as yummy.

We went to Discovery World this week, knowing that it had received many poor reviews. It has been a year or two since the last comment I’ve heard on the museum and we decided to give it a try. They’ve had plenty of time to get things up and running by now. It couldn’t be all that bad, right? Wrong.

First of all, Discovery World will never be a place for children under ten. The exhibits will be too advanced and they plan to have an RFID passport system in place, so you can track your child. A younger child isn’t going to be able to work the passport system, much less understand the exhibits. It’s not really a problem right now, though, because there still aren’t many functional exhibits. The exhibit hall is still under construction and the few completed exhibits already have issues. Some require the RFID tag, which doesn’t exist yet, and others are broken. So, if you’re going to the lake front for Discovery World, save the $16.50 admission and stay home. Spend the money on vinegar and baking soda (or Diet Coke and Mentos) instead. Show the kids how to make volcanos.

On the plus side, the aquarium is nice. It’s probably smaller than the aquarium at the zoo, but it includes more salt water species and a tidal pool for the kids to the touch fish. You can see the entire aquarium in under an hour if you rush. Take your time, because it’s the only thing worth seeing at the pier.

I heard yesterday that you’re considering putting in a street car route to boost mass transit ridership. I’ve got to tell you that it won’t work. Trust me!!!

I’m from Milwaukee, where our street car is about a decade old now. To be honest, I don’t even know if we’ve got one anymore. It ran from near the UWM campus to the liquor and gay people parts of town. Is this sounding familiar, Columbus?

If memory serves, trolley fare was originally fifty cents. So, it never made any money. One could assume from the artificially low fare that it was never meant to. One must assume then, that the idea behind the trolley was to boost interest in mass transit or perhaps to encourage tourism. Since the trolley typically runs empty and you’ve obviously never heard of it before, I’d say it failed to do either. It’s not even a topic of interest locally, except when our county executive suggests that we’re losing revenue on the service. That’s the only time anyone notices the blasted thing. We spent all that money on specially decorated busses and signage, and got nothing out of it. On the bright side, we didn’t waste taxpayer money installing a rail system for our street car experiment.

Let me ask you something: what sense does it make to operate a trolley car in a modern city? Wouldn’t driving the thing past the giant, electric marquee on High Street spoil the retro image? Look, I’ve been to the German Village. Parts of this town understand that ambience is an all or nothing affair. You can’t just slap a street car in the middle of downtown and expect it to be a success. What’s going to motivate people to ride it? 

I’m strongly advising you against this poor investment. As usual, my consulting fee is half the dollar amount I’ve saved. I’m eagerly awaiting my check.

Hugs and kisses,

Aaron

I took some photos on my way past the salt piles on Jones Island this morning. There isn’t anything left. Once the local stores are used up Winter needs to end, or we’re in for it.

Here are a few photos of where salt used to be. Normally the piles are as large as a good-sized office building.

Here’s one small pile on the right, next to the road.

This pile is what’s left of the Jones Island salt supply.

I’m afraid we’re all going to get really good at driving on ice and slush really soon!

On my drive in this morning Jay Weber’s topic was the problem with teenagers at the ‘Tosa Denny’s. I don’t know the gory details. It’s just another one of those troubling stories about how far astray our city’s youth have gone. Somewhere in that discussion I got side-tracked and started thinking about a little girl I met on 16th and Becher one night.

I wasn’t comfortable standing outside in this neighborhood after dark. I’m white, and none of the many kids who were up past any reasonable bedtime were. They were making quite a commotion, but didn’t seem openly hostile toward me. I resigned myself to minding my own business in the hopes that they would return the favor.

This girl, about 10, approached me to meet Cole. I must have asked her what she was doing up so late, because she told me that her parents had a party going on and they put her out of the house. She didn’t seem really happy about being forced to play in the street at night. I guessed that this was an all too familiar situation for her. Her parents, I discovered, were indeed partying. I spotted one of them hunched over the kitchen table with a towel covering his head, a sure sign of a great party.

Listening to Jay Weber this morning I realized that this young girl’s future is already decided. So long as she’s stuck with those parents, no amount of money, food stamps, schooling, or government pandering is going to save her from her fate. If she doesn’t find a way to save herself, by herself, this girl is another sad statistic within a decade or so. Her parents aren’t raising her, so the lousy neighborhood she lives in will. And, it won’t be kind to her. We should all pray that the spark of intelligence I saw in her is her guiding light, that she will rise above the influence, as they say.

As I exited the freeway I started thinking, the best thing I could’ve done for that young girl that night would’ve been to kidnap her and raise her as my own. But maybe I’m being a little too hard on her parents, who force her to wander the streets after dark.