Common Council - Regular Meeting

The hour of 6.30, having arrived, I will call to order the Common Council meeting of Tuesday, June 23rd, 2026, and ask the clerk to please call the roll.

Thank you. Alder Lieberman. Here. Alder Lieberman is present. Alder Madison. Here. Madison's present. Alder Martinez-Rutherford. Back. Alder Matthews. Here. Alder Matthews is present. Alder Mayer. Here. Alder Mayer is present. Alder O'Brien. Alder O'Brien is present. Alder Oakwich? Present. Alder Oakwich is present. Alder Pritchett?

Here.

Alder Pritchett is present. Alder Tischler? I'm here. Alder Tischler is present. Alder Revere?

Here.

Alder Revere is present. Alder Vidover?

Here.

Alder Vidover is present. Alder Zhang? Here. Alder Zhang is present. Alder Duncan?

Here.

Alder Duncan is present. Alder Evers?

Here.

Alder Evers is present. Alder Field?

Here.

Alder Field is present. Alder Figueroa-Cole?

Here.

Alder Figueroa-Cole is present. Alder Glenn? Present. Alder Glenn is present. Alder Ugair?

Here.

Alder Ugair is present. Alder Harrington-McKinney? Present. Regent McKenney is present. Madam Mayor, we have a quorum.

Thank you. As always, I will remind us that we're here to do the business of the people of the city of Madison and ask that we do that with grace and kindness and refrain from using any profanities in your marks. Everybody has a time allotted to them that you can speak. You do not feel like you have to use the entire time, although I feel like we may be expeditious tonight. The first, don't say it, don't say it. The first item we have is a presentation, legislature 9-3-4-5-5, a poetry recitation by Steven Espada Dawson, our poet laureate.

Hi everyone, can you hear me okay? Yes. All right, I'm gonna try to be, Okay, all right. Okay, great. Well, thank you for having me today. I am going to read the first poem from a collection called Deaf Republic by the poet Ilya Kaminsky. To give you a little context, Ilya Kaminsky is a Ukrainian poet who wrote this collection about 10 years ago in response to Russia's occupation of Ukraine. And at the same time, he was receiving his American citizenship, so it was a very complicated time for him. It's also called Deaf Republic because he is hard of hearing and speaks four languages, one of them American Sign Language, and that is an important aspect to this book. But I do think that although it was specifically written about that specific conflict, it is really helpful in thinking through kind of every conflict that our own country touches. We lived happily during the war. And when they bombed other people's houses, we protested, but not enough. We opposed them, but not enough. I was in my bed. Around my bed, America was falling. Invisible house by invisible house by invisible house. I took a chair outside and watched the sun. In the sixth month of a disastrous rain, in the house of money, In the street of money, in the city of money, in the country of money, our great country of money, we, forgive us, lived happily during the war. Thank you.

Thank you, and thank you to the Madison Arts Commission and the Planning Division for facilitating the Poet Laureate Program. All right, our next item is disclosures and recusals. Are there any disclosures or recusals on items on tonight's agenda? Alderfield.

Thank you, Mayor. I wanted to disclose that on item 45, I'm a UW-Madison employee, but that will not affect my vote on this item.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Tischler.

Yeah, I'm also a University of Wisconsin-Madison employee, but I also in particular work for Division of Information Technology, so I'm going to abstain from this one.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Mayer.

I'm an employee of UW-Madison that will not affect my vote on item number 45.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Matthews.

I am also a UW-Madison employee, and this will not affect my vote for item 45 either.

Thank you, Alder. Are there any other disclosures or recusals on tonight's agenda? Seeing none, and we'll move on to the presentation of the consent agenda, President Madison.

thank you mayor a consent agenda is moved with the recommended action listed for each item on the agenda including public hearings except one items which have registrants wishing to speak to items which auditors have separated out for discussion and or debate purposes This document lists supermajority items, agenda items with recommendations different from the agenda items for exclusion, items introduced from the floor, and agenda items with corrections. Agenda items that are supermajority items. Note, supermajority items will be recorded as unanimous votes unless a roll call or exclusion is requested. Agenda item 36, which is legislative file number 92335, amending the 2026 police department operating budget and authorizing the Dane County Narcotics Task Force led by the police department to use its city multi-year fund account to purchase funding, radios, and investigative supplies through state funds provided by a 2026 Wisconsin Department of Justice law enforcement drug trafficking response grant of $49,992 report of the Finance Committee 15 votes required agenda item 44 which is a legislative file number nine three four one nine creating a 1.0 full-time position of or FTE position of legislative analyst LTE in the mayor's office operating budget, authorizing a memorandum of understanding with Harvard College to place a Bloomberg Harvard City Hall fellow in this LTE position in the mayor's office, and accept a grant from Harvard College to pay the salary, benefits, and other employment costs, and amending the mayor's office 2026 operating budget accordingly. Report of the finance committee, 15 votes required.

I don't see a fellow in your contacts. Who do you want to call?

Thank you for Siri.

Okay, let me just figure out how to get that off.

All right, so items with recommendations different from the agenda. Legislative file number 93243, repealing and recreating section 9.33 of the Madison General Ordinances related to regulation of massage equipments. Items referred to this meeting, Alder Martinez-Rutherford recommendation to re-refer to Board of Health for Madison and Dane County on July 8th, 2026, and back to Common Council on August 4th, 2026. Agenda items excluded by one, request of alders, or two, speakers registered by noon on June 23rd. Item number six, legislative file number 93082, approving the landmark domination of the property located at 415 West Gilman Street as Master Hall in District 2. This should be report of Landmarks Commission, not Finance Committee, by Alder Oglewicz. Agenda item 36, which is legislative file number 92335, amending the 2026 police department operating budget and authorizing the Dane County Narcotics Task Force led by the police department to use its city multi-year fund account to purchase training, radios, and investigative supplies through state funds provided by a 2026 Wisconsin Department of Justice law enforcement drug trafficking response grant. of $49,992 report of the Finance Committee pulled from Alder Glen. There are no items introduced from the floor in this section and no items with corrections in this section.

thank you president madison we also have a registering on item seven and we'll separate item eight for a staff presentation as well are there other items that alders would like to see separated from the consent agenda at this time Seeing none, and let me just run through that one more time to make sure we're all on the same page. Items 36 and 44 require 15 votes. On item 55, the recommendation is to re-refer to the Board of Health on seven, eight and the council on eight, four. Items six, seven, eight and 36 will be excluded from the consent agenda. And that is it. Anything else? seeing nothing else then president madison emotion emotions will adapt second moved and seconded to adopt the consent agenda is there any objection to recording unanimous vote in favor of the consent agenda seeing no objection we'll record that vote and we will move on then to public comment we have one item with registrants wishing to speak item seven which is adopting the southeast area plan and the related amendment to the comprehensive plan in districts 3 15 and 16 on item 7 tanya hamilton nisbet is here from monona tanya

Thank you, Mayor. Can everyone hear me? So 20 years ago, I was involved in a plan that was a grassroots effort, which is one of the six plans that informs item number seven on your agenda, the Southeast Special Area Plan. And that was the adoption of a plan for Stoughton Road. And we were able to get that adopted into the city's comp plan in 2008. I'm here personally, not as a part of that body anymore, but I am encouraging you to enthusiastically approve that plan, which is very good. So the Southeast Special Area Plan is very much an encapsulation of the Stone Road Plan. And what we tried to do in that effort was really make it as broad as possible with as many broad stakeholders as we could. We had representatives from eight neighborhoods. We had the same three aldermanic districts that is adopting this plan tonight, three, 15, and 16. We covered two county supervisory districts. We got grants from the city, the county, the state, private donations. We held public meetings. We had focus groups for businesses. We did everything we could to make this as broad as possible. And I'm happy to say that this plan is a very great encapsulation of what that is. So the language used in this plan is very much what people were talking about back then. They're looking for Stoughton Road to be a connection and not a divider. The disconnection, not only from neighborhoods across Stoughton Road, but also to the city writ large, as well as looking for things like kids to be able to walk to school safely. People don't maybe realize this, but the district I used to live in, Alder O'Brien's district, has children south of the Beltline that their entire K through 12 school, they go up Stoughton Road and across it to get to school. I used to live in East Buckeye, and there was somebody who I know who used to walk home from La Follette across Stoughton Road. And at that time, it was one of the deadliest intersections in Madison. It's very dangerous. So we are looking, people in this area have articulated to us time and again through that effort, which is again encapsulated in this plan. They're looking for something that is different from what it is currently. So residents really want this road to have its own identity. They're looking for a place to live, work, and play and break the inertia of what it is today, which is a road that you get on in your car and you travel really fast and you get to somewhere else. And that is what this plan hopes to be able to stop doing. That's why I support the city's support of WisDOT reducing the speed limit to 35 miles an hour. About 15 seconds left. That plus all of the the other things like miss mixed-use development south of flam west of it opportunistic development on the on the east side of it Really would help to change the character. Can I one one more second? I just want to thank the planning staff and all involved in this plan and I encourage you to adopt this Thank you very much.

Thank you. Are there questions for the registrant? Seeing none. Thank you very much. I All right, that is the only registrant wishing to speak on tonight's agenda. So our next item is a presentation. It's item three, legislature 93642, a presentation from the Welch Group on State Legislative Affairs.

Good evening, everybody. How's everybody doing? Good. I have to apologize off the bat, and it's been a long day. I spent the morning with the Democracy Defense Project, trying to figure out ways to strengthen our democracy and educate voters. And then in the afternoon, I was with the Senate Democrats at their golf outing at University Ridge. So I was defending democracy and then helping to fund it, I guess, today. So it was a busy day, but it's always an honor to be here and to present to you guys and just kind of go over what's what happened this session and what we're we're looking forward to so let's go right to the third slide if you could okay not a problem Okay, so just for a session overview, obviously every two-year session, the biggest piece of legislation that gets passed is the state budget. So on July 3rd, Wisconsin's new two-year state budget was signed by Governor Evers, totaling $111.1 billion in spending. That's about a 12% increase. For historical context, back in 11-12, the biennial state budget was about $60 billion. So costs have obviously gone up quite a bit. Obviously, a lot of strategic pressures in the building. Negotiations this session were pretty intense. Not only... not only between Democrats and Republicans, but between Republicans and Republicans and Democrats and Democrats within their own caucuses. It was something that we forecasted going in that this was going to be a tougher session given the fact that majorities are super slim in both the Senate and the Assembly. And there's always divisions within caucuses that can cause issues. You haven't seen as much of that over previous sessions because there were bigger majorities, but this session really highlighted those divisions within the caucuses. So the legislative session started January of last year and ran through spring of this year. Assembly Republicans gaveled out in February and then the State Senate wrapped up their session on March 17th with all bills being delivered to the governor on May 27th. A quick look ahead is a lot's gonna change after November. We're anticipating changes and possible changes in majorities in one or both houses, but the biggest change is gonna be the personalities at the top. Governor Evers obviously isn't running. Speaker Voss isn't running. and majority leader Lemahieu is not running. So whatever happens, we are guaranteed new leadership across the board and in the assembly, the Senate and the governor's office. So a lot of attention will be paid to that over the course of the next few months, as you guys know. So the next slide. So this was the City of Madison's 25-26 legislative priorities that you all helped come up with. Obviously, there's a lot of different items on there. I can say that while aspirational it was we always knew it was going to be difficult to tick off a lot of these items but unlike most groups we were we were actually successful in getting some things across the finish line this session was extremely difficult to get bills passed early in the session Well, really, for the first year of this session, it was incredibly difficult to get state senators, especially on the Republican side, to even agree to author a bill. So that led to a lot of angst amongst people like me in the lobby corps, because we all know that once you get to the end of session, it gets... even more difficult to get things passed. So you always want to try to get your bills out sooner, but this was a difficult session. So we also anticipated that it was going to be slower than normal. Not as many bills introduced, not as many bills enacted. Unfortunately, what we forecasted came true. There just wasn't a ton of activity. There were some obviously big ticket items like the budget, the surplus deal that didn't quite come together, and a number of other things. But I am proud to say that we got a number of things done. that the city was interested in. So I won't rehash all that, but looking forward to next session, I'm sure we're gonna have a similar list and hopefully more opportunities for success. Next slide. So one of the things that I really enjoyed this session working with you all is alders that took the time out of their day to come to the Capitol, and have our own kind of mini lobby day so we had two of those one on september 24th of last year and one on february 18th of this year nine council members as well as the council and mayor's office staff attended those we focus primarily on our footprint folks folks that represent madison or the dane county area So mostly Democrats, but we also included Republican Todd Novak in those meetings because he chairs the assembly committee on local government. I hope the alders that were in attendance at those felt like they were worthwhile. I certainly did. I always think it's important to strengthen those bonds between the Common Council and not only your lawmakers, but as we go forward, starting to expand the number of people that we're talking to. Because having been in the legislature, there is nothing more important, I can tell you, than having that personal contact with lawmakers. Get to know them on a personal level. I'll be honest, there's some people on the Republican side of the aisle that have certain perceptions of what Madison Common Council is and who you all are. And I think you would be doing yourself a big service by getting in front of them and just showing that you don't have pink horns coming out of your head or anything like that. So I encourage going forward in next session and sessions beyond that, Talk to some of the folks that attended those meetings, see what they thought. Hopefully they'll give you a good review and then try to take some time out of your days in the next session to attend these because with the numbers that we had, it was great because we were all together and we could all be in one room. But if we have more folks, we can divide and conquer and reach even more lawmakers that way. So next session, we'll be looking at doing similar things, especially as early in the year as we head into the budget and then post budget, as we're looking at hopefully try to get a bunch of other stuff across the finish line. Next one. So this, you know, there's a lot of numbers up here and without a lot of context, but when you look at the number of bills introduced, roughly, you know, 1,238 bills introduced in the assembly, 1,185 bills introduced in the Senate, not for a total of 23, 2,400 bills. Some of those are companions, but not atypical number of bills introduced. but the bills that failed to pass or passed and then were not enacted into law was the number that we look at. So when you look at Overall numbers enacted into law, 136 Assembly bills, 111 Senate bills. Again, some of those are companion bills. It's a pretty light, small number. It's hard to get a historical context on if it was the smallest number passed. in history i don't think it was but it was it was very small in comparison to at least my background in the state capitol you know usually you'll get a couple hundred 300 bills this was not that Also a lower number of vetoes than we've seen in the last couple of years, 62 assembly bills vetoed, two of those partially vetoed, and then the Senate 34 and one. So again, just a slower session, much harder to get anything done, but thankfully we were successful with some things in the areas that we cared about. So we'll move on to the next one. So housing and development, you know, these are all pieces of legislation that the City of Madison registered in support of. You can see that five different bills surrounding the issue of housing and development were passed, two on emergency services and two on local government infrastructure. So, That's nine bills that we cared about that got passed. That's actually pretty good for this session. The bills that we cared about on the opposite side that we opposed, I don't think any of them got signed into law. I think zero. So we were successful in getting some things done and we were even more successful in killing the stuff that we didn't like. So then we'll go back to the 2025-27 state budget. Obviously the big win was getting the increase in payments for municipal services programs. It was a $7 million annual increase. I know it's still not enough and we gotta do more and we're gonna try in the next budget, but I have to give credit to Senator Hesselbein and others in the Madison area that worked extremely hard to get this done. Basically how that all transpired was, I think they played a really smart game. They just kind of sat on the sidelines and waited for Republicans in the state Senate to kind of fall apart and not get the votes to pass the budget. And so when Leader Lemahieu went to Senator Hesselbein saying that they needed some of their votes to get the budget done, Senator Hesselbein was ready with a list. And she got a lot of things she wanted, and one of the main things was a municipal services payment. But I think the key to her negotiations there was she didn't come in asking for the moon and asking for things that she knew wouldn't have a chance of getting done with Republican control. So I think she came in with reasonable ass, ended up getting them. And that was a big help to us. We worked with Senator Hasselbein and others throughout the course of the process to make sure that if the opportunity presented itself that everybody was ready. So big thanks to Senator Hesselbein and others on the municipal services payment. But on core education and childcare, on the next slide, nearly $1.4 billion in new resources for public schools. It boosted the special aid ratio to 42% in year one and 45% in year two. Those were numbers when the budget passed. after the budget as the number of kids in special ed goes up that percentage comes down a little bit but still a significant boost in special ed aid then child secure child secure Sorry, I am tired. Childcare support. Over $330 million was provided to childcare networks, launching an innovative state-funded general revenue program to stabilize local centers. And then on higher ed, the university system got $250 million in new funding and a 20% increase for Wisconsin grants at private colleges. None of these were easy feats, and... I have to give credit to Governor Evers here, too, as typically in prior budgets, when I was in the legislature, the governor came in with his proposed budget, gave it to the legislature, and then kind of walked away and let the legislature do their work. And then when the legislature gave him the budget back, he would veto out what he didn't like and then sign the rest. I think he really dug in this time and did more negotiating. So that's to his credit. I think a lot of the things that are in here probably wouldn't have happened if he hadn't done that. And then on the next slide, more details on tax relief and food security. $1.5 billion in tax relief in the last budget. providing substantial middle class income tax reductions and robust retirement income exemptions for seniors. And as I'm sure you're all aware, they also eliminated the municipal and state sales tax on electricity. This energy is gonna be something that this, This next legislature and legislatures for many years are gonna be dealing with. As you guys are well aware, on the data center issue, the rising costs, people are really starting to feel the pinch, and the energy conversation is going to get more intense as we go forward. I'm hearing from the public, I don't think they've ever been as upset at utilities as they are right now. And that's as we saw with candidate Barnes, you know, he's going after the utilities hard on this stuff. And so it'll be interesting to see. And I think that's going to be a bipartisan thing where both Republicans and Democrats are going to say enough is enough. We've got to do something on not only electricity rates, but on data centers and cost shifts from data centers. Just as an aside, I saw during the whole data center debate, I saw a post from, I think it was WeEnergy saying that they were going to protect consumers from cost shifts due to data centers. There would be no cost shift. The next tweet immediately below it was a report from a news outlet saying that they went to PSC with a plan to make sure that data centers paid 70% of the costs and consumers only picked up 30. So those two back to back just didn't make a whole lot of sense. So this conversation is going to continue throughout the summer and fall. I think it's gonna be a big election issue, just utility rates in general, but also the data center issue, because I don't care left, right, or center, people are not happy with what's going on with that. So that's just, I'm trying to be expeditious. So that's a real quick recap of where the legislative session is. Heading into the next slide with the 2026 legislative election cycle. You guys are familiar with how you run for office. I used to be a locally elected official, so I know Knocking on doors in January and February is a lot worse than over the course of the summer and early fall. So I give you all a lot of credit. I did it. It's not fun. But for the state legislative races, they started taking out papers April 15th. People had to declare whether they were not going to run by May 22nd. And then on June 1st, everybody filed their papers. There are races in, I think, every seat except for maybe one this session. So it's going to be a busy election. Obviously, most of those seats You know, the outcome is almost already determined before the election because it's either a real strong Democratic seat or it's a real strong Republican seat. but there are a number of races that are gonna be tightly contested more so than in the past. August 11th is that partisan primary where after that, we know what the slate is gonna look like for November. And then obviously the general election is on November 3rd. So on June 1st that week, there were three events where we got to meet all the candidates. You know, as lobbyists and others, they had events where we could go and get to know the new people coming in. I always find that it's an extremely valuable use of time. Those events, you know, you don't have a whole lot of time with individual candidates, but you get to meet them, know them a little bit. And then over the course of the next, several months leading into the election and leading into the next session, what we do, just because there's not legislative action going on across the street, we work extremely hard during this time to strengthen bonds with lawmakers that we already have, to meet candidates that are running, and to gain a relationship with those folks that might be walking into the building come January 1st next year. I don't know why more people don't do this. I think it's extremely important because on day one, they walk in and if they already know you, there's a level of trust there that the candidates, you know, newly elected people have if they already know you and a level of familiarity. So this is how the next slide goes over a closer look at how control could flip. Republicans hold both chambers now, slimmer majorities, but the new maps, narrower margins, midterm election with Trump in, President Trump in office, means that the dynamics have significantly changed even from two years ago. So in the state assembly, Republicans hold a 54-45 majority, so they would need to flip five seats and maintain all their other seats to gain the majority. And in the Senate, currently there's 18 Republicans, 15 Democrats. Democrats only need to flip two. There's four targeted seats in the state Senate. three of the incumbents and those three of the Republican incumbents in those seats have left office. So those are now open seats, which all those seats, Kamala Harris won in 2024, I believe. So Democrats have a really good chance of picking up the control of the state Senate. State Assembly is a little bit closer call. Five seats is a lot. Republicans probably wake up on the election day with 46. So they need to win four out of the rest to maintain control. But when you look at the races in the state assembly, there's really about 12 races that will determine the outcome of the majority. Republicans lost two incumbents in Jesse Rodriguez and Dean Coffert, both in extremely difficult seats for Republicans. They felt good about holding those seats if those two had stayed on. both of them have left. So again, that's probably, if I had to bet my house on it, I'd say probably those two seats go to the Democrats. So it is going to be an interesting session, no doubt, or an interesting election, which will lead to an interesting session. We could end up with, I think it's unlikely, but we could end up with the same dynamic we have today. Republicans in control of both houses, a dem governor. You could have split control in the legislature and dem governor or Republican governor. And you could have a trifecta of Democrats if Democrats you know, if things go dramatically off course for Republicans in the next few months. What we're looking at is what every prognosticator looks at when it comes to elections. We're looking at pocketbook issues. If gas is anywhere near five bucks a gallon come November, I think Republicans are in deep trouble. They have started to come down now, but we all know that that could change tomorrow based on what's happening in the Middle East. So we did get, I appreciate a couple of the alders that sent questions ahead of the meeting. I'll just go through some of those real quick. One of them was, is a single stair bill going to be reintroduced? I'm sure you guys probably know, but just to refresh your memory, that's allowing for single stairwells in buildings up to six stories. That was Mike Behr, Representative Behr, Senator Walbill. I fully expect that to come back. You know, obviously, in the last session when it was introduced, there was some opposition from firefighters and others. Hopefully, those issues can be worked through. Also, a question, was there any effort to add inflation to the base levy limit? I don't think that was part of our conversations when we were setting up our initial priorities for this session, something we're happy to look at. And what I hope you all do along with the mayor's office is refine that agenda, or the priorities of this last session and refine it for next session, knowing that whatever you work on right now, you may be able to get more based on what happens in November, you may be able to get less. So just kind of having some wiggle room on those priorities and understanding that what happens in November is gonna have a big impact on that is something important to keep in mind. Last couple of questions. Is there any momentum behind a surplus deal? I'd say right now it's unlikely. I talked to Senate leadership on the Republican side and was told that if they come back to vote on something again, they'll probably have less Republican votes than they did the first time. And Senator Hesselbein, I think, has also said publicly that she's open to coming back, but I don't think she believes it's likely either. Good news, bad news. The surplus sits in Madison. It doesn't go back to the people who really need it right now with costs going up and their wallets being pinched. But heading into the uncertainty of 2027 might not be the worst thing in the world to have a little bit of money in the checkbook if you know, the economy goes off the rails for some reason. The mayor and I were talking earlier, when you have diesel prices as high as they are and have been for a sustained amount of time, that is gonna trickle through the entire economy, and I don't think we've seen the full impacts of that yet. costs could continue to rise even if diesel prices start to come down a little bit. Costs can continue to rise throughout the summer. So that's something we'll be looking at. But never say never. In the legislature, anything could happen. And, you know, the governor could do more work with Senate Democrats to get them in a comfortable place. We just don't know. I know the governor, obviously, you probably all saw his comments after the the deal failed where he really took on uh senate democrats for their unwillingness to uh to vote for it i think largely because governor evers felt like this was his crowning jewel at the end of his run getting another significant boost of dollars into k-12 education so i know there was some frustration there I don't think he's going to give up on it, but we'll have to see. I'd say right now it's doubtful. And then the last question I got was, what is possible in the new session? I'll tell you on November 4th. It's really, really hard to know right now, but, you know, it's no secret. The political environment favors Democrats. I don't know who's going to come out of the primary on the Democratic side, but I would have to say, I would have to guess that this is a lean Dem year for governor and a lean Dem year for the legislature. How big that wave is going to be yet to be determined might be small and it might get the state Senate and the governor's office, maybe not the assembly, but if it's big, they could take control over everything. So obviously, like I said, when putting forward our priorities or thinking about our priorities for next session, we just got to keep all that in mind. What are the political realities post-November 3rd? So that's all I got. Happy to answer any questions if anybody has any. Thank you.

Are there questions?

Yes.

Alder Pritchett. So assume right now that the makeup of the Senate and the Assembly remains the same after November. Knowing that there are priorities as far as property taxes, schools, those kinds of things. What do you see as being your top priority for moving forward? And when I say that, I'm really looking at what constituents are saying in terms of pushback from data centers, property taxes on down the line. So how would you prioritize?

Well, that's a good question. I mean, there's so many things that go into it. It's not only the letter behind people's names that will influence what we're able to get done, it's also economic conditions, right? I mean, if all of a sudden we slide into a recession, that couple billion dollars that we have in a surplus and the couple billion dollars that we have in the rainy day fund, It's not going to amount to a hill of beans if we head into a recession. There's probably going to be cuts if that happens. If things stay on the trajectory they are currently, I think there's going to be a little bit of money to spread around. All candidates, Democrats and Republicans, like I said, I went to all these different events with all the new candidates. Republicans and Democrats alike are talking about property taxes and doing something about property taxes. It is a sticker shock for people, and it is... tougher on people of low income that own a house or people that are elderly, retired, and are living on a fixed income. Those are the two groups of folks that it affects the most. So there is, and we also have the Wisconsin Realtors Association, which is like an 800 pound gorilla over there. This is a big issue for them. So I expect something to be done on property taxes. just don't know how they do it or what mechanism they use to bring it down. They could take the technical college completely off the levy. There's a lot of different things that they could do. But, you know, in this world where property taxes are such a big conversation, I don't know that we're going to see, even on the Democratic side, a big rush to remove levy limits. I mean, I think that's likely to stay in place. I don't even know if there's gonna be opportunities to adjust how that is calculated either, given that everybody is running on reducing property taxes. So it'd be kind of odd for them to come back after the first year and allow municipalities to tax more than they're already allowed to tax. And schools, I think schools will continue to receive some attention. You know, the one thing that I've told my former colleagues on the Republican side is the less money you invest, the more it disproportionately hurts your rural schools. It just does. A lot of these educators, and my wife is one of them, she's not in a rural school, but these educators coming out of school, going to a rural school and getting hired at 40, $45,000 a year, and they're really never gonna make more than that. They'll get cost of living adjustments, but not really more buying power. That's not sustainable. So there's a lot of issues there, and I think people on both sides of the aisle realize that, obviously, if Dems are in full control, I would expect them to invest more in public education than Republicans would if they retained control. But I think the most likely scenario is... a split legislature where there's going to have to be bargaining between the two sides, right? You're going to have to get Republicans to pass it in the Assembly, Democrats to pass it in the Senate. None of this is foregone conclusions, but our best guess at this point. And then the governor's race, again, probably lean them but anything could happen. We've seen stranger things happen. So as far as priorities, again, I'd look at that list, come up with your dream list. If conditions are right and we have the ability to get things done, and then one that's a little bit pared back depending on the other outcome. But I will caution that, let's say Democrats take full control of everything, it's not gonna be easy for them to govern either. They haven't done it in a long time over there. And the divisions within the caucuses are real. So, You know, it's one of those be careful what you wish for, because I think leadership over there is, even if they have a trifecta, is going to have a difficult time. It's going to take a lot, a lot of work to get their caucuses on the same page.

So we'll be going through a process like we did previously to set the agenda for the next session. So we'll Sam will facilitate that will elicit priorities from all of you and obviously from staff as well and put together a similar list as the one that you saw earlier in terms of what our legislative priorities will be. And obviously some of that will depend on what happens in November and but you should expect a similar process to what we went through in the past year.

Yeah, and I'm happy. I will be as direct with you as I possibly can be as far as how realistic those things are. Like, there was Medicaid expansion on those priorities. We knew that wasn't going to happen with Republican control. It just wasn't. But it's good to keep out there that that's something that the city cares about.

You know, I ask that because there are implications, widespread implications, for if the current makeup remains the same. And I don't say that lightly. You know, I'm reminded of seniors. I'm reminded of what happens to schools, things like that. I'm reminded of all the issues, the things that are just being bombarded. And at some point in time, you know, one loses his or her appetite. you know, but they're not gonna go on a hunger strike either. So that's why I'm asking, you know, when we start thinking about priorities, we also have to think about what are the implications and how do we make adjustments?

I couldn't agree more. And like I said, this, your job is to come up with the priorities working with the mayor's office. And my job is to do the best job I can to get those things across the finish line. But I'm not gonna send you on fool's errands, right? If I believe something is impossible, I'm gonna tell you that because I don't wanna spend $100 on it across the street knowing it's gonna not go anywhere. And I don't want to spend your valuable, the city's valuable time tilting at windmills either. So I'll be as direct as I possibly can on that stuff.

Thank you. Thank you, Elder. Elder O'Brien.

Yeah, thank you for the presentation and thank you for your work in the building last year. I know it was a little hectic over there. I have two questions. One, are you anticipating with the changes in leadership and obviously the potential changes in a chamber that we're still going to be expecting a budget by July 1st-ish?

I wouldn't bet the house on it. So I mean, because, you know, just take a step back. It was just I can't remember what budget was, but when Republicans had unified control, that went into September because we in the legislature were fighting for more transportation funding and the governor didn't want to go along. So that, even with United Control, that lasted into September. So if you have split control on the legislature, that means the budget will likely go to a conference committee and I think it would be doubtful. I'd be surprised if they're able to get it done by June 30th.

Do you think and these are all hypotheticals, I guess, but Obviously, there's going to be a push for changes to municipal payments and changes to share revenue and the expense restraint program. Do you think that we could see a bill that changes that before the budget? And do you think that has a high likelihood of happening before the budget? Or do you think it'll happen post budget and expect to lobby for those priorities?

Yeah, I think something like that would most likely have to happen inside the budget because it'll take some compromise. You know, one of the things that we'll do over the course of the summer and fall leading into those discussions is to work with folks that are in Republican districts as well as Democratic districts, folks that care about this, to try to get some kind of coalition together surrounding this. But as a firm, we have interviewed almost every single candidate that's running on both sides. You know, not some of the people that, you know, talking about, you know, your normal candidates that are running. And, you know, normal is a subjective term, I guess, especially in today's politics. But what I mean is, like, you know, the fringier candidates that just get their name on the ballot, nobody's ever heard of them. We're not bringing them in. But, like, everybody else we're sitting down with. And especially on the Democratic side of the aisle, municipal issues are front and center.

we're working with all of them on on those issues um and then we've been hearing a lot about the Hiawatha line through Amtrak coming in and I know that a bunch of other cities um kind of in that corridor are also pushing for that where do you do you think that there will be support in the legislature for the local match that'll be required if should that funding come through

it's it's a good question i i couldn't give you an educated answer at this point i would say that if if you have if democrats have a trifecta yeah if republicans just don't like trades a lot so like i i think that would be a harder lift but again it all depends on how negotiations go if uh If the Democratic side of the aisle really wanted that in the worst way and were willing to trade something that they really didn't want to happen, anything is possible. But again, it's going to be a new dynamic, new leaders, very green behind the ears. The people that I expect to be leaders have worked with each other before, but just not in this direction. with those titles. So it's really hard to say. I mean, one side might be, as a new leader, they might be out to prove something and want to really draw lines in the sand and not budge. That's the worst possible case scenario. Hopefully, leaders on both sides will realize that this is a new dynamic, that nobody can get anything done really without each other. So they'll find some areas to compromise.

Thank you. Thank you, Alder Lieberman.

Thank you. Two questions for you. The first, you mentioned the governor's failed surplus spending deal. How, I guess, first off, how did, you all engage with legislators during that sort of short period between its introduction and the eventual vote on it, and then what is your process for gathering input from the city when there are very short turnaround votes like that?

Yeah, I take all my direction from the city, and, you know, on the surplus deal, everything moves so fast that they're... Most of the details were unknown until the last minute. There just really wasn't that opportunity to engage with lawmakers and set up meetings and work the building. You know, I think one of the, from what I understand, and I don't know if this is accurate or not, but what I have heard is Senate Dems were upset because the negotiations happened between Evers, Governor Evers, Speaker Voss, and Majority Leader LeMahieu. and they weren't included at all. So the deal was kind of stuck out there, said, here's the deal that you're expected to vote for, and Senate Dems were just like, no, we weren't involved. So I don't know, in scenarios like that, there's usually not a lot that guys like me can do to push it across the line, I guess is the point.

Thank you. Anything else, Elder?

Yes. Oh, yeah. You had one more.

Yeah. The cannabis is set to become re-regulated, but become illegal again at a federal level later this year. There were some bills to... legalize or decriminalize in Wisconsin that failed this session. I'm curious, do you see that as being something the legislature will try to take action on before the federal change in status?

Well, yeah, it's a complicated question because there was a bill being worked on in the legislature to deal with hemp-derived products, right? And um there are a lot of sticking points there but one of the major ones is that the beer distributors wanted all hemp products to go through the three-tier system so you know your topicals your ointments your drink everything that was a no-go for a lot of people across the street leading into the next session i again i think it'll depend but if we're if you're talking about a split legislature where Dems have the Senate and the governor, there's a shot. Speaker Voss was one of the staunchest opponents of legalizing marijuana. I think, I'm saying this publicly, it's fine. I think if you put a recreational marijuana bill on the floor, I think it probably passes. But getting it to the floor is a whole different story, right? So the personalities changing might have an impact on that. And if, you know, again, if Republicans are dealing with a really slim majority in the assembly, maybe one or two seats, It's possible. But again, that might be an issue where a new leader in the assembly as a Republican says, I don't want that to be my first thing coming out of the gate. All right. I don't want to cave right away. Even if they might support it personally. And there are people across both parties that support it. Legalizing just might not be willing to do that is one of the initial things out of the gate. Unified Dem Control, it's legal by like January 4th. So I think that's AB1.

Yeah. Great, thank you.

Thank you all there.

are there other alders in the queue with questions so thank you very much appreciate the time yeah thank you and i i appreciate uh your engagement i i like i said i i know it's difficult to take time away from work to make office visits across the street but if you get the opportunity to do it Please join us because it really is. It's helpful for you guys. It's helpful for me. And I think it enhances the city's image as you walk around, talk to people and show them that you're normal folks. So thank you.

Right. Then our next item is item six, legislature 93082, approving a landmark nomination of the property located at 415 West Gilman Street as Master Hall in District 2. And I believe for this, Alder Okrovitz will make the motion.

Yes, I'll make a motion to place it on file with no additional language.

Is there a second? Second. Moved and seconded to place on file. Are there questions for staff on item six? Seeing no questions, item six, the motion is to place on file. Is there discussion? Alder Oklovitz.

Yeah, if I could just speak briefly to this. When this item came to us on the agenda, it was also to place it on file, but with additional language that this otherwise would meet the criteria. And it just doesn't... The reason was because the demolition for the building is already approved, but the legal status, whether it's a demolition permit, doesn't have any effect on the historical significance. And so if Landmarks Commission thinks that it meets the criteria, they should just approve the landmarks nomination and not place it on file, but say that it's also a landmark. And that's the reason why I pulled this to take essentially the same action as what's going on right now.

thank you elder is there further discussion seeing no further discussion the motion is to place on file is there any objection to recording a unanimous vote in favor Seeing no objection, we record a unanimous vote in favor of placing that item on file. Our next item is number seven, Legislature 92878, Adopting the Southeast Area Plan and the Related Amendment to the Comprehensive Plan Impacting Districts 3, 15, and 16. And we'll start with a short presentation from staff, who I assume are going to be over here.

Not sharing the right screen. Let's try that again. All right, second time's a charm. Good evening. My name is Jeff Greger. I'm co-lead of the Southeast Area Plan with Rebecca Kinnear. Tonight's a culmination of about an 18-month planning process. And if I can get my slides to move. So this is the southeast area in context with the 12 other areas. Southeast and southwest plans are the third and fourth in the series. The boundaries of the southeast are Highway 30 on the north, I-39-90 on the east, Sigil Cow Road and the Village of McFarland on the south, and the City of Monona on the west. I just want to highlight some of the public engagement that we did. Like I said, we've been working on this plan as staff for the last 18 months. We kicked off in November of 2024 with a public meeting and have been working with various groups. We've worked with the UW People Program, La Follette High School students. partnered with the NENA collective to host some focus group meetings. And we had some really good outreach events at High Stand and Honeysuckle Park for our community action strategy portion of the plan, the paint and pack events. We were able to get 100 backpacks and school supplies in children's hands last August, as well as do really fun events painting the basketball courts with some animal stencils. So really good turnout for those events, lots of families, lots of good input on the plan. So I just wanted to highlight that. And again, thank our partners in the Parks Division who allowed us to hold those events. I want to highlight some of the main feedback that we received throughout this process. We received a lot of support for mixed-use development and denser development residential options, especially along commercial and major corridors, such as Milwaukee Street and Cottage Grove Road. There was a lot of concern over pedestrian and bicycle safety, especially near schools and, again, those larger road corridors. There was support for sidewalk installation where none exist, especially where students would be walking to school. Folks were interested in more youth-focused spaces and programming. And there was support for revitalizing the Milwaukee Street Corridor with mixed-use destinations, small business clusters, additional dining. The besides transportation, which I'll hit on on the next slide, land use was kind of one of the bigger topics as well. The black dash circle areas are areas where the plan adds additional density to the planning area, so along Milwaukee Street, Cottage Grove Road, Atwood and Monona Drive. There's a node circled at 51 and Buckeye, and then there's Another little node off of Buckeye to the east where the feedback that we got from the neighbors there was that they'd like to see a node of neighborhood mixed use. A couple other highlights with the land use during this process, both the southeast and southwest area plans are proposing to add a new residential category to the comp plan, which would be medium residential one. So with southeast and southwest going forward with the additional area plans, that new category would be added. Also made some modifications to the LMR. The plan removes what was termed as the escalator clause. And those escalated land uses went into that MR1, medium residential one category. And then wrapping up the land use highlights, for general commercial and employment, again, for both the Southeast and Southwest plans, the plan is recommending that no additional residential be developed in those two categories. During the planning process, staff evaluated the areas that were shown for general commercial and employment, and if it was determined that they were good Places for residential, they were changed to a mixed use category. So the plan reflects that areas where residential should happen and is reserving the general commercial and employment for those uses and not residential. There are also a number of sites where we're calling them key sites where we envision change or the plan envisions change. I'll go over a couple of those. First one is the former American Family office building on Walbridge Avenue. It's a 41-acre site. Currently, there's a rather large vacant office building, large parking lots, and some pedestrian paths. The plan recommends a mix of housing types on a grid system of public streets. And the plan has two options in it. And as you see on the screen, one is to redevelop the site but reuse the existing office building as a mixed-use building. And the other option would be to demolish that office building and basically have a blank slate to develop a neighborhood with a mix of housing types. And then the second area I wanted to highlight was the Highway 51 Stoughton Road corridor, and specifically between Buckeye and Tompkins Drive. Planning staff has been coordinating with the Wisconsin DOT on the US 51 study. Currently the study is still going on and the state is looking at a couple of options. One is a 45 mile an hour limited access roadway. And the other one is a 35 mile an hour urban Boulevard. And the land uses in the plan would be different depending on which option is chosen. If the state goes with the 45 mile an hour option, essentially the land uses would remain the same as they are today general commercial excuse me on the west industrial and a little bit of employment on the east the plan does advocate for the 35 mile an hour urban Boulevard option and what that would do then to the land use is change that to CMU, Community Mixed Use, as well as it would provide the ability to add some additional street connections across Highway 51. You can see those with the dashed arrows. So again, the plan does advocate for that 35 mile an hour urban boulevard. And then the images to the right of that are some conceptual images of how it could be redeveloped if that urban boulevard was realized. This slide summarizes the transportation actions. The plan advocates for creating well-connected streets in newly developing areas. You can see that on the street network map. As well as providing those additional connections across Stoughton Road that I just talked about, encouraging the 35 mile an hour urban boulevard, upgrading bike lanes to the all abilities and ages standards, and making priority sidewalk connections. There's also, as I alluded to, the community action strategy chapter. And the area that we focused on in the plan is the high stand neighborhood, and that's the area highlighted in red up at the top of the map. The chapter covers capacity building within neighborhood and enhancing community and stakeholder relationships. There is also a potential for small-scale physical improvements. It could be between $100,000 and $200,000 in federal CDBG funding. if that funding is available from the federal government. And we were very transparent with the community as we were out getting input on the plan that that funding may or may not be available from the federal government. But we were moving ahead as if it were so that we could plan for projects as you see in the table there. We had the community rank those projects. There are a couple with asterisks that are outside of the scope of the CAS budget, but we did pass those along to the Parks Division to consider as they're doing their park planning, which is ongoing right now. Another important part of the Southeast Area Plan, as well as the Southwest Area Plan, is archiving the underlying plans. For Southeast, there are six. Those existing plans will be archived with the adoption of this plan. And through the planning process, staff incorporated and reviewed relevant recommendations in those plans. and lifted them up, promoted them into the Southeast Area Plan so that they would not be lost to time. Just to wrap it up here, this is a summary of the board's committees and commissions review and approval of the plan. Just a couple of highlights. The Transportation Commission recommended removing Action 4D and replacing it with the text that you can see on your screen. And then the Landmarks Commission asked for or recommended that the wording in Action 7 add a historic district to that action. It's a list of potential historic districts or national historic districts. So that was just a minor add. And then finally, at the Plan Commission last week, They requested that a map note be placed on the future land use map for the Wingra quarry and the property directly adjacent to it to the east. That once more detailed planning goes on for that site, that there could potentially be the ability to add additional streets. Right now it's a quarry. The final grades are unknown. It's unknown if additional streets can be added between those two properties. it was requested to put that map note on the plan so that there could be that could be reviewed in the future as when a development proposal comes in so with that I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have thank you questions for staff on item seven

Going once, going twice, seeing none.

Thank you.

All right. Then on item seven, President Madison, motion please.

Motion to adapt.

Moved and seconded to adopt. Is there discussion? Alder Field.

Thank you, Mayor. I'll be brief. So I wanted to share with my colleagues a little bit of perspective as one of the local Alders and then also a member of the Plan Commission through this process. First, by assuring my colleagues that staff put a lot of thought into removing the escalator clause as it applies to some of the land use categories here. in order to provide a little bit more clarity about the allowable volume of residential units that could be allowed in the future. We had a really good discussion about this last summer where they made a really good case that that escalator clause was kind of problematic for future population forecasting when doing things like sewer upgrades and when reconstructing a street needing to estimate how much volume of our utility service our utilities needed to plan for these streets. So that was super interesting and they came up with this pretty creative idea of the two degrees of medium residential categories. So I wanted to acknowledge that because it is a new feature of these plans and my understanding is we'll probably see this incorporated into future area plans as well. staff also put a lot of thought alongside plan commissioners into determining which areas should be general commercial or employment versus moved into mixed use with the question of where residential uses are appropriate which in other parts of the city we've had proposals that are kind of hard to grapple with where we have a precedent of approving residential in some categories but then those categories in other places don't really fit residential so we're trying to address that policy question a little bit with the plans moving forward. And I wanted to speak to some of the rigor and thoughtfulness of that discussion the Plan Commission has been having. I wanted to, for those interested in the comments, direct my colleagues to the Legistar item for this and the attachments seven and eight, which show the feedback that the plan has gotten and various elements of neighborhood challenges and opportunities. We see these directly reflected in the plan, everything from the need for housing choices that suit people's different modes of life to pedestrian and bike safety needs throughout the area, but focused on a couple of the corridors where a lot of people live and a lot of people drive. This was an enormous amount of work, and I can't speak for the experience of the other local alders per se, but I can personally attest to open house meetings with presentations, presentations to neighborhood meetings, presentations to PTO groups and facilitated feedback activities at those meetings, tabling at neighborhood events, especially meaning that we were finding people where they were already going to be, not necessarily getting them to come and talk about city business, right? Resident surveys, including the very popular Madison Bandness Bracket Survey. So that was a pretty high participation one. an online commenting map, focus groups, a business walk, a neighborhood walk, and several public hearings and discussions with city committees that had input from constituents. So I wanted to share my sincere thanks with the Southeast Area Plan team and the multi-agency team who collaborated on this plan, but most especially the two planning co-leads, Rebecca and Jeff, for their thoughtfulness, responsiveness, and creativity throughout the process. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Alder. Alder O'Brien.

I will also be brief, but I do really want to extend my gratitude to the planning team, especially Rebecca and Jeff. This project started before I was elected, but it really kicked off just kind of as I was stepping in. Um, and it's a, it's a big project to, to kind of walk into. Um, and it was, they were incredible. Um, the staff who worked on this, it's not just them, but it is a huge number of folks across the entire city. Um, they, they worked with the neighborhoods, they worked with the stakeholders, they worked with the businesses, um, and really did a fantastic job of, um, incorporating all of the different needs, especially in a in a widely varying area. is also a difficult plan when you have one of the largest north south connectors in it that is under design in a way that the city is not able to control and we have limited input on with stoughton road and so i'm very glad to see that we have a handful of scenarios in it i will say i i do hope that we get the 35 mile an hour wide boulevard because it does advocate it will it will single-handedly reshape the East Side for the next generation should that happen. So I'm very grateful for staff and including that. So just thank you to everybody.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Martinez-Rutherford.

Thank you so much. I would like to third that, I guess. The way that Rebecca and Greg have... responded to constituents' concerns, was just so wonderful and particularly hopeful that Stoughton Road will be redesigned into a wide boulevard with a 35 mile an hour speed limit to make sure that The students that go to La Follette are safe and able to cross the street and get back and forth. The engagement was profound and prolific, and I'm really grateful to the team who all who worked on it. So and as well as the Alders that that were alongside it the whole way.

So thank you.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Ugar.

Thank you, Mayor. I'd also like to thank the staff. And although we're not considering item eight specifically, you'd also thank Rishi Martin and Ben Zellers for the stellar work that they did. It's a continuing

You'll have the chance.

Yes. As a continuing beneficiary of the escalator clause, and some of you know why I say that, I think it does make a lot of sense as all the fields explain that we have this new, but I would encourage all of my colleagues here as you look forward to your time to work on an area plan that you take a look at all of the work that was done here. Because as we transitioned from looking at the West Area Plan and the Northeast Area Plan, we learned so much about what works well in engaging the public. And that really showed up in the kind of results that we were able to get and the responses that came in from everyone. Thank you.

thank you elder i have no other elders in the queue wishing to speak so if the council will indulge me in a point of personal privilege i'd just like to thank the staff as well for their work on this and jeff and rebecca did a really good job leading the team but the entire planning division was involved in one way or another they did do a really remarkable amount of public outreach the stencils the turkey stencil in particular was a joy to behold and to see our planning staff out on a basketball court with covered in paint and rolling stencils around and yeah it was that was a really a remarkable event i'd also like to just take a moment to congratulate rebecca on her new role with the city as principal planner for neighborhood planning preservation and design congratulations

And with that, item seven has been moved and seconded. Is there any objection to recording a unanimous vote in favor? Seeing no objection, we're recording unanimous vote in favor of item seven. And move on then to item eight, which is Legislature 92879, adopting the Southwest Area Plan and the related amendment to the Comprehensive Plan impacting districts one, seven, 10, 19, and 20.

On item eight, we will have a presentation from staff as well. It takes a minute.

There you go. All right. Good evening, everyone. My name is Urvashi Martin. I work in the Planning Division. I was one of the co-leads for the Southwest Area Plan, along with Ben Zellers joining me here. And there are several other staff members from Planning Division, Tim Parks, Kirstie Latch, Linda Horvath, and Angela Puerta, who were also on the team that worked on this area plan. So we'll start off with a little bit of background about the Southwest area. It's bounded by the Beltline Highway to the north, the city's municipal boundaries to the east, Highway 18-151 and Cross Country Road to the south, and High Point Road to the west. There are approximately 37,000 residents who live in the southwest area, which is approximately 13% of the city's population. This area is also one of the more racially and ethnically diverse parts of the city that has a higher percentage of people who identify themselves as black and Hispanic Latinx. Like the Southeast Area Plan, we also had a pretty robust public engagement throughout this process and utilized a number of very similar engagement techniques like the Southeast Team where we had our traditional public meetings and also community survey. We also had some focus groups that organization Nina Collective helped us organize and neighborhood walks, business walk, art workshop. youth engagement through the UW People Program. One thing that was different from the Southeast Area Plan Team is that we also hired community partners, and these are organizations and individuals that have work in the community and have trusted relationships, so organizations like Just Dane, Melahood Foundation, and others. And these organizations really helped us reach some of the underrepresented. populations in the area helped us spread the word about the process and also helped us recruit participants for the focus group meeting so that was that was a very that was very helpful for our engagement process and we were able to engage with a lot of community members that we typically weren't able to engage with So these are some of the key feedback themes that emerged from our engagement process so Transportation was a topic that was heavily commented on and we heard a lot about issues relating to speeding and traffic safety issues there were also a lot of feedback on the lack of affordable housing in the area and also need for housing in general and also in addition to not only adding new housing in the area but maintaining some of the existing affordable housing the rental housing in the area and making sure that that they're high quality and safe for residents. We also heard a lot of comments about wanting more walkable mixed use areas and destinations that people could walk to, so like places like coffee shop, restaurants, local businesses. And then also a lot of comments about creating more accessible and inclusive spaces. So these comments that we received and these themes helped to shape the actions and the recommendations in the plan. So I'm going to start off with highlighting some of our draft actions and recommendations from the plan, starting with our future land use recommendation. So as Jeff mentioned in the Southeast Area Plan presentation that we use the comprehensive plan as a guiding document and use the vision and the framework of land use recommendations from the comprehensive plan and categories that are consistent to that. So the maps here on the left are showing the future land use recommendations from the comprehensive plan and the map on the right is showing the changes that we recommended to the future land uses through the Southwest Area Plan process. So as I mentioned in the slide before about our key feedback themes. One of the things that we heard a lot was about creating more mixed use areas and also more housing. So we increased the intensity of mixed use development and residential development at several locations, especially along major transportation corridors like Schroeder Road, Gammon, McKenna, Raymond Road, McKee, Maple Grove Drive, and other key transportation corridors that are within this area. We also, looking at the future land uses, this area is largely residential and has a very small percentage of land that is assigned to employment and commercial uses. So in our evaluation of future land use recommendation, we really tried to strike a balance between residential development and also maintaining some of the employment uses since we got a lot of comments as well about jobs in the area and also creating jobs with livable wages. For our transportation specific recommendations, so for our pedestrian network, we have a pedestrian network map where we are recommending closing some of the sidewalk gaps and also prioritizing some of the sidewalk improvements, especially areas that are close to schools and also major streets. We also have a map as shown here where we are recommending upgrading some of the existing on street bike facilities to an all ages and ability standards to make them more safer. And also we have recommendations like striping buffered bike lanes on Whitney Way and have some detailed graphics to illustrate what that cross section could look like. Some other recommendations from the transportation chapter, we have a planned street network that recommends creating a more well-connected street network through our planned street network map. We have some recommendations there of streets that are already officially mapped and on the city's official map, like the Schroeder Road and Hampshire Place connection that have been on the city's official map since the 1960s. In addition to that, we also recommend a street for considering for official mapping. That's the segment of Meadow Street Drive that connects with High Point Road and also several other planned street connections throughout this area. Some other transportation-related highlights, we have some actions relating to Raymond Road. We heard a lot of concerns about improving safety along Raymond Road, so we have a short-term as well as a long-term recommendation to improve safety. Also, for the intersection of Cross Country, Maple Grove, and Nesbitt, we are recommending a roundabout to improve safety and traffic flow at that intersection that we received a lot of comments on. In addition to that, we also added additional details in the plan for the Beltline study, which was additional information that came about when we were working in this process from the Beltline PEL study that was made available earlier this year. So we added more details on that and also added additional partnerships with WSDOT to address some of those concerns that came up with that study. Community action strategy areas similar to the southeast area we also have Community action strategy areas that are eligible for federal funding through the CDBG program so we also have several recommendations Relating to that we have three community action strategy areas in in the southwest Park Edge Park Ridge Meadowood and allied And we have several recommendations relating to capacity building in these areas or improving community relationships and as well as some small-scale physical improvements like sculpture art or mural or Street painting and things like that could be potentially funded through those CDBG funds These are just some highlights of the comments that we received on the draft plan. So there was a lot of appreciation for the planned Hammersley Road path extension that we're showing in the plan. There was also a lot of support for the separated bike lanes that we have recommended for Whitney Way. There were some concerns brought up about McKee Road that should be included in our Vision Zero speed analysis map. There was also a lot of support expressed for the Seminole Highway bike lane recommendation that we have to upgrade it to an all ages and abilities facility. There were also some comments about adding Watts Road on our priority sidewalk connections map. There were also some comments that were brought up about making sure that new shared use path connections proposed in Elwood Park, that they don't interfere with the existing cross-country ski paths. I just wanted to note here that parks department will be starting a master planning process for Elver Park. And through that effort and planning process, they will be determining more exact locations for those connections. We also got some comments, mixed feelings on the action that we had for studying Woodington Way as a one-way street by Nana Elementary to improve safety. And then there were several other comments opposing the Hampshire Place connection that we show in the plan. So some of the edits that we made in response to these public comments that we received, we removed the recommendation to study Woodington Way as a one-way street. We also included a community action strategy project in the Allied area to improve park amenities at either Britta Park or Duval's Park. We also included a partnership with Dane County for McKee Road, which is a county highway, to improve safety along that street. We also added additional details on the Beltline Study and also additional partnerships with WisDOT in light of the Beltline Pell Study. We also added a map to identify some of the improvements that could be made to the Verona Road area and also additional narrative on that. And as noted earlier, we also created a map that shows recommended improvements that could be made to existing bike lane facilities to improve them to an all ages and abilities facility. So this is the list of the various committees that this draft plan was referred to. It's essentially the same committees that the Southeast Area Plan was also referred to. All these committees recommended adoption of the plan. Landmarks Commission had a minor edit in their motion. to the wording in one of the actions in the culture and character chapter. But other than that, there weren't any other edits really suggested by the other committees and commission. So that concludes my presentation and Ben and I will be available for questions.

Thank you. Are there questions for staff on item eight? Seeing none, President Madison, a motion, please.

Motion to adopt. Second.

Moved and seconded to adopt item eight is their discussion. Alder, Figueroa, Cole.

Thank you. I don't have a big speech prepared for you guys, but you know how I feel about you in general. This plan has been, I've been waiting for this plan for a long time since I first became an elder, so I'm excited that here we are at the end of it. And this plan came with a lot of curveballs through the process, like the WISDOT project, for the love of God, and with the school referendum school, and you guys, every single time that If an obstacle came, you guys were available to work with those parties and get us through and help me communicate to the community what we were trying to do. So I'm really grateful for that. So thank you, Ravashi. Ben, Tim, Linda, Kirstie, and Angela for all the support for every community, for every neighborhood association meeting, NRT, that you guys stopped by, and all the community engagement. And also there were areas where, you know, I wouldn't be me if I wouldn't be pushing on something. So I want to really thank you for, you know, Megan, that really helped me translate some of my thoughts on things that I was looking for. Even Derek had to come and do a walk with me so I can speak more. planning language related so I could communicate better with you guys. And just the other day helping me answer the questions about Elba Park, which by the way, I talked to the gentleman yesterday and he's fine with the information that was provided. So thank you for that, for all that work. But I also want to thank the community because my perspective from the engagements that I participated on, it really was a, these are difficult conversations to have, but I felt like the community was really show a lot of respect for you guys. And they were open communications, unlike other situations that we have seen. And I really hope that any future plan continues to be like that. The engagement from the community was so positive and so willing to, communicator needs but also understand the restraints that came with those needs I I really want to appreciate that I want to really give also a shout out to to that engagement so with that thank you very very much Thank You Alder, Alder Lankella a really quick brief

Thank you, staff, especially Ben and team did an amazing job and obviously keeping me updated constantly. Thank you very much for your job. You know, even with the staff turnover in between, I was only part of the last one year and keep me Up to date on those, it was really appreciate you guys keeping us updated in there and especially keeping the community involved. I know it helped a lot them putting those and hopefully we'll have more of those in future. At the same time, it might be causing us more trouble now because we let them put the stickers on, draw the lines. Now they assume it's already done. So they're already asking me when is the roundabout is coming or when is that project, the sidewalk is coming. So hopefully we'll have enough funding to get all of those done. But I really appreciate you guys' effort and continue keeping this in progress. Thank you.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Harrington-McKinney.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I did prepare something because I wanted to make sure that I covered the things that I wanted to say. Tonight, we are not simply voting for a land use document. We are voting for a vision for how Madison grows who benefits from that growth and whether the Southwest area remains a place where working families, seniors, young professionals, and long time residents can continue to call home. The Southwest area plan does matter. The Southwest area, Southwest Madison is one of the fastest growing areas of our city. Growth is coming whether we plan for it or not. The question before us is whether growth will happen intentionally or by default. The Southwest Area Plan gives us a roadmap to guide housing, transportation, parks, economic development, employment, stewardship, and public safety in a coordinated way. We learned a lot of lessons from the Southeast Area Plan that you put into action. you covered a lot of difficult questions especially related to meadow sweet drive and also hampshire place and you faced those challenges and those questions and residents felt that they were heard they might not have gotten what they wanted but at least you listened and that was really very important Tonight's vote is about more than maps, zoning, categories, and planning documents. It is about whether Madison will have the courage to prepare for its future, Will our children and grandchildren be able to afford to live here on the southwest side? Will working families continue to find opportunity on the southwest side? Will seniors be able to age in place on the southwest side? Will growth create stronger neighborhoods rather than deeper divides? As the Alder for District 20, I have heard from residents who care deeply about affordability, safety, sustainability, neighborhood character, and quality of life. They may approach these issues from different perspectives, but they share a common desire. They want a Madison that works for everyone. The Southwest Area Plan is not a final destination. It was a road map. It relates to lessons learned acknowledges challenges ahead and positions us to grow responsibly, equitably, and sustainably. And I am, I ditto the thanks to staff for your efforts in putting together a workable plan. Thank you so very much for listening to the residents. Thank you so very much for creating a space on the Southwest side where people continue to live. That ends my comment.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Madison.

While my district is in 17, which is in neither of the two plans that were presented, I do just want to say thank you. Because the highlights that you shared about the community aspect is one that I was really interested in. And you can see the effort that you all put into the two plans. I saw that in the northeast area plan. So it was really, I don't know, really interesting to see. I don't think we had anything, though, with painted sidewalks or whatever the mayor was referring to. So I feel a little...

something about that but that's my own personal thing it has nothing to do with you all but thanks for y'all work yeah thank you alder alder are you here thank you mayor i just want to emphasize in particular that as district 19 older i feel fortunate that so many constituents are not reticent about expressing their opinions about being deeply engaged and civil affairs the exception is that part of the of district 19 that falls south of the beltline down to schrader road it's always been very difficult for myself and past holders to really engage with that population on a particular point out and thank you for the extra effort to bring in the third party to really find ways to reach out to the populations that otherwise are not in a position or not inclined to express their opinions. I think we all benefited from that process. Thank you.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Duncan.

Thank you, Mayor. I want to thank the staff. District 1 had a very small sliver in this plan, but the roads and the areas for the Southwest plan do impact District 1 residents. And I just want to thank you all for listening to them, for taking the time to keep the elders up to date and listening to what we had to say when it comes to what we've heard from our residents, making sure that their voices are being heard. This is an exciting plan, and I am excited that District 1 will at some point be able to experience working through a plan also. So thank you all.

Thank you, Alder. Alder Mayer.

Thank you. I so appreciate all the work the staff did. I grew up in this area. I spent the bulk of my childhood years and all of my teenage years in an apartment near Whitney Way and Raymond Road and explored a lot of this area by bike, which at the time was often at great risk to my personal safety with inadequate road crossings and bike facilities. So I really appreciate all the work you've done to that to make that sort of thing a lot more safe. Also, a lot of those areas seem neglected over the years and clearly you've paid a lot of attention to it. And I appreciate all the feedback that you took from area residents. And I'm excited to see what happens to this area in the future. Thank you.

you alder i have no other alders in the queue so i'll add my thanks to the staff as well on this plan again it's a tremendous amount of work and that's a job well done and item eight has been moved and seconded is there any objection to recording unanimous vote in favor Seeing no objection, we'll record a unanimous vote in favor of item eight. And that will take us, yes, good job staff. that will take us to item 36 which is legislature 92335 amending the 2026 police department operating budget and authorizing the dane county narcotics task force led by the police department to use its city multi-year fund account to purchase training radios and investigative supplies through state funds provided by a 2026 wisconsin department of justice law enforcement drug trafficking response grant on item 36 president madison emotion please motion to adapt moved and seconded to adopt item 36 are there questions for staff on item 36 alder glenn

Yes, thank you, Mayor. I see Captain, I can't see behind Attorney Haas. Yep. Captain's here. Hi. Go ahead.

I just have a few questions and then some comments later.

So this grant is stating that it will work to just kind of support the Dane County Task Force for supplies. Can you be, do you have any more specific?

Yes, we'd like to purchase radios for each of the task force members and have a few spares as we have different agencies rotate in and out. On a particular basis, we have some of the local agencies send us officers as they can. So we'd like to purchase additional radios. There were some lighting equipment that we would like to use for them to be able to do surveillance at night and some other equipment to replace some equipment that's outdated.

Thank you. I have a few more. Sorry, my computer died and so I'm trying to read it on my phone. I mean, like, doesn't work. Okay.

Does the Dane County Narcotic Task Force collect and publicly report any race disaggregated data on people stopped? I just needed glasses.

We do collect data. I don't know that the task force publicly shares that information, but we can certainly do so. If you could let me know exactly what you're looking for.

yeah i'd um specifically around race stopped searched arrested prosecuted under task force operations sure is there a particular time period you're looking for i would like it i mean i think um we get

reports but i know looking into this grant it's a year long so maybe halfway through six months and then at the end okay okay um and does is there any kind of community oversight for dean coney task force

So there is a board, um, that is made up of members from the different, um, agencies. So there is a steering committee, which is made up of the Dane County. So, um, the UW police departments and the Madison police departments, as well as, um, some members from the Dane County chiefs of police association.

Okay.

And so for like just for a definition of because in the grant and for this, it's drug trafficking organizations. Do you know how that's defined by you all?

Yeah, so we are looking at organizations that are working to the specific grant is looking at organizations that are involved in drug trafficking as far as outside of the area and then transporting drugs into Dane County. So we're looking at doing some mail interdictions and parcel interdictions, looking at air transportation, bus travel. So organizations or entities that would be involved in larger scale drug trafficking as we're seeing an area that we have not had a lot of experience in and we'd like to further our drug abatement efforts.

Thank you.

What kind of racial equity or implicit bias training does the task force do?

Well, I can only speak for the Madison Police Department members, but we do go through regular training in our in-services where they are forced to attend every year in order to get their training hours. So there have been implicit bias and procedural justice and other trainings that they have undergone.

Thank you very much. With this grant, is there a timeline? I know I'm waiting on a DOJ grant myself for my day job. So wondering, is there a timeline for when this needs to be implemented with DOJ on your end?

The reason I'm asking is because the Public Safety Review Committee didn't need to consider this item. So I'm wondering if it should be seen by them.

I would say yes. We were looking to actually start this grant in February of this year, so we've held off. I'm trying to look through any of my paperwork that I have on timelines. So we haven't started anything yet, but we would like to do so as soon as possible. If you need any other information in order for it to go before any other committee, I can certainly provide it for you.

Yes. Thank you. Okay. That's the end of my questions. Thank you. I don't have anything further. Thank you, Alder.

Alder, figure out all questions. Thank you. So is my understanding that this is a collaboration with Dane County? agencies, have they accepted their portion of the grant already?

Yes, they have.

Okay, so they are kind of ready to go. And how old, is this a new program or is this something that is an ongoing program?

This would be a brand new program for the Drug Task Force.

And the funding, this is the state funding, correct? Correct. Was there any matching funds associated to this?

No.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Alder. I have no other Alders in the queue with questions. So thank you, Captain. Item 36 has been moved and seconded. Is there discussion? Alder Glen.

I'll try to make this as brief as possible. So I don't know if people realize like when we talk about oversight and how important it is and with grants, I understand $50,000 isn't like going to make or break the Dane County Narcotic Task Force. In a county with well-documented, decades-long, nationally recognized racial disparities in drug enforcement, black residents of Dane County have been 97 more times likely to be incarcerated for drug crimes than white residents. The widest disparity on this measure in the United States. And when you look into the Wisconsin Department of Justice Law Enforcement Drug Trafficking Response Grant, specifically with this DOJ, the Edwin Beam Memorial Justice Assistance Grant had itself its own biases built into it that they were then asked to do and forced to do training and rewrite their grants. So just a few headline numbers. 97 times, a black residence of Dane County was 97 more times likely to be incarcerated for drug crimes than a white resident. Dane County's Task Force on Racial Equity confirmed this. It is the widest such disparity ever recorded in the United States on this specific measure. Number three, Dane County raked third worst in the entire United States for racial equity in drug offense incarceration. This is done by a local study, the Marquette Wire. In 2009, 433.76 versus 4.46. The black drug prison admission rate in Dane County was 433.76 per 1,000 residents. The white rate was 4.46 per 100,000 residents. That's a 97 to 1 ratio, 12 times more. Madison police arrested or cited black residents for marijuana offenses at more than 12 times the rate of white residents, despite national surveys consistently showing black and white people use marijuana at comparable rates. That was in 2016, Madison State Journal. 2018 arrest data analyzed by the JFA Institute for Dane County. The arrest rate for black residents remained approximately eight times higher than white and Hispanic rates, even when controlling per person based rather than population based calculations. That is from Dane County Jail Race Ethnicity Disparity Analysis in 2020. The rate for jail incarceration for black residents in Dane County was approximately 16 times higher than white residents. The primary source of disparity occurs at the point of arrest. Black residents make up approximately 6% of the Dane County's general population, but 40% of its jail population. That persisted across multiple decades. 2007 governor doyle creates the wisconsin commission on reducing racial disparities 2009 dane county executive kathleen falk creates a task force 2014 wisconsin center per investigative journalist finds black arrest rates are highest in every crime category statewide 2016 to 2018, despite marijuana decriminalization debates and reform advocacy, Madison Police continued to arrest black residents for marijuana at 12 times the rate of white residents. 2019, Dane County Criminal Justice Council Commission analyzed JFA Institute analyzes specifically to examine race as the driver of jail incarceration disparities. Conclusion, disparity originate primarily at the point of arrest. JFA in 2020-2021, Dane County Jail Race to Ethnicity Disparity Analysis passes unanimous equity resolution. 2026, we vote on the giving them more money. So each cycle follows the same arc. Data reveals extreme racial disparity. Task force or commission is created. Recommendations are issued. Disparities persist. New cycle begins. This is what structural inequity looks like. Not individual bad actors, but systems that reproduce the same outcomes generation after generation, even as individual actors express good intentions. Tonight's vote is a decision about whether Madison continues that cycle or begins to break it by conditioning enforcement grants on demonstrated equity. So just want to read a little bit. A peer-reviewed 2021 study published in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management examined the Byrne-Jage predecessor program and found that found that receipt of these discretionary law enforcement grants significantly increased drug arrests and that the increase was concentrated in arrests of black and brown residents. The mechanism is structural. Task force must demonstrate productivity through arrest numbers to justify continuing funding. As the ACLU of Texas documented in its analysis of narcotic task force, to receive federal funding, task force must have good arrest numbers. And targeting minorities is an easy way for task force to pad their statistics. The ACLU's landmark 2014 report, War Comes Home, documented how federally funded task force use militarized tactics to aggressively and violently target black and brown communities. Federal compliance training for the Burn J grantees acknowledge this. It specifically covers privacy and civil liberty rights, task force performance measures, personnel selection, and task force oversight accountability. That this training exists is evidence that these risks are officially recognized. So I know $50,000 is not going to make and break a drug task force, but I think it is important for us when we see these to be looking at them and dig into them because while we have very limited due to state rules of how we, what we do about policing, we do have the budget, we do have the purse strings. And I think it is important to ask the hard questions or at least put some boundaries around them so that we can really be digging into what the data is saying and do something different.

Thank you. Thank you, Alder.

Further discussion on item 36? Seeing none, item 36 has been moved and seconded. Is there objection to recording unanimous vote in favor? Seeing Alder Martinez-Rutherford.

Please mark me as a no.

The clerk will mark that. Seeing no other objection, we'll record that vote. And that will bring us to the end of our agenda. And are there any other introductions of items from the floor? Seeing none, are there any announcements? Seeing no announcements, Alder, Lieberman, it's your turn.

I move for adjournment.

moved and seconded to adjourn is there any objection to recording a unanimous vote in favor of adjournment seeing none we stand adjourned have a good evening everyone