Friday, July 31, 2015

Abele: Taxpayers, Like Workers, Should Be Exploited And Not Heard

Last fall, the Milwaukee County Board did the heavy lifting in trying to salvage as much as they could from Milwaukee County Emperor Chris Abele's dysfunctional budget.  Thanks to their hard work, the county is in better fiscal shape this year than would have been the case with Abele's budget.

Accordingly, the board chose to reinvest the money back into the county.  They chose to put $5 million back into the parks which have suffered under years of neglect by Abele and by Scott Walker before that.  They decided to invest $1.5 million into technology for the transit system that would increase efficiency and cut travel time.  The board also wanted to stop the high level of turnover among employees by giving a 1.5% raise to county works.

Abele vetoed these common sense measures, calling them "irresponsible" and tried to claim that these moves were "a raid" on county reserves.  Yes, he said reinvesting in county assets was irresponsible.  That's how much he thinks of the people of Milwaukee County.

In a separate move, the board also approved a half million dollars to be used to make the workers of the private cleaning agency contracted to the county whole. The money would be used to give the workers back pay so that they were being paid a living wage as the law requires

Abele also vetoed this.  Abele claimed that the company wasn't meeting the requirements of their contract by half and that this had been going on for over a year.

Don't be surprised. I've been telling you for a long time that Abele is just like his BFF Scott Walker in that they have the same anti-worker attitude.

What Abele doesn't explain is why his administration didn't do their job in enforcing the contract until now.  Nor did Abele explain why he would punish the workers of this company for his failure to do his job.  He also doesn't explain why he is so adamant about wanting to give the job to another company without an open and transparent bidding process.

Thankfully, the board ignored Abele's infamous temper tantrum (about the only thing he does know how to do) and overrode each of his vetoes.

But Abele doesn't hold great disdain just for workers.  He also finds taxpayers beneath his contempt.  This was exemplified this week when it became painfully apparent that Abele didn't want to hear what the taxpayers had to say about him giving away 10 acres of county land for a whole dollar:
Tuesday marked the start of a new era for the Milwaukee County Board when, as supervisors started talking about sale of properties including the Park East corridor, they were told they have no power over them.

“They do not need to be here, but they are here, apparently,” the county's corporation counsel Paul Bargren said in response to a question from the board’s development committee about the land sales.

“These will be handled administratively from now on,” he said. “They won’t be coming to the committee.”
Abele is so arrogant that he didn't feel that he needed to even bother coming down to answer any questions about his land giveaway.

Maybe he was afraid someone would ask how much he stands to gain with his $2 million condo being adjacent to the property he and his plutocratic pals want to develop.

Hey, what's a little largess with county assets for his good friends, especially if he can make a big profit for himself as well?

The fact that Abele is trying to stop any improvements in the way the county operates or the services it provides shows that he isn't interested in good government.

And the fact that he doesn't want to hear what the citizens have to say, much less be held accountable to them, shows that he isn't even a good emperor but a petty tyrant that needs to be dethroned.

1 comment:

  1. And yet supposedly Liberal Milwaukee cant get rid of him any more than we can get rid of Walker and his failures and here in Manitowoc we cant get rid of Ziegelbauer.
    Thank you, Sir! May I have another?

    ReplyDelete