Politics Remain Local—Fitchburg Wisconsin Mayor Is Swept from Office

Political party know-it-alls were swept from office
in this progressive city of 25,000 in south-central
Wisconsin, (election results, Dane County).
Citizens elected the city's first Latino mayor,
Jason Gonzalez on a campaign message stressing
neighborhood activism and social justice.

Fitchburg, Wisconsin — In the country-side regions of Fitchburg can be found majestic homes.

People live here, with real concerns and sentiment about maintaining a way of life in their homes and communities.

They voted heavily for Bernie Sanders on April 5, 2016 in the presidential party primary, and they joined a broad rejection of a first-term Wisconsin mayor, sweeping one Steve Arnold from office, and electing the city's first Latino as mayor, Jason Gonzalez.

Gonzalez assembled a coalition from across the political spectrum in calling for social justice, neighborhood empowerment and listening to the people.

Politics is local. The message from Fitchburg is: People matter more than politicians, more than political parties, and more than grand schemes to change the character of a rustic city without consent.

Jason Gonzalez chats with supporters
after being elected Fitchburg's first
Latino mayor.
Image from Gonzalez campaign volunteer.

Gonzalez congratulated his opponent last night at a celebration at Laredo's Mexican Restaurant, and vowed to seek the consent of the citizenry.

The incumbent mayor, breaking from well-observed tradition here, did not phone Gonzalez to congratulate his campaign on his electoral victory.

No matter. The victory was sweeping as all four aldermanic districts decisively voted for Gonzalez, delivering a warning shot to state Democratic Party hacks that people really should be listened to.

Those who seek the consent of the people ultimately prevail. This is a both an article of faith and a political truism.

Will Wisconsin Democratic Party commissars get the message? I know the Republican Party of Wisconsin will not.

Deceit in Fitchburg, Wisconsin

Thief-in-the-night public policy

Fitchburg, Wisconsin is a small city bordering Madison in southern Dane County.

Known for its rustic character, the highly educated and diverse populace votes some 70 percent Democratic-progressive with an emphasis on green politics.

Fitchburg is also the latest victim of political deceit and chicanery from its mayor, Steve Arnold, who won a narrow victory last April.

Mayor Arnold dropped a late-September bomb, his proposed 2016 budget, that would hike residents' property tax bill some nine percent.

This translates to higher rents for tenants and some $200 in higher property taxes for the typical single-family household.

Arnold calls his budget a "moral document," yet one on which Arnold declined to campaign.

The last 30 years Fitchburg mayors typically submitted budgets which would 'hold the line' on taxes, and take it easy on households' financial bottom line.

Not so with Arnold.

Arnold writes to the Common Council, "[T]he average home will pay approximately $2,288 towards city government operations, an increase of $202 or 9.7%," (2016 Budget letter, p.6 (pdf)).

I have been living in—or covering as a journalist—Fitchburg for decades and no one, (and I mean literally no one), has ever ran on a political platform calling for higher property taxes. It would be political suicide.

So Arnold decided he would leave this hike-property-taxes scheme out of his 2014-15 campaign for mayor. Have a look at Arnold's "Fitchburg Idea," and tell where he even mentions property taxes.

Our household and many of our neighbors' are counting on the Common Council to kill this budget and make it DOA: No property tax increases wanted, period.

This government by ambush, perfected by Gov. Scott Walker, should stop, it's an affront to representative democracy and households' bank accounts.