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Meetings and Updates Week of Nov 4

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  • City Meetings:
    • Plan Commission 11/4
    • Board of Park Commissioners 11/6
  • Today (Sunday) is the Final Chance to Vote Early!
  • Independent, Third-Party Review of Madison’s Budget by WI Policy Forum
  • Update on North Thompson Drive Shots Fired Incidents, Community Meeting 11/11
  • WisDOT Public Meeting for South Stoughton Road Corridor Study 11/19
  • Events & Announcements

City Meetings

Note: This is not a complete list of meetings for this upcoming week. All meetings and their details can be found at the Meeting Schedule page.

Plan Commission

The Plan Commission meeting will take place on Monday, November 4, at 5:30 p.m. in virtual format. Agenda items include development-related requests (none in District 3).

Board of Park Commissioners

The Board of Park Commissioners meeting will take place on Wednesday, November 6, at 6:30 p.m. in virtual format. Agenda items include an informational report regarding the fireworks shows at the Madison Mallards in the 2024 season, as well as an informational presentation on efforts to manage toys intentionally left in parks.

If you would like more information about becoming a member of a City board, commission, or committee, please visit the page linked here.

Today (Sunday) is the Final Chance to Vote Early!

Are you ready for the dark ads, junk mail, and spam texts to end? I sure am.

Sunday, November 3rd is your last opportunity to vote early by voting absentee in-person. This Clerk’s Office webpage has more information about how to vote early as well as locations and times.

The General Election is Tuesday, November 5. Polling places open at 7 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. Make a plan to vote if you haven’t already!

Independent, Third-Party Review of Madison’s Budget by WI Policy Forum

The Wisconsin Policy Forum is a nonpartisan, independent statewide policy research organization that provides analysis of critical policy issues affecting local and state government in Wisconsin. Each year the Forum prepares an analysis of the City of Madison’s budget (and does the same for other municipal governments, too!). I highly value their independent analysis and presentation of budget trends from a third-party perspective.

Last fall I shared information from their analysis of the 2024 City Budget proposal in a blog post and heard from several residents that they found it to be very informative. I highly recommend that folks check out their analysis of the 2025 City Budget, which also includes a comparison of the referendum-passing and referendum-failing scenarios and the resulting impact on City reserve funds and City services under both scenarios. Here is the WI Policy Forum’s 2025 Madison Budget In Brief document.

Here’s the Introduction section from WI Policy Forum's analysis:

“As Madison seeks to balance its 2025 budget, the city will largely do so on its own. Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway, the Common Council, and ultimately the voters themselves will have to decide the right level of city services and spending for next year and beyond. Then city taxpayers will have to dig – and perhaps dig deeply – to fund that increase without new infusions of state or federal funds.

The mayor and Common Council members have placed a $22 million referendum on the Nov. 5 ballot to help fund increased spending for city operations. After years of tight state limits on Madison’s tax levy and three years of rapid inflation, the mayor says the increase is needed to give raises to staff, reduce employee turnover, and ensure services remain at high levels. Under her proposed 2025 budget, nearly three-quarters of the revenues in the city’s main fund would come from property taxes on the owners of homes and businesses in the city.

That rising share illustrates – perhaps better than any other statistic – the predicament for the city and its residents and taxpayers. Though property values in Madison have skyrocketed and its population is growing, state law limits any increases in the city’s tax levy for operations to the growth in new construction within its territory. Development in the city is outpacing the state average, but still fell well short of the inflation rate in recent years, which has driven up costs for both Madison residents and the city budget.

Towns and cities across the state face a similar challenge, but many of them received help in 2024 in the form of a massive boost in a form of state aid known as shared revenue. Yet as last year’s budget brief showed, Madison received the least additional aid per resident of any municipality in the state.

To be sure, the city benefits mightily from being the seat of state government and the home to the world-class research institution that is the University of Wisconsin-Madison. These assets have long buoyed the city’s economy and property values, and state officials have some justification in being reluctant to provide direct aid to the city. At the same time, however, state law also limits what Madison officials can do to tap the city’s high property values to fund services with local funds.

In recent years, city spending has been increasing at a rapid clip. Since 2021, that spending has been propped up in part with federal pandemic relief aid, but this year essentially marks the end of that source of support. The city retains ample reserves of its own – enough to fund this spending for a period of time into the future but not forever. In addition, this option would weaken the city’s traditional strong finances and credit rating and leave city employees and residents more exposed to the impact of future crises.

If successful, the referendum would not solve all the city’s challenges but would bring a measure of fiscal stability to the city budget. If it fails, the problems would be greater still, with the city cutting some services, dipping into its reserves, and leaning heavily on an undrafted and untested new infrastructure special charge. As always, we take no position on the referendum or city budget as a whole. Yet as members of the Common Council and the voters themselves consider these questions, we hope this brief offers insights that will help them to make these difficult decisions for themselves.”

Continue reading in the WPF’s full 2025 Budget In Brief document, available here.

Update on North Thompson Drive Shots Fired Incidents, Community Meeting Scheduled

The area near the 200 block of North Thompson Drive have experienced two separate incidents of multiple gunshots, one on October 6th and one on October 12th. In both cases there were multiple guns involved, many casings left at the scene, and property damage.

Madison Police Department continues to work on extra patrols in the area and is coordinating the investigations through the central Violent Crimes Unit. They are still asking for help and information from residents related to the incidents. Anybody who has Ring doorbell or dash-camera footage of this area from the evenings of Oct 6th or 12th, or other relevant information, should please contact Madison Area Crime Stoppers by calling 608-266-6014 or visiting p3tips.com. Tips can be shared anonymously.

The Hiestand Park Neighborhood Association, Public Health’s Violence Prevention Unit, and Focused Interruption organized a neighborhood listening session to bring neighbors together to discuss these recent events. Residents of the Hiestand Park neighborhood, and especially those who live along the North Thompson Drive corridor, are invited to this meeting to discuss their concerns and learn more about potential ways the community can address root causes of gun violence in the longer term. MPD will be there to share updates and answer questions where possible. I will be attending as well (this is my own neighborhood).

  • Where: East Madison Baptist Church, 4917 Milwaukee Street (in the downstairs Fellowship Hall)
  • When: Monday, November 11th at 6pm

Pizza and beverages will be provided and childcare will be available to families who attend.

WisDOT Public Meeting for South Stoughton Road Corridor Study on Nov 19th

The Wisconsin Department of Transpiration has scheduled and Public Involvement Meeting on November 19 to discuss and gather feedback on the US 51 (Stoughton Road) South Corridor study. The city of Madison will also have a representative available to provide information on the city's Southeast Area Plan. 

South Stoughton Rd near District 3 is shown in blue.
South Stoughton Road near District 3 is shown in blue.

The South Stoughton Road study covers the part of the road south of Highway 30 and includes the intersections and on/off ramps at Milwaukee Street and Cottage Grove Road in District 3. No construction is yet scheduled. The study is intended to make recommendations to update and redesign the highway and its intersections and to rethink details like speed limits, the number of lanes, potential new ways to cross Stoughton Road and reconnect neighborhoods, and how well (or poorly) other modes of transportation are accommodated by South Stoughton Road or crossing South Stoughton Road.

This public meeting will be a good opportunity for residents to share their thoughts with WisDOT about what they do and don’t like about the current configuration of South Stoughton Road or to ask questions. I hope to see you there!

  • Where: La Follette High School
  • When: Tuesday, November 19th at 5:30pm

WisDOT also invites comments and suggestions related to this study in their online commenting tool, which you can access at this link: comment now

Events and Announcements

For the full list of upcoming events, please visit the City events calendar. 

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District 3 - Alder Field

Alder Derek Field

Alder Derek Field

District 3
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