With all due sympathy for the circumstances of George Torres's exit from Franklin's Plan Commission (illness forced him to resign), a letter like the one he wrote to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel doesn't make me want to lead a rally for his return:
Walker's transit plan makes good sense
Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker supports a strong transit system. He told the Milwaukee County Transit System to submit a balanced budget for 2009 that did not cut routes or raise fees. The good news is that transit officials met that challenge.
Looking ahead, Walker has a plan to provide a long-term funding source for the transit system by pursuing a plan at our airport that is similar to the plan being approved by Chicago for Midway Airport. Chicago Mayor Richard Daley already has received $1.8 billion for the Skyway toll bridge and is anticipating
$3 billion for Midway through a long-term lease. Scott Walker is also seeking to use all of the $91.5 million in federal aid to improve and upgrade the bus system through Bus Rapid Transit. Mayor Tom Barrett's plan for a streetcar system in a three-mile radius of downtown Milwaukee would cut $3 million in state and federal aid from the bus system. BRT is the better plan for the future.
George A. Torres
Milwaukee County, Director of Transportation & Public Works
Milwaukee
In other news: Amy Winehouse's lifestyle should serve as a template for all others.
Readers of this blog may recall the name; George Torres was the sitting plan commissioner who felt comfortable writing a letter dated 1/2/07 to WISDOT in support of developer Mark Carstensen's Shoppes at Wyndham Village strip mall before seeing any definitive plans and before
Carstensen's development had appeared before him in his role as plan
commissioner - - a role in which Torres would and should be expected to
show no positive predisposition toward a project that has not yet
demonstrated compliance to the city's requirements.
An especially cuddly passage from Torres' letter:
Mr. Carstensen has also proven to be committed to ensuring his developments meet all State and local requirements. He remains open and receptive to ideas and suggestions that must be met in order to allow his projects to move ahead.
You gotta hand it to Mark Carstensen, though. After hoodwinking both the the city of Franklin and a family into a situation where there is now a single family residence built right behind Target in "Franklin's City Civic Center District" (!!!), he had the brass coconuts to actually mention the debacle from the podium at the Sendik's opening!
It's been almost a week and my mind is still reeling from some of the things I heard from that podium; more later ...
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