Milwaukee – Page 57 – Marquette University Law School Faculty Blog

Barrett’s Valley, Walker’s Corridor

Post author:Alan J. Borsuk
Post published:March 4, 2010
Post category:Milwaukee Speakers at Marquette

What’s the difference between Tom Barrett and Scott Walker?

The Menomonee Valley versus the Park East corridor.

Barrett, the Milwaukee mayor who is the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor, tried out that answer Thursday at an “On the Issues with Mike Gousha” session at the Law School. Chances are you’ll hear it a lot more in coming months as Barrett battles with Walker, the Milwaukee county executive who is the leading candidate for the Republican nomination.

Barrett said that the city was responsible for what to do with vacant land in the Menomonee Valley, and, in recent years, attracted companies which employ about 2,000 people to the western part of the area south of I-94 and west of downtown (presumably, that doesn’t include the Potawatomi gambling complex).

Milwaukee County is responsible for the Park East land, the former freeway zone that runs along the north edge of downtown.

A Public Service Environment

Post author:Alan J. Borsuk
Post published:March 1, 2010
Post category:Marquette Law School Milwaukee

When I was hired by the Law School in October, I joked that my basketball affections were for sale – Go, Golden Eagles – but, especially when I was writing in my own reporting voice, I didn’t expect to change my journalistic standards (there really are such things) after more than 35 years of newspapering in Milwaukee. So if you want to consider this hopeless pandering to my bosses, I can’t stop you. But I regard this as just a blog item in my voice.

The annual Law School Public Service Conference was this past Friday at the Alumni Memorial Union, with a theme of “Water and People.” It’s one of the centerpieces of the Law School’s involvement in public issues and its commitment to promoting knowledge of and involvement in those issues.

But I’ve been impressed in the four months I’ve been hanging around the building with how strong the public service environment is in the Law School and with how little of the reason for saying this is rooted in once-a-year events. Consider a partial list:

Milwaukee Sick Leave Ordinance May Be Headed to State Supreme Court

Post author:Paul M. Secunda
Post published:February 24, 2010
Post category:Health Care Labor & Employment Law Milwaukee

Hat tip to CCH Technical Answer group for an update on the status of the Milwaukee Sick Pay Ordinance that was passed by referendum in November 2008, only to be invalidated by a state trial court judge. According to the posting, the Milwaukee paid sick leave case has now been referred to the state supreme court:

On February 18, 2010, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to take up the constitutionality of Milwaukee’s paid sick leave mandate.

In June 2009, Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Thomas Cooper ruled that the city’s paid sick leave ordinance, which provided up to nine paid sick days per year based on the number of hours worked and the size of the business, was “invalidly enacted and unconstitutional.” (Metropolitan Milwaukee Assoc. of Comm. v. City of Milwaukee, Milwaukee County Circuit Court, No. 08cv018220, June 12, 2009). 9to5, the National Association of Working Women, appealed Cooper’s ruling. The supreme court has been asked to decide whether the ballot question put before the voters of the City of Milwaukee complied with the statutory requirement that it contain “a concise statement of [the ordinance’s] nature” — whether voters were informed of the contents of the ordinance . . . .

Nearly 70 percent of . . . voters approved the referendum for paid sick leave in the November 2008 election.

Marcia McCormick (St. Louis) has written before on the ordinance. I personally think the law was properly enacted and constitutional. It will be interesting to see whether the Wisconsin Supreme Court takes the case.