Community Input, Partnerships, and Connection
- Record and publish all city meetings.
- Utilize current technology to transcribe city meetings and publish transcripts.
- Community Input, Partnerships, and Connection
- Allow timed public comment for all items at Common Council and committee meetings.
- Expand eComment system on the city meeting portal for all topics as another avenue for citizen participation.
- Create email inboxes for all committee groups so public comments can be directly sent to committee members.
- Create a neighborhood association steering committee on development
- Establish a process for developers to meet multiple times with a neighborhood association's steering committee to discuss development projects that do not meet "by-right" standards before going through the City review process. This allows both parties to find common ground and buy-in for projects and should make the process less adversarial as projects go through the city review process.
- Allow the neighborhood association's steering committee to present to City committees with the same privileges afforded to developers. This allows residents to lean on neighborhood associations to help advocate for them more efficiently. Timed public comment would still be guaranteed to the community.
- Create two new committees to bring new voices and perspectives to our decision making process.
- Small Business Owners Committee: This committee would be made up of Wauwatosa residents who are Small Business Owners from different industries and parts of the city. Their focus would be on Small Business initiatives, policy that impacts Wauwatosa's small business community, and other items referred to them by Common Council.
- Renter, Landlord, and Affordability Committee: This committee would be made up of Wauwatosa residents that are either renters, landlords, and/or members of the Wauwatosa Joint Housing Coalition. Their focus would be on policy and referred items from Common Council that impact renters, landlords, and rental affordability issues.
- Utilize communications staff to create email signups with various topics to subscribe to so that you can get a "Peek of the Week" of upcoming meetings and topics that matter to that individual.
- Maintain the option to attend and comment in meetings through Zoom.
Neighborhood Planning and Diversity in Development
- Create guidance and codified districts on Bluemound Road and Mayfair Road for long term planning, uses, infrastructure and safety improvement, to foster businesses growth and enhance community space.
- There are "Sub Area" plans in the Comprehensive Plan in development, however, we need a more in-depth plan tailored to this unique area, similar to the North Avenue Master Plan or MidTown North Avenue Plan, so that this area is a main focus and not a small chapter in the city plan.
- Research and forecast the future of commercial real estate and office parks. If a decrease in demand for commercial real estate and office parks is predicted, begin planning for the next steps, which could include mixed-use single-family homes, medium-density residential (duplex, quadplex), townhomes, condos, senior living, and high-density residential with neighborhood commercial districts to provide more small business opportunities.
- Create family-friendly housing opportunities to help keep our school population healthy and strong and maintain our neighborhood schools.
- Encourage more senior living and affordable condo projects for households looking to downsize but stay in Wauwatosa.
Protecting and Strengthening Wauwatosa's Financial Health
- Limit use of TIF funding for projects and provide more community input and transparency when TIF projects are brought up.
- Require community input on vision and multiple bids on development on City owned properties.
- Hire a consultant to review our ordinances and processes to align with industry best practices for greater efficiency and potential expense savings.
- Review our current lawsuits impacting our city and see if we can correct them with better policies or ordinances. If it can't be fixed, explore the option of hiring more staff attorneys so we can lower our outside legal counsel expenses.
- Set aside funds for a participatory budgeting process so that the community can direct where they want to spend funds.
- Create more community touchpoints for input and feedback.
- Have clear and complete reports on city expenses available on the City's website for community consumption.
Innovation to help our Budget and Community
- Create a program to help increase childcare options and capacity in Wauwatosa by using already established resources to fund expansion of childcare facilities or by creating new sites.
- Create a program to assist Seniors with their property tax bill. This program would be modeled after Madison's Property Tax Assistance for Seniors. Wauwatosa's version would be adjusted to meet the needs and desires of our committee and rely heavily on community input and guidance from Wauwatosa's Senior Commission. In addition, this program could partner with Wauwatosa's Housing Rehabilitation Program to further help Seniors.
- Budget for and hire a dedicated grant writer to help pursue available grants for city priorities and free up resources for other projects.
- Set aside funds for a participatory budgeting process so that the community can direct where they want to spend funds.
- Hire a consultant to review our ordinances and processes to align with industry best practices for greater efficiency and potential expense savings.
- Review our current lawsuits impacting our city and see if we can correct them with better policies or ordinances. If it can't be fixed, explore the option of hiring more staff attorneys so we can lower our outside legal counsel expenses.
- Seek community input and study which areas in Wauwatosa could handle overnight street parking. If there is community support and areas can handle it, create an optional overnight parking pass system for residents living within those zones.
Enhance Community Safety
- Use elements of Complete Streets that are tailored specifically to the unique characteristics and uses of streets in Wauwatosa to improve safety for all on our roads.
- Increase safety calming measures on popular routes to school, high pedestrian areas, bike routes, and accident prone areas to improve safety.
- Maintain staffing levels for our first responders.
- Maintain funding for mental health resources for our first responders and community.
- Resolve contract issue between WPD and City to help retain and attract officers.
- Support more community partnerships between police, community advocacy groups, residents, and neighborhood associations.
- Have crime reports posted on the City's website for each aldermanic district.
- Support technology resources for our police to help supplement their ability to keep the community, and themselves, safe. This could include an unarmed drone to aid in locating suspects as well as additional traffic cameras to alert police when it finds a stolen vehicle or one that has been involved in a violent crime. Please note that auto-citation cameras for speeding or reckless driving is against Wisconsin State law.
Protect & Invest in our Unique Assets and Infrastructure
- Commit to protect and recognize our parks and green spaces for their impact on our community and environment.
- Study and implement traffic calming measures in high-risk and high pedestrian traffic areas.
- Study future and long-term use and impacts to better prepare our infrastructure for changes in population, environment, climate, and land use beyond our comprehensive plan.
- Identify community areas and advocate the Wauwatosa community to plant more trees to keep our city green.
Easily Accessible Reports, Data, and Scorecards
- Publish and provide easy access on the City's webpage reports on various community topics to help residents better understand how our government operates and what we are doing. Reporting could include finance, expenses, crime, and development.
- In conjunction with the City Administrator, Mayor, Common Council, and staff, create easy to understand city goals, similar to what the school district publishes, to show our success, areas of improvement, and the overall status of Wauwatosa. Goals should be attainable and should be of interest to our community. This could include showing if our construction projects are on time and budget, our progress to our housing unit development in the 2023 housing study, the average time to resolve a city service issue, and other areas the community would like to be informed of. This should be published on our website or printed as a yearly statement with other relevant information to our residents.