The Economic Ties That Bind (Madison to the Rest of the World)

Foreign Policy magazine has published a Global Cities Index for 2010 and I see that Chicago ranks sixth. We here in Madison are only about 140 miles away from one of the biggest and most influential cities on the planet. But this isn't really news. Lots of Madisonians head south to take in a concert by a group that rarely, if ever, comes to Madison to perform. Despite all the buy local hoopla, tons of the food on our grocery store shelves comes from Chicago. (This is probably especially pronounced in the ethnic grocery stores.) And I'm sure there are countless other examples of how Madison is, in certain ways, a satellite of Chicago.





It seems to me that with Amtrak service coming to Madison in less than three years, we have a good opportunity to create more ties to the Midwest's most important portal to the world. I nodded my head in agreement with urban planner Barry Gore's quote in a recent CapTimes article:

Gore is particularly miffed by the mayor’s efforts to piggyback a public market project onto the train station and a new parking ramp. He says Cieslewicz is more concerned about turning the downtown into a tourist attraction than fostering any tax-generating business development.

“I can’t see why a public market is suddenly the most important land use to pursue,” says Gore. “Are we to believe that businessmen and women coming to Madison from Chicago or Milwaukee on the train will want to buy some asparagus on arrival or departure?”

While I'm not against putting a public market in Madison, I do question the wisdom of making it a priority to place it across the street from the train station. It is very disappointing to see our mayor eschew/demote the view that the train stop is going to be a portal to A) Milwaukee, our state's largest city and B) Chicago, the region's powerhouse and a global city and instead advocate on behalf of asparagus. Not that his promotion of the public market is proof-positive that he isn't taking a wider view but, for me, it certainly makes his concerns seem very parochial.

A lot of what having a train stop here will or won't do for Madison is dependent on our next governor. Scott Walker has pledged to put the kibosh on the whole thing if elected. He oversaw Milwaukee County's Income Maintenance Program's descent into disaster and, if this article by Steve Jagler at Milwaukee's BizTimes is any indication, he isn't particularly interested in anything other than promoting himself:

County government has played virtually no role in the attraction of economic development and jobs in recent years.

The county also has been the slowest among the local government players at the table to embrace the aerotropolis concept of development around General Mitchell International Airport. The county-owned land in the former Park East Corridor still stands vacant.

By contrast, the City of Milwaukee government has been the driving force in bringing companies and jobs to the Menomonee Valley, the 30th Street corridor, the former Tower Automotive site and other developments, including the Manpower Inc. headquarters in downtown Milwaukee.

Meanwhile, the county’s economic development director position has been vacant since October of 2008, when the county’s previous director of economic and community development, Robert Dennik, left the job to become a vice president for Pewaukee-based VJS Construction Services.

And, ironically, who does he finally pick for the position?

Walker, who is campaigning as the Republican nominee to be the next governor and is vowing to stop the federal high-speed rail project if elected, is asking the county board to approve the appointment of a former high-speed rail planner in Gov. Jim Doyle’s administration to be the county’s next director of economic development.

One conclusion that Jagler reaches:

Whenever possible, Walker has taken a minimalist position of government advocacy and involvement. He has tried to diminish the size and the reach of the county government. He has tried to privatize much of county government. Walker believes the private sector is best left alone.

While there are certainly areas that the state government apparatus should stay out of, I do believe it has a role to play in advocating for Wisconsin's businesses and economy as a whole. And Walker doesn't seem to be the least bit interested in doing so. What we need is a governor who is willing to step up to the plate and work with the private sector to strengthen our economic ties to Chicago, not one who fiddles while Rome burns.

An example I read somewhere (Richard Longworth's blog?) was about a hypothetical Chicago law firm with a global clientele. The Chicago office would do the global business (partners are there as is O'Hare) but it could have satellite offices elsewhere to handle business within the U.S. Perhaps Milwaukee or Madison could have one of those offices instead of somewhere like Indianapolis. Again, it's purely a hypothetical. However, Barrett seems more like someone who would try to partner with Chicago/take a more regional view to try and get Wisconsin's foot in the global door than Walker who seems more interested in aggrandizing his own power while his backyard falls to pieces.

Similarly, Madison needs a mayor with a wide view of our city and its place in the region. Cieslewicz may be the right man for the job but linking a public market to the new train stop doesn't instill any confidence in me that he is. Madison is home to what I am told is the largest private venture capital fund in the Midwest - Venture Investors - as well as the UW, which is a huge research institution and apparently also has a kick-ass entrepreneur program. I don't know the exact role city government has in putting together seemingly disparate pieces of the economic puzzle but instead of saying, "Come and buy our asparagus", perhaps the mayor could be looking at the Amtrak stop as a potential way to get law firms to open satellite offices here or of having firms partner with the UW here in developing solar technology, et al.