A stunning 43 Milwaukee County parks—including jewels such as Lake Park, Estabrook Park and Whitnall Park—could be sold off with just the signature of Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele and one other individual, thanks to a last-minute amendment slipped into the state budget last summer by state Sen. Alberta Darling (R-River Hills), apparently at Abele’s request.
The provision was just one item in a catch-all amendment that members of the budget-writing Joint Finance Committee, co-chaired by Darling, voted on with no public input late in the evening of the July 3, going into the holiday weekend.
The amendment gives the county executive the power to sell or lease county land that is not zoned as parks if the county comptroller or just one other individual signs off on the deal. The Milwaukee County Board has no say in the deals and the state provision doesn’t require a public hearing.
Priceless county assets such as the zoo, the airport and the Milwaukee Public Museum are not zoned as park land and could be sold off by Abele and one other individual.
And until last week, the public believed that the Milwaukee County parks were safe from Abele’s closed-door crony deals.
But a report from the Parks Department released last week showed that at least portions of 43 Milwaukee County parks are not zoned as park land and are at risk of privatization without any oversight from the Milwaukee County Board. The at-risk parks include Cathedral Square Park, Red Arrow Park, Brown Deer Park, Estabrook Park, Grant Park, the Milwaukee Rotary Centennial Arboretum and Whitnall Park. (For a full list, see the sidebar.)
“This could happen tonight,” warned Supervisor Marina Dimitrijevic in a board committee meeting on Friday.
Trust Abele?
Abele’s response to the revelations is that the public should trust him not to sell off the parks and that he’s working to close the loophole to protect them.
Last Monday, he sent a letter to each of the mayors and village presidents whose parks are at risk, asking them to change their zoning so that the parks are protected from Abele’s deals.
His spokeswoman said that Abele was unaware that he could sell off some parks without board oversight.
“Neither the county executive nor the county board knew there was an apparent discrepancy between this land’s current zoning designation and its current use as parkland until the Parks Department completed its review in January,” Abele’s spokesperson Melissa Baldauff emailed.
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But Abele’s proposed zoning fix isn’t a sure thing. Nor can the public be assured that Abele won’t sell off or lease park land, because he has attempted it previously.
The local governments can totally ignore Abele’s request to rezone the at-risk park land. Or, they could take their time rezoning the land, leaving the parks vulnerable to development in the meantime.
That said, some communities may be interested in privatizing or taking over their parks. For example, as the Shepherd reported in November 2014, the Abele administration was working with Greenfield officials to lease Kulwicki Park to Greenfield. Abele officials didn’t give county supervisors a heads-up on the plan until after the Shepherd reported on the negotiations. Ultimately, the board shot down Abele’s proposal. Kulwicki Park isn’t on the list of at-risk parks, but Abele won’t need to get board approval for any future or pending plans to lease other parks to a municipal government or sell to a private developer. As a realtor pointed out, a park like Brown Deer Park with its excellent golf course, would make for a wonderful condo development where you can roll out of bed and be on the golf course.
In addition, Abele tried to sell off O’Donnell Park to Northwestern Mutual without a competitive bid, even though some of that land was zoned as park land. Once again, the county board scuttled that deal and the county is now seeking an agreement with the Milwaukee Art Museum to take over that parcel.
Lastly, it must be noted that the original budget amendment, passed by the Darling-led Joint Finance Committee, actually gave Abele vastly more power to sell off county assets without board approval. The original amendment, apparently requested by the Abele administration, didn’t include the park land exemption. It would have given Abele the power to sell off all county-owned assets with just one other signature and no competitive bids, oversight or county board vote. While the Joint Finance Committee approved the amendment on a party-line vote, the amendment was whittled back in the state Legislature’s review of the budget to include the exemption for park land.
Restoring Parks Protections
On Friday, the board’s Intergovernmental Relations Committee heard testimony from Abele’s appointed Parks Director John Dargle about the extent of the at-risk properties within his department. Dargle said that the Parks Department owns and operates land in addition to officially designated park land, which he called areas of flood plains or agricultural land not necessarily zoned as park land. This additional land was not included on the list of at-risk parks.
The supervisors voted in support of asking the municipalities to change their zoning to protect park land, but they also tore into Abele for sending out the letters to the municipal leaders requesting zoning changes last Monday, as the supervisors were preparing their agenda for Friday’s meeting.
Supervisor Gerry Broderick, chair of the parks committee, said that Abele’s letter’s “timing was curious,” since Abele didn’t act on the matter until the supervisors prepared to make the 43 at-risk parks known to the public.
At Lake Park on Monday, state Sen. Chris Larson (D-Milwaukee), Abele’s rival in the spring election, and state Rep. Chris Sinicki (D-Milwaukee) announced their intention to introduce the County Parkland and Heritage Protection Act, which would restore county board oversight of all county land sales. However, the county supervisors could only approve or reject the county executive’s proposed deals under this legislation, they couldn’t amend them.
Larson blasted Abele’s power grab, saying that the county executive hasn’t explained to the public why he sought such extensive power over land sales and leases or if any land deals are underway. Abele has a history of cutting private deals with his pals.
“We have no idea what land sales are pending,” Larson said.
43 Parks at Risk of Abele Privatization
Thanks to a last-minute amendment to the state budget, Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele needs just one additional signature to sell off valuable non-park land owned by the county. A review of county records shows that 43 parks are not entirely zoned as park land and therefore could be sold by Abele. The 43 at-risk parks are:
Algonquin Park, Brown Deer
Armour Park, Milwaukee
Baran Park, Milwaukee
Bay View Park, Milwaukee
Big Bay Park, Whitefish Bay
Brown Deer Park, Brown Deer
Cathedral Square Park, Milwaukee
Chippewa Park, Wauwatosa
County Grounds Park, Wauwatosa
Doctors Park, Bayside
Estabrook Park, Milwaukee
Falk Park, Oak Creek
Franklin Park, Franklin
Froemming Park, Franklin
Grant Park, South Milwaukee
Greene Park, St. Francis
Grobschmidt Park, Milwaukee
AC Hanson Park, Brown Deer
Joseph Lichter Park, Milwaukee
Juneau Park, Milwaukee
Kletzsch Park, Glendale
Kohl Park, Milwaukee
Lake Park, Milwaukee
Lincoln Park, Milwaukee
Melody View Preserve, Milwaukee
Milwaukee Rotary Centennial Arboretum, Milwaukee
Mitchell Airport Park, Milwaukee
Mitchell Boulevard Park, Milwaukee
Oakwood Golf Course, Franklin
Pere Marquette Park, Milwaukee
Rawson Park, South Milwaukee
Riverside Park, Milwaukee
Runway Dog Park, Oak Creek
Servite Park Reserve, Milwaukee
Sheridan Park, Cudahy
St. Martins Park, Franklin
Red Arrow Park, Milwaukee
Roverwest Dog Exercise Area, Milwaukee
Scout Lake Park, Greendale
Southwood Glen, Franklin
Whitnall Park, Franklin
Wilson Recreation Center, Milwaukee
Zeidler Union Square, Milwaukee
