[CORRECTION: I had speculated that the Appleton representative that Alderperson Denise Fenton had referenced was Amanda Stuck. Alderperson Fenton has since said that Amanda Stuck was not among the people who reached out to her. It was actually Penny Bernard Schaber.]
The Common Council met 01/20/2021, and as I posted yesterday, they opted to take up and vote on the resolution to put a non-binding referendum regarding non-partisan redistricting on the April 6 ballot instead of putting the resolution through the normal committee review process.
Taking the resolution up immediately limited the ability of the public to comment on it, but it was necessary in order for the Council to vote on the item in time for it to be placed on that ballot. By state law, the resolution needed to be filed with the clerk a minimum of 70 days prior to the election. The deadline for this election was January 26.
Alderperson Denise Fenton, who along with Alderperson Vered Meltzer sponsored the resolution, posted on facebook in response to questions about why the resolution was not submitted in time to go through the normal review process, “[T]his resolution was based on a request from citizens. We did not receive it early enough to make the last Common Council meeting, but I thought it was important enough to make the effort to meet the deadline for getting in on the ballot.”
The city clerk reported to Council members that Outagamie County held a county-wide resolution on this specific issue during the April 2018 election. Although Appleton is in three counties a majority of our residents are located in Outagamie county. She pulled the numbers from the Outagamie County referendum for Appleton residents only. 78% of Appleton residents who voted on this question voted in favor of it. Not every person who voted in the election voted on that question and when those people were factored in, 73% of total Appleton voters who voted in the election voted yes on the Outagamie County referendum.
Additionally, last year Mayor Woodford issued a Non-Partisan Redistricting Proclamation and the Common Council passed a non-binding resolution calling for non-partisan redistricting procedures.
At the state level, Mayor Woodford informed the Common Council members that Governor Evers has created a nonpartisan redistricting commission.
Beyond that, it will cost the city approximately $1,500 to add the question to the April 6 ballot. This is not due to the timing of the addition or the nature of the question being added but simply because there is a cost to put anything on the ballot.
A couple Council members wondered if this resolution and referendum were necessary, given that it appears that our community has spoken clearly in multiple ways on this matter.
In answer to these concerns, Alderperson Fenton stated that several alderpersons were approached by citizens, including a former state representative for Appleton as well as other people, who told the Alderpersons that the citizens of Appleton would like to be heard on this issue.
[To editorialize…honestly, it really came off sounding to me as if recently retired Assembly representative Amanda Stuck gathered one or two other people to talk to Alderpersons Fenton and Meltzer about getting this issue on the ballot. {CORRECTION: Alderperson Fenton has stated that Amanda Stuck was not one of the people who contact her. No word yet on who the representative was.} It didn’t sound nearly as organic as the many many calls originating from community members for the expo center and the library project to be put up for a community-wide vote. Be that as it may…]
Alderperson Fenton pointed out that, although the governor has created the fair maps commission, the commission has no legal authority, and the state legislature still has the responsibility for drawing the district maps. What the governor does doesn’t carry much weight with the legislature currently. The idea behind holding this referendum is to get as many communities around the state as possible to voice their support for nonpartisan redistricting procedures so the legislature can see that the citizenry is overwhelmingly in favor of fair maps. She stated that 54 counties within Wisconsin, as well as a number of municipalities, have, either by resolution or referendum, expressed their desire for fair maps. Appleton has multiple districts and, per Alderperson Fenton, they are divided on their enthusiasm for this issue. This referendum would give residents another opportunity to express their position on this matter.
Alderperson Matt Reed said that he wasn’t anticipating debating this tonight. Fundamentally he didn’t have a problem with this going to referendum because it is about voters having a voice and that’s what the democratic process is about. At the same time, he’s not supportive of the underlying purpose of the referendum. In his opinion, the push for non-partisan redistricting both in Wisconsin and nationwide is coming heavily from Democrats. That can also be said of the calls to remove the electoral college. To him it came off as, “We can’t find a way to win these darn state house seats, so we’re going to change the rules.” He’s not okay with that. He thinks that everyone should be abiding by the same rules. Gerrymandering has been around for 200 years and is not a new phenomenon. It’s been ruled on many times and as long as there is not a racial element to drawing those lines, the Supreme Court has pretty much stayed out of it and left things up to the states. He does agree with having fair votes. He disagreed with the second “whereas” of the resolution “WHEREAS, there are numerous indicators that the citizens of Wisconsin are concerned about the practice of redistricting by whichever party holds the majority, because it may stifle political participation and competition, discourage collaboration and compromise, and lack the fairness necessary to our democratic process, by undermining the principle of one-person-one vote”. He was curious how the concept of “one person one vote” would be impacted by having the district lines drawn one way or another since everyone would still be able to vote.
Finally, speaking more to the public than to the other alderpersons, he said the resolution was calling for “non-partisan” procedures but he thought it would be better if they had some sort of “bipartisan” solution because a non-partisan solution takes the process away from the legislature and the voters and puts it with some sort of non-elected body. Those people will not be accountable to the voters or the public, and whatever they decide to do when they draw district lines would be beyond the scope of what the legislature does. The lines they draw would not be able to be changed by the voters.
He thought that the proposed referendum question would actually undermine what the proponents are hoping to accomplish by taking that authority away from the legislature. Right now, if people don’t like the district lines that are drawn by the legislature then they can change the legislature by electing different people and altering the political mix. He acknowledged that he was in the minority, but he wanted to make sure that the public was actually aware of the substance of what voting for this would mean.
Alderperson Fenton thanked Alderperson Reed for his good questions and input. She said that the whole idea of the referendum was to take the redistricting process out of the hands of either political party. They want the voters to decide on the process. She pointed out that in the last election that they have final statistics for, one party got 54% of the votes but only 36% of the seats, which to her was not indicative of representative democracy. That was the thing her constituents were asking to have a say on. She said that she contacted everyone on her email list and the support for putting this on the ballot was “unanimous”. She had one person express reservations.
Alderperson Meltzer stated that their constituents have asked for this referendum. They have asked for this opportunity for their voices to be heard, and the alderpersons have found it within their ability to allow that to happen. Unless there is a very good reason to not give their constituents this request to have their voices heard, Alderperson Meltzer didn’t think there was any reason to vote against the resolution and encouraged all the alderpersons to support the resolution.
Alderperson Schultz said that the public has something of a short memory span as well as the legislature. Additionally, the legislature does turn over occasionally. They might not remember a 2018 referendum. He thought that if they had an opportunity to send a message now that it would be worth it to spend the little bit of money it would cost to get it on the ballot and allow the citizens to make an overwhelming show to the current governor and the current legislature.
The Common Council voted on the resolution and it passed 15-0.
[Personally, I think this is a great move on the part of the Common Council and the public should remember how strongly the alderpersons spoke out on the value of the community having a voice. The next time we have a contentious issue like the expo center or the library project I anticipate that the Common Council will push as hard for a city-wide referendum for those issues as they pushed for a city-wide referendum on this issue.]
View full meeting details here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=825730&GUID=A8FC7DB2-4B6A-4CD1-B060-0054C1C683AB&Options=info|&Search=
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