Consolidation reduces our citizen's sense of community, and moves local elected officials farther from those they represent. I believe that our current structure of city, village, and town government, if properly managed, can still meet the needs of our growing population, provided several changes are made. There is a tendency among some townships on the fringe of urban centers to encourage urban or suburban growth that their government structure and service delivery mechanisms were never designed to accommodate. This leads to a second problem, which occurs when those towns rely on their county government to provide basic services to these growth areas that should be provided at a local level, such as police protection. This added cost contributes to tax rate disparity between cities and towns, which further promotes town development and sprawl, creating a vicious spiral.
Growth is a reality on Wisconsin.
Smart growth principles dictate that most of this growth should take place as a compact, contiguous extension of our current urban centers. I hope the Commission will address this and other issues of fairness and equity between the various levels of local government. Political or functional consolidation is not necessary to allow communities to cooperate in service delivery. Current statutory provisions are adequate to allow for this, and many communities are doing so when they believe the situation warrants it. This should remain a local decision, not one imposed by the state through mandated consolidation.