They call themselves "Watchdog Milwaukee"?

For a group that call themselves "Watchdog Milwaukee", they sure are not paying attention. How can they have been so dead wrong?

On the Watchdog Milwaukee website posted on June 29th, the author Jim McGuigan on several occasions, emphatically stated that Scott Walker's new proposal on the parks system would not run by an "elected board"-

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker doesn't want to pay for parks so he's endorsed a plan to turn them over to an unelected, unaccountable board with taxing authority. This is bad on so many levels.

Milwaukee County parks have been described as a jewel, a beautiful part of what makes Milwaukee beautiful. But Walker's plan to close park pools is being met with a chilly reception and now he's hoping to pawn this hot potato off on an unelected board. AN UNELECTED BOARD.

I have no idea where Mr. McGuigan was getting his information, but on the day before this was posted, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has released the following information and they clearly stated that the new Park District board would consist of ELECTED officials. The people of Milwaukee county would indeed have a say over who was on this board and how their parks should be run.

From the MJS on June 28th-

Under the park district concept, board members elected countywide would control the parks system and hire a director. The current director, Sue Black, would be a logical choice, said Walker, who appointed her in 2003.

It would be nice if the "watchdog" stopped chasing it's tail and actually corrected this information on their website.

Edited to add: Watchdog Milwaukee has now updated their site. It no longer states that the proposed new Parks district board will be unelected. Now it only states that board would be "unaccountable".

The "unaccountable" argument is a bit hard to make, since these will be elected officials. Elected officials are accountable to the people who elected them. If the citizens see a problem with the folks elected to the proposed Parks district board, they can remove them from office during the election cycle. Of course, there is always a recall election also. Milwaukee voters have proven that they are not shy about having a recall vote. How many county board supervisors were recalled during the pension scandal? At least 7- perhaps more. I cannot remember. Either way, Milwaukee knows how to shake things up when it comes to holding their elected officials accountable.