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Residency rule doesn't hurt police or firefighter hiring, city official says

The current residency rule that requires candidates for police officer and firefighter positions to live in the city has not deterred anyone from applying, says Mike Tobin, the executive director of the Fire and Police Commission. »Read Full Article

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  1. Governor Walker, you have enough to worry about running the State. Why not let Milwaukee retain local control of its conditions for employment? After all, isn't local control one of your Republican principals?
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    • What is more local control than individual control over where one lives? The big government here is Mayor Barrett and thre city of Milwaukee.
    • In November 2008, 69 percent of voters in a city referendum voted in favor of the ordinance. The referendum resulted from Wisconsin’s so-called “direct legislation” law allowing referenda on ballots in Milwaukee when 25,800 citizens sign a petition supporting such legislation. The 9to5 group and its supporters ended up with 42,000 signatures. This was a local control issue that Mayor Barrett lost on and didn't like, so he went to the State and begged them to overturn it (which they did). Barrett doesn't care about local control, because if he did then he never would have tried to kill the sick leave referendum that had been approved by a majority of voters. You can't have it both ways!!
  2. I work for MPD and I can tell you that we are getting the best of the willing to live here... Which frankly means we aren't getting the best people for a very tough job... Just read the news on here...
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  3. Funny about Gov Walker wanting no residency for fire and police. When he became County Executive , ho couldn't wait to ask the Transit System operators to get residency for all the employees. Of course the Transit Workers Union didn't support him. But Fire and Police did, uhm!
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  4. Silly concept. You want the best cops - hire the best candidates, no matter where they reside. Same for firefighters.
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    • And who will pay them? Surely-go ahead and hire a couple dozen folks from Plymouth or Sun Prairie, and whose taxes pay them on the job?
    • First of all this is a STATE wide issue, not a Milwaukee only issue. Secondly this is lifting the residency requirement for all public employees; not just Fire and Police. That means teachers, garbage workers, and everyone else will now be free to choose where they would like to live and raise their families. They work hard and provide a service for the public; for which they are compensated in the form of their salary which comes from taxes and shared revenue. They are responsible for doing their jobs professionally, not for being the social glue that holds a city or society together. If they were, then that would have been spelled out in their job description. When you shop at Wal-Mart the money you pay goes for those employees salary; by your logic you should be able to tell them where to live and raise a family. How insanely absurd!!!
  5. Another day, another Don Walker article telling us who doesn't like the residency proposal.

    We know what Barrett thinks. We know what Flynn thinks. We know what Michael Murphy thinks. We know what the ACLU thinks. We know what the League of Wisconsin Municipalities thinks. Now we know what the head of the police and fire commission thinks. All thanks to Don Walker. The only group whose feelings on this subject he didn't feel obliged to write about are the people of Wisconsin.

    You'd never know because Don never reported it but a recent MU poll showed overwhelmingly support statewide to eliminate residency rules. State residents favor eliminating the rule by a margin of 53%-42%. Metro Milwaukee residents favor eliminating the rule by an even greater margin, 68%-28%. Even in the City of Milwaukee itself, where this PR campaign to continue this rule is originating from, people favor Walker's budget provision 49%-48%.

    Why didn't Don report it? He felt the fact that these numbers were reported 16 paragraphs into an article entitled "MU poll shows strong support for background checks on private gun sales" was good enough. I don't know about you guys, but if I wanted to look for an update on the residency restriction the first place I'd look is in an article about background checks for guns.

    And yet again, no mention of teachers. Just another article making this look like Milwaukee Police and Milwaukee Fire are the only ones who benefit.
  6. I'd be very interested in living and working in the great Milwaukee but no one can tell me when the city is testing for police again. Anyone out there know?!!!! I agree with hire the best officers no matter where they live.
  7. Regarding the article itself. These numbers are meaningless without greater detail.

    First off, it doesn't tell us how long this eligibility list has been around for. If only 53% of police candidates are still interested you'd have to imagine it's been around for quite some time. It's not like you have 1699 people put onto the list every year.

    Next, assuming the 53% numbers applies to the entire list, you can knock the 1699 number down to 900. Then you can mention that none of the 900 still interested candidates have gone through a background check yet. That step will eliminate even more candidates. Let's say a measly 10% fail their background checks. Cross 90 more people off the list, which brings it down to 810. Now given than Milwaukee PD typically hires one class of about 60 candidates each year, that would mean that 1 out of every 13 or so qualified, interested candidates gets hired, depending of course on what actual percentage is eliminated through background checks. How does this number compare to other municipalities? How does it compare to say, Madison? Qualified candidates aren't all equal. You want the best ones, not just ones who are "qualified".

    Also, why not compare the average education of Milwaukee cops vs other surrounding areas? Are people with Bachelor's Degrees more likely to apply in the suburbs? If so, why? And don't you think Milwaukee would do well to find a way to get them to apply to the City instead?

    How about, for once Don, doing some actual research on the topic instead of just listing off everyone who disagrees with the Budget proposal?
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  8. What is this all about "the best". You think hiring at MPD of MFD is any different than any other job? They aren't hiring "the best". First, they hire those with parents who have been cops or firefighters. Then those with other connections. Then come the minority and female hires. And THEN the hire from the best remaining canidates.

    Lets be honest here...most MPD and MFD want to work for Milwaukee because they pay better, have better benefits, lots more advancement, and is a lot more interesting work than schlepping around the burbs...
  9. I can tell that nobody really cares about open residency by how few people comment on it.Give it a rest mr.mayor.
  10. What this article as usual fails to identify is that this is a STATE issue and will impact all public employees to include teachers (not just Fire and Police). Beyond the confines of Milwaukee (i.e. the rest of the State), this topic is a non-issue, but this article wants to focus only on Milwaukee so here it goes. It’s such a basic civil right (freedom) that I am astounded that some people in this day and age are still unable or unwilling to grasp the concept. The world didn’t end with Y2K, the 2012 Mayan calendar scare, and it won’t end nor will Milwaukee collapse from this latest Mayor Barrett scare that all is lost if we can’t FORCE the city employees to live in Milwaukee. We trust them with our safety every day, but we can’t trust them to make their own decisions on where to live. Come on!! Milwaukee has many things to offer and it has many things to improve on; it may not be for everyone. This legislation gives Milwaukee employees as well as all employees in the state their right back to choose where to live! That’s it! It’s called Freedom!!!!!!!!
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