Panel of local mayors lament impacts of wave of state, federal decisions

IOWA CITY - The mayor of Madison, Wis., estimates 'conservatively” about a third - or $50 million of his city's police and fire budget - is spent dealing with consequences of mental health and substance abuse challenges.

A more realistic picture than police rushing to deter 'bad guys” is one that Madison authorities dealt with on Thursday, when they spent 10 hours addressing a veteran with post-traumatic stress holed up in his home with a stockpile of high-powered rifles and a gun, Madison Mayor Paul Soglin said during a panel discussion here Friday.

'That is how our public resources are spent and yet we are being strangled not providing treatment up front, which has enormous cost to the individual affected as well as the larger society,” Soglin said.

Soglin was speaking at a panel called 'What Four Mayors Have Learned Over the Past Year,” hosted by FilmScene in Iowa City. In addition to Soglin, Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett, Waterloo Mayor Quentin Hart and Iowa City Mayor Jim Throgmorton participated in the lunch hour event.

The mayors painted similar pictures of trying to grapple with housing needs, tight workforces, policing issues and shrinking state and federal dollars juxtaposed against more demand for services.

An overarching theme is how citizens are starting to feel the direct impact of decisions made at the state and federal level.

Corbett, the lone Republican in the group, discussed how city government has had to incorporate strategies to grow the workforce with unemployment hovering around 3 percent. This includes expanding offerings of arts, music and culture to improve quality of life.

'Our business community is now struggling to find workers, and we are seeing the churn of employees moving from company to company,” Corbett said. 'Just recently, we had two potential businesses that were looking at locating in the Cedar Rapids area, but they declined to locate in Cedar Rapids because of their fear, really, of finding available workers.”

Throgmorton discussed 'running into a headwind” of federal and state mandates. Recent decisions have pre-empted Iowa cities from banning the sale of fireworks, setting a minimum wage, regulating residential occupancy based on familial status, expanding individual access to guns and allowing those with guns in City Hall, he said.

In many cases, he said, the changes were made with little public debate.

President Donald Trump's 'appointments, words and executive orders concerning immigration and refugees” have caused 'fear and anxiety” in Iowa City, which cause their own challenges, he said.

Throgmorton said he believes it is the role of mayors to speak up.

Throgmorton and Soglin specifically laid blame on Republicans who've been swept into power in many states, including Iowa and Wisconsin and at the federal level.

'I believe we mayors are called upon to display moral clarity, courage and an ability to strengthen bonds of the community across racial, ethnic, religious and political divides,” Throgmorton said.

Hart discussed 'real-life impacts” if the state removes a backfill worth millions of dollars to offset the rollback of commercial property taxes. In Waterloo, he said, such a hit could cost 25 to 30 jobs within the community.

'This could potentially be one of the largest hits to residential property owners we've seen in a long time,” Hart said.

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