Monday, July 8, 2013

Deferred Maintenance Leads To Deferred Jury Duty

On Friday, I reported that word in the halls of the Courthouse was that Scott Walker was ordered to appear - as a member of a jury instead of the defendant in front of one.

Wouldn't you know it, but the day after he tries to sneak in signing bills that would severely restrict the rights of women and of the unemployed and two days before he was to be at the Courthouse, a fire conveniently breaks out there:
The Milwaukee County Courthouse and Public Safety Building will be closed Monday and Tuesday, after a fire Saturday knocked out power, caused more than a half-million dollars in damage and forced county dispatchers to move to Waukesha County to field 911 calls.

The more than a thousand people who work in the Milwaukee County buildings should not report to work Monday or Tuesday unless told otherwise by a manager, County Executive Chris Abele said. The employees will still be paid.
The fire buys Walker only a one week reprieve. Milwaukee County officials are telling anyone that was supposed to report as a witness or juror is to return next week.

Although, if there was any justice in the world, Walker would be appearing as a co-defendant with Milwaukee County Emperor Chris Abele for being the cause of the fire.

When Walker was Milwaukee County Executive, he was infamous for not spending the needed money to make necessary repairs or even routine maintenance to county buildings. During Walker's tenure in the county, we had seen parts of the cornice on the courthouse fall of, parts of the airport fall down and the tragic loss of life as part of O'Donnell Park fell on a boy, killing him. The facility at the Milwaukee Mental Health Complex was found to be in shoddy condition. The parks buildings were found to need nearly $300 million in repairs and deferred maintenance .

Milwaukee County Emperor Chris Abele has done nothing to change this horrible track record. The Mental Health Complex was recently cited for being in even worse condition than before because of Abele's policies.

 Three weeks ago, part of the Coggs Building fell off, closing the loading dock at that facility.  And that was just a couple of years after the county spent a truckload of money on inspections of all the facilities.

Even Abele admits that the courthouse fire stems from deferred maintenance (emphasis mine):
The fire began at 12:30 p.m. Saturday in a large basement utility room with numerous electrical systems inside. Fire officials estimated the cost of the damage to the building at $368,000, and the property damage inside was estimated at $150,000.

"Some equipment is older than it probably should be," Abele said of the utility room's contents.
Over a half a million dollars in damages, and that's just their guess for now.  And that's not counting the cost of more than a thousand county employees, including some of the highest paid ones - like the ones in Abele's office - getting two extra days off with pay.

Y'know, I betcha that the cost of having proper equipment and routine maintenance would not have cost as much.

Abele keeps touting how he wants efficiency, yet he keeps showing he doesn't even know what the word means.

Abele would do well to seriously reconsider the way he is going about things, before someone becomes seriously hurt or worse, killed, due to something that could have been prevented except for his adoration for austerity.

2 comments:

  1. You are right. Again.

    Abele won't reconsider anything because he is paid not to.

    Just follow the money.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Do you think that a sociopath will be allowed to sit on a jury?

    ReplyDelete