Today marks the first day Mayor Dave Cieslewicz will be lobbying in Washington, D.C., for many key issues regarding the Madison community.
The mayor's spokesperson, George Twigg, highlighted two issues the mayor will lobby while in Washington.
\One is the train-whistle ban,"" Twigg said. ""The federal government is in the process of changing the law that would pre-empt our whistle ban.""
The current train-whistle ordinance in Madison prohibits trains from blowing their whistles at street crossings. According to Twigg, Cieslewicz will lobby on ways to preserve the current law so Madison does not return to having train whistles blowing around the Madison community.
Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4, was the main founder of the train whistle law. Verveer believes this issue is very political and highly contested in Washington and across the country.
""The federal government has been toying with the idea of pre-empting train whistle bans for many years now,"" Verveer said. ""[Madison] actually enacted our train-whistle ban ordinance in 2001 because we knew there was a chance it could be preempted by the federal government.""
Verveer added if the federal government preempted train whistle bans, Madison could still keep the ordinance by developing ""quiet zones"" which are specially enforced gates and signals at train crossings.
The second concern for Cieslewicz is the Community Development Block Grant Commission, or CDBG said Twigg. This commission seeks to help low-income families access state and federal grant money to pursue home ownership.
""The CDBG is another important issue,"" Twigg said. ""The President has proposed making major cuts to that program, which would be very harmful for Madison residents.""
Twigg added the mayor will be encouraging members of Congress, such as Tammy Baldwin and Herb Kohl, to fight to preserve the CDBG program.
Ald. Austin King, District 8, who serves on the CDBG Commission, believes the issues the mayor is lobbying are important considering the Bush administration's stance.
""The [Bush administration] wants to take CDBG and reprioritize the program,"" King said. ""[CDBG] will only have money for economic development, instead of for community centers, homeless prevention and other important community services provided with CDBG dollars.""
King added the city often ends up with the brunt of bad decisions by the government, and speaking up about federal support bills can dramatically affect the city in ways we have no control over.
