NATIONAL CIVIC REVIEW, vol. 90, no. 1, Spring 2001 © Jossey-Bass, A Publishing Unit of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 45

Whither Local GovernmentReform? The Case of Wisconsin

James Simmons

Under the leadership of Robert La Follette and his sons, progressives had a majorimpact on Wisconsin’s policies, laws, and institutions throughout the first halfof the twentieth century. Grassroots municipal reform played a major part in thisregional movement. Although Wisconsin retains a distinctive reputation for pro-gressivism, only ten cities have retained the council-manager form of local gov-ernment, despite this structural change having been one of the great hopes ofmunicipal reformers during the Progressive Era. In fact, Wisconsin leads all statesin the number of cities that have abandoned this structural reform.

This article attempts to explain why so few of the state’s cities adopted themanagerial plan while the vast majority were rejecting it. It also considerswhat, if any, social, political, and economic outcomes may have been producedby this kind of structural change. After reviewing the salient characteristics thatdistinguish the state’s council-manager form from the mayor-alderman form,an explanation is developed as to why hybrid forms of city government struc-ture, involving variations on the mayor-administrator-council system, havereplaced efforts to promote the full-blown managerial plan locally.

Conducive Environment for Urban Reform

Wisconsin is a state that should have provided a fertile field for urban reform.Daniel Elazar has argued that historical migration patterns produced a “moral-istic” culture in the state that emphasized implementation of the common goodand promotion of shared principles.1 Citizens in this culture look at govern-ment in a positive light and expect a public bureaucracy that is professionallycompetent, is hired on the basis of merit, and pursues the interests of all. TheProgressive movement created intense distrust of party organizations andadministrative amateurism, along with reliance on direct forms of citizen par-ticipation. Progressivism has promoted government professionalism, non-partisanship, education, weak political parties, and mechanisms of directpopular control (primaries, recall, referendum, and so on).

Wisconsin cities share most of the characteristics ordinarily associatedwith municipalities that have adopted structural reforms.2 Statewide social

46 Simmons

demographics indicate that the population is predominantly clustered withinmedium-sized cities, suburban areas, satellite cities, villages, and rural orexurban towns with high levels of both education and average income. Socialhomogeneity is also characteristic of most of the state’s cities.3 Only Milwau-kee, Madison, Racine, and Kenosha have substantial racial minority popula-tions. The relatively low urban growth rate and the comparatively largeCatholic population are the only features of the state’s cities that are not ordi-narily expected to produce congenial conditions for municipal reform.4

Around the country (and Wisconsin is no exception), municipal reform usu-ally pits the local chamber of commerce, major employers, professionals, themedia, developers, universities, and city management associations against a dis-parate coalition that is typically composed of taxpayer alliances, the elderly, low-income individuals, students, and labor unions. Campaigns to promote or defendreform plans are normally coordinated and well financed, while the opposition isgenerally a poorly organized, underfunded local social movement.5 This mismatchin available resources generally favors the cause of municipal reform.

Current Structural Reform Patterns

Despite their national popularity, few Wisconsin cities ever adopted either ofthe two major municipal reform models (the commission form being theother such model), and all but ten of the cities that did later abandoned thoseplans (Table 1). Conflict over government structure continues in many of thecities that have retained a reform structure.6 With only 19 council-managergovernments (Table 2), Wisconsin’s municipalities are in sharp contrast withthose of its nearby neighbors: 65 communities in Minnesota, 40 in Iowa, 146in Michigan, 78 in Ohio, and 91 in Illinois have a managerial form of gov-ernment.7 Despite the striking unpopularity of the council-manager form, thestate’s cities do have most of the other general features of government profes-sionalism. For example, they tend to use modern administrative techniques,hold nonpartisan city elections, and employ civil service systems in depart-ments with appointive heads; they have also progressively reduced the num-ber of elected local officials.8

Wisconsin’s manager cities have surprisingly few of the expected socio-economic characteristics (service base, weak unions, rapid growth, highincome, social homogeneity, and suburban or satellite-city locale) normallyfound in reformed cities.9 Instead, the ten manager cities are older industrialcenters with growth rates that lag behind those of other communities in theirrespective regions in the state. Furthermore, to avoid the virulent oppositionso frequently generated by efforts to promote the council-manager plan,10

advocates of municipal reform have largely redirected their efforts over the pasttwo decades toward promoting adoption of a hybrid system with an appointedgeneral administrator or chief administrative officer and a weak, part-timemayor within the traditional mayor-alderman form.

Unsatisfactory Explanations

This section raises and rejects in turn several of the most prominent explana-tions for why municipal reform is not prevalent in Wisconsin.

Some analysts have attributed the failure of municipal reform in Wiscon-sin to presumed popular preoccupation with grassroots democracy and dis-trust of business and professional classes. They argue that there is widespreadresistance to any change that requires professional expertise and does notreflect the “common sense” and conventional community values of local resi-dents.11 Members of the state’s city manager association have attributed manyof their problems to a generalized distrust of “carpetbaggers” and “outsiders”

Whither Local Government Reform? 47

Table 1. Status of Municipal Reform in Wisconsin

Commission Plan Manager Plan

Cities Adopted Abandoned Adopted Abandoned

Antigo 1914 1952Appleton 1911 1918Ashland 1913 1918 1947 1955Beloit 1929Chippewa Falls 1918 1929Eau Claire 1910 1948 1949Fond du Lac 1915 1956 1957Fort Atkinson 1931Green Bay 1916 1926*Janesville 1912 1918 1923Kenosha 1922 1958Ladysmith 1913 1951Lake Geneva 1948 1961Lake Mills 1954Madison 1947 1951Marinette 1951 1960Menomonee 1912 1951 1969 1986Oshkosh 1912 1933 1957Platteville 1971Portage 1912 1918Port Washington 1917 1939Rhinelander 1926 1950Rice Lake 1913 1922Ripon 1941 1943Superior 1912 1929* 1941 1958Stevens Point 1928 1936Two Rivers 1925Watertown 1948 1960Whitewater 1955

Note: * Green Bay (1930–1952) and Superior (1930–1941) adopted modified commission forms thathad more of the characteristics of mayor-aldermanic government. Ten Wisconsin villages also adoptedthe council-manager plan, and one abandoned it.

48 Simmons

among the local population. Narrow parochialism emphasizing limited self-government and individualism has been identified as being among the lead-ing obstacles to structural reform.12 Locals are also said to fear the probable“isolation” of a small council elected at large.

Yet Wisconsin has historically experienced multiple competing conserva-tive, progressive, and socialist traditions that were closely linked to big gov-ernment and an enlarged public role in community life. The state’s high tax rate,extensive public programs, and innovative records in education and welfare(embodied in the Wisconsin Idea) hardly indicate a region atypically isolatedfrom national trends in governmental expansiveness and bureaucratization.

Another claim is that Chapters 64 and 66 of the state statutes provide Wis-consin city managers with greater power over appointments and planning thanis common in other states, and that the mayor-alderman statute (Chapter 62)is sufficiently flexible to allow systemic alterations designed to meet particularlocal needs. By making the manager the city’s chief executive officer, it isclaimed, a political leadership vacuum was created that concentrates unwantedpublic attention on the professional position holder.13 Much of the Wisconsincouncil-manager plan is based upon the National Civic League’s second ModelCity Charter, which did not provide for even a weak, directly elected, titularmayor and gave the city manager almost exclusive control over budget prepa-ration, organizational structure, and employee recruitment and management.14

Most important, Wisconsin expanded the manager’s role by giving the positionpolicy-making functions with statutory responsibility for chairing the planningcommission that links the city manager with every controversial local propertyrights issue (zoning, traffic rules, land transactions, etc.).

The merits of this legalistic thesis are undercut by the relative lack ofreform efforts using either the flexibility provided in these chapters of the statestatutes or exploring the potential for legislative change. Why haven’t propo-nents of reform modified the rigid manager-centered approach to make the“Other Forms” law (Chapter 64) more palatable to voters, as reformers in other

Table 2. Number of Municipal Governments by Type

Class One Class Class Class Type Cities Two Three Four Villages

Mayor-alderman 1 7 15 104 335Mayor–general 0 3 5 44 50administrator–council

Council-manager 0 2 4 4 9Council-manager 0.0 16.7 16.7 2.6 2.3(% of total)

Professional forms 0.0 41.7 37.5 31.6 15.0(% of total)*

Note: * Professional forms = mayor–general administrator–council and council-manager forms

states have? And why haven’t other reformers in Wisconsin resorted to the flex-ible provisions of the existing Home Rule statute (Chapter 66) to producemodified city charters that allow larger districted councils under the council-manager system or a weak-executive mayor within the manager form, as a1992 referendum initiative in Beloit proposed?

A third perspective suggests that there is scant popular perception of anyneed for structural reform since most of the state’s city governments performcompetently with little or no corruption to target.15 Similarly, municipal elec-tions are all nonpartisan and the major political parties are weak locally, sothere is little evident bossism or patronage. Therefore, it is said, structuralreformers find it difficult to find any salient political issue to mobilize around.

This explanation simply ignores the state’s history of corruption, bossism,and partisanship. Urban politics has not always been conducted on a highmoral plane in Wisconsin.16 Indeed, the municipal corruption of the past pro-duced statewide mobilization of both Mugwumps (Liberal Republican) and Pro-gressives. These reform movements contributed to the distinctive moralism thatElazar identified. Even the unusual success of socialism in many of the state’scities was, in part, a response to municipal misconduct and official misman-agement. Reformers defeated urban machines in Wisconsin, but unlike theircounterparts in nearby states they did not replace them with the managerialform in most cities.

Another explanation posits the limited resources of the state’s small cities.According to this view, low salaries attract only mediocre administrators, who arepoorly equipped to deal effectively with the cultural traits of the cities they are hiredto govern. Another variant of this argument contends that the relatively lowcompensation disproportionately draws assertive, abrasive managers, with theresult that reform plans get a bad reputation.17 This is compounded by a patternin which the best and brightest among the administrators simply move on to bet-ter jobs at the first opportunity.

There is little that can be said in a positive way for this perspective. Thecouncil-manager form is generally popular in small to midsize cities nation-wide, and salaries for city administrators in Wisconsin are more than adequate.The International City/County Management Association’s own compensationsummary for municipal officials shows that the salaries of Wisconsin’s citymanagers are near the midwestern regional average and substantially above thenational average.18 Nor is there is any reason to think that the individual man-agers recruited in national searches for positions in Wisconsin cities shouldhave distinctively negative personality traits.

Abandonment of municipal reforms has also been associated with a range offactors including isolated personality clashes, specific circumstances, particularindividual figures, unrelated economic trends, scandals, and the identification ofsome managers with controversial local policies. Local analysts invariably linkabandonment attempts to a major overriding issue or single precipitating eventin their city. Deposed managers also complain about the unique combination of

Whither Local Government Reform? 49

50 Simmons

naysayers, malcontents, and substandard intellects in the community whoopposed their businesslike administration.

Local idiosyncrasies fail to explain the general pattern of low adoption andfrequent abandonment statewide. Wisconsin cities are not significantly cul-turally distinctive or demographically different from the municipalities of othernearby states where such plans have been successful. Therefore, each of thesecircumstances should have hindered reform elsewhere in this region, but theyobviously did not.

Finally, it is argued that the stringent ethical code, professional standards,and relatively high compensation of city managers are at odds with the over-riding cultural ethos of parochialism, amateurism, and alienation that is saidto be dominant in most of the state’s cities. Many locals want personalized ser-vice and preferential treatment rather than neutral policies, objective standards,or planning. Managers themselves often attribute their problems to the “lower-strata” in their communities that do not understand and do not want the capa-bilities, ideas, and virtues that they can bring.

Yet these are widespread political problems for the reform model that arenot unique to the state of Wisconsin. Nor is small-town resentment of out-siders with cosmopolitan values. Complaints about service delivery and thesalaries of public officials are commonplace. Similarly, although professionaladministrators have indeed faced parochial opposition to their values, the pop-ular local amateurs who have been appointed to the state’s city manager posi-tions have also faced serious problems.

Explanations for Wisconsin’s “Exceptionalism”

Conservative InitiativeWisconsin’s municipal reform movement took at least two distinctive paths.19

One was an upper-middle-class movement that lobbied for structural changessuch as the commission or manager forms of government because these formspromised to install men of substance to political office, impose patrician values,and employ business methods in deciding public questions.20 The second wasmore populist in tone since it frequently opposed local commercial interestsand emphasized such socioeconomic reforms as equitable tax burden, publicownership of utilities, better municipal services, and other programs in theinterest of the lower classes. Both of these movements converged for a time onsome issues, but efficiency and tinkering with governmental mechanics werethe primary thrusts of the patrician reformers, while redistributive programsand grassroots democracy characterized the social reform–oriented efforts.

Both the commission and manager plans were authored and promoted byconservative stalwarts. Each contained elements that restricted public involve-ment in ways that hindered enactment. Wisconsin’s commission plan concen-trated authority in a small, three-member, six-year-term administrative boardand did not allow popular initiative or referendum as checks on official activ-

ities.21 The enabling legislation of 1919 that empowered the state’s cities toadopt the new manager form was initiated by state assemblyman Clark M.Perry, a stalwart conservative Republican representing Oshkosh.22 This law,which has not been altered since its adoption, makes the appointed managerthe city’s chief executive officer and gives him or her greater powers in admin-istrative appointment, budgeting, and planning than is typical for the positionin most other states.

For patrician reformers, the primary selling point for structural change inmost Wisconsin cities was its promise of honesty, efficiency, tax reduction, andbusinesslike management. This meant excluding the ward-based politicianswho represented the popular mass in order to create more wieldy constituen-cies and attract professionals, prominent businessmen, and a better class ofpeople to government service.23 Thus, structural reform was far from demo-cratic in the traditional sense of promoting greater popular control that wouldenable both inner-city ethnic groups and the middle class to exert effectivepressure on public officials. Progressive reformers, on the other hand, soughtto achieve a balance among competing interests without arousing class ten-sions by advancing programs that benefited the entire community.

When the radical Social Democrats took office in Milwaukee in 1910,they created a Bureau of Economy and Efficiency and called upon Prof. JohnR. Commons to direct the work of expanding the city’s services to encompassprograms for the health, welfare, and prosperity of the entire community.24

From the standpoint of business leaders, however, the issue was not to pro-vide the institutional base for more services or make responsive decisions.Rather, it was a question of having the right people in government to makedecisions favorable to commercial interests. Thus, business-oriented partybosses such as Milwaukee’s Henry Payne could support urban structuralreforms the likes of civil service and nonpartisanship in local elections evenif this meant reducing patronage for the Republican machine he directed inthe city and statewide (Table 3).

Progressive municipal reform in Wisconsin had broader appeal and a lesstechnocratic agenda than it had in many other states. This meant suspicion ofspecial interests, an activist welfare role for government, and a broadening ofcitizen participation in public affairs. In contrast, the advocates of the two gov-ernment reform models wanted to increase the influence of business groupsand insulate city hall from popular pressures.25 Although professionals andbusinessmen used the language of reform to promote retrenchment, social con-trol, and budgetary contraction, progressives and socialists were talking moreabout an activist city that ensured economic fairness and social welfare.

The narrow goals of the structuralists were not popular in Wisconsin duringthe Progressive Era. Although a few progressive strongholds (such as Ashland,Rice Lake, and Superior) adopted the commission form, they each abandoned itat the first opportunity. In fact, the commission system was effectively dead in thestate by 1920, and the manager form found few takers until after World War II.

Whither Local Government Reform? 51

52 Simmons

Progressives could combine with conservatives to promote adoption of the non-partisan local election reform, as they did in 1911, but this was largely a deviceto defeat the socialists in Milwaukee and in several other cities. Nevertheless, pro-gressives and socialists shared the mission of broadening the range and quality ofmunicipal services. This idea simply had greater mass appeal than the retrench-ment, efficiency, and tax reductions heralded by the opponents of the mayor-alderman system. Consequently, the two structural reform plans were successfuland survived longest in the conservative urbanized regions of the state.26

Reform Timing

There were at least two municipal reform eras in the state (roughly 1890–1930and 1946–1970), but in each of them there were substantial obstacles to suc-cess. In the first era, political progressives gave only lukewarm support tostructural reform or resisted it altogether. La Follette progressivism had muchmore of a populist agenda than was typical in the municipal reform move-ments in surrounding states.27 As a consequence, only a handful of progres-sive or socialist cities adopted either plan, and the few that did, such asSuperior, Rhinelander, and Kenosha, later abandoned them. For example,when Madison, the urban bastion of the movement, faced initiatives in 1946and 1951 to change its form of government, the local Republican newspaper,the Wisconsin State Journal, favored the manager form while the old-time pro-gressive Capital Times successfully opposed the plan.28

In both reform eras, the association of structural reform with businesscouncils, the open shop movement, moralistic women’s groups, and blue (vice)laws also hurt the two plans in strongly unionized and ethnically heterogeneouscommunities.29 Cities in the state’s lakefront and northwestern cutover regionsexperienced extensive socialist opposition to both structural reform plans. Rad-icals offered their own options for change, which competed with the proposalsof patrician reformers throughout most of the early period. Organized labor and

Table 3. Partisanship and Municipal Reform

1910 Democrat Republican Socialist Other

Reformed cities* 29.4% 57.7 10.4 2.5Unreformed 41.8 40.8 15.9 2.2

1936 Democrat Republican Progressive Other

Reformed cities** 20.0% 37.0 40.1 2.9Unreformed 24.9 26.5 46.5 2.1

Notes: * Cities adopting the commission form between 1910 and 1920** Cities with the manager or commission plan between 1930 and 1940

Source: Wisconsin Blue Books

socialists distrusted the “corporate government model” as well as the businessinterests and wealthy individuals who so consistently endorsed it. At-large elec-tions diluted their working-class ward vote, while professional managers wereperceived as simply tools of the elite class.30 Even when organized labor wasable to win a council majority in a citywide election, as it did in Racine in 1941,the inexperienced union leaders soon found that a professional regime was dif-ficult to manage, and its blue-collar coalition was impossible to maintain.31

Furthermore, many municipal reformers were also advocates of a broadsocial agenda that included not only “good government” but also union bust-ing, Americanism, and regulation of morality (laws against drinking, prostitu-tion, gambling, and so on). Such civic leaders were at least as interested inpromoting middle-class values and reducing the power of the political leadersfrom workingmen’s neighborhoods as they were in eliminating waste and gov-ernment inefficiency.32 Much of the dissatisfaction with the aldermanic form inYankee cities such as Janesville and Beloit had little to do with partisanship orcorruption. Well-to-do civic and fashionable social leaders simply wanted totake government away from the less prosperous and less enterprising elementsof the city, whose representatives conducted public business in street-cornergatherings, saloons, and other questionable centers of social life. Protestantchurches, professional men, and recently enfranchised women’s groups wantedstricter regulation of public morals. Their support for the council-manager plandampened its appeal among the working-class and Catholic population.

All these factors ensured that most of the state’s industrial cities wouldresist reform. Municipal reformers were often seen in ethnic neighborhoodsas agents of righteousness who were contemptuous of the mores and behav-ior of ethnic minorities and recent immigrants. It is notable that the perceivedconnection between efforts to restrict consumption of intoxicating liquor andthe advocacy of professionalism in government limited the appeal of the com-mission and manager plans for Catholics and Lutherans from 1910 until wellafter the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment. When a referendum was ini-tiated in 1929 to repeal the Severson Act and end enforcement of Prohibitionstatewide, nearly 70 percent of the voters in unreformed cities favored themeasure. The proposal was much less favorably received in reformed cities,with six of them actually voting it down. Cities with large German popula-tions such as Oshkosh and Fond Du Lac would not be attracted to the man-ager form, despite their otherwise conservative values and voting behavior,until after World War II.

Only after the mid-1950s, during the second reform era, when economicgrowth replaced moral values as the paramount issue in local affairs, did a fewof the state’s more economically troubled and ethically heterogeneous citiesadopt the council-manager form. Growing cities could simply fine-tune what-ever governmental form they already had to improve their infrastructure, pro-mote commerce, and generate jobs. However, for economically challengedcommunities, professional management promised growth, innovation, and

Whither Local Government Reform? 53

54 Simmons

development. Only the state’s stagnating cities felt some urgency for consider-ation of reform proposals that called for drastic change in their governmentalstructure. Adoptions occurred in moribund, declining cities such as Marinette,Oshkosh, Platteville, Whitewater, and Fond du Lac. Continuing stagnation alsoexplains why some of these same cities later reversed this decision.

Performance

Cities that adopted or abandoned the council-manager form during thepost-World War II period generally did so in response to economic crisis(infrastructure decay, urban blight, factory relocation, job losses, popula-tion decline, and so on). The change to the manager system, however, didnot typically live up to its promise of efficiency and innovation-generatedgrowth. Taxation was controlled, efficiency measures were introduced, andmunicipal administration was modernized. Council-manager governmentswere also more likely to create industrial parks and to adopt innovativegrowth-stimulation policies such as tax increment financing, subdivisionsubsidies, redevelopment initiatives, and public-private partnerships. Butdespite all of these measures, the surviving manager cities remain poorerand less vibrant than the majority of their counterparts who retained thetraditional forms of municipal government. The socioeconomic disparitiesbetween the few remaining manager cities and the municipalities that haveadopted intermediate reforms are striking (Table 4).

Reform also seems to have reduced citizen participation in local electionsand civic volunteerism. It is now difficult to say that one form is better thananother since there are few demonstrable advantages that can be attributed toany particular government form in terms of expenditure variation, employ-ment rate per capita, or spending or service levels.33 Mayor-alderman cities doshow high spending levels per capita, but mayoral cities with general admin-istrators look very much like manager cities (Table 5). The only differences thatreally stand out are the generally lower tax rates per capita, higher debt ratios,and lower voter turnout found in manager cities compared with those in may-oral cities with a general administrator.

Another problem confronting the advocates of the council-manager sys-tem is that a growing number of cities have adopted many of the efficiencymeasures associated with the plan, without resorting to the formality of chang-ing to the managerial form. Not only have many localities adopted the posi-tion of general city administrator while retaining a mayor but they haveconsistently reduced the number of elected municipal officials and replacedthem with individuals appointed on the basis of merit. Wisconsin cities havealso generally adopted progressive management practices in such areas as per-sonnel policy, program budgeting, strategic planning, citizen surveys, perfor-mance evaluation, and the like without regard to their specific form ofgovernance.34 Perhaps most discouraging for council-manager proponents is

the impressive population growth rates and fiscal integrity of the cities thathave adopted only partial reforms within the mayoral framework.

This disparity between the promise of the council-manager plan and itsperformance record creates a setting conducive to attempts to abandon the plan

Whither Local Government Reform? 55

Table 4. Characteristics of Reformed and Unreformed Wisconsin Cities

Government Type

Variable Manager Mayor-Administrator Mayor

PopulationNumber of people 35,262 25,502 69,249% change 1950–1994 +65.4 +160.5 +37.5

EconomyHousehold income $26,026 $34,679 $29,999% below poverty 15.1 5.3 10.6% over $75,000 4.2 7.4 6.8% commute to work 28.5 63.5 40.1Median home value $51,388 $77,722 $64,147% manufacturing 30.6 24.4 25.0% unemployed 7.0 4.0 5.2

Homogeneity% nonwhite 5.5 2.9 5.8% foreign born 2.4 2.7 3.0% college graduate 18.9 24.9 19.3% public assistance 9.0 5.9 7.3% professional or manager 22.0 27.2 22.8% female householder 35.8 21.3 25.2Crime rate (per 100,000) 6,335 5,053 5,820

Public policySpending per capita $858 $868 $925Public employment rate 103 99 108(per 1,000 residents)

Debt (% assessed value) 2.50 2.01 2.19Taxes per capita $241 $372 $353Municipal tax rate 7.28 7.95 8.97Number tax finance districts 5.39 1.74 3.00Executive salary $72,751 $59,176 $50,857Councilor pay $2,049 $5,085 $8,373

Political process% local voter turnout 23.8 32.0 31.7% Republican (1988) 48.9 51.6 45.8Mayoral veto none partial fullNumber council members 7.4 9.5 14.2Constituency type At-large District District plus

managern = 8 n = 2 n = 23

Note: All cities with population of 10,000 or more

Sources: Wisconsin Blue Book, 1990 U.S. Census, Wisconsin Taxpayers Association, League of Wiscon-sin Municipalities, 1998 city clerk survey, city and county data books

Tab

le 5

.M

un

icip

al S

pen

din

g (P

er C

apit

a)

Gen

eral

H

ealth

and

C

ultu

re a

nd

Deb

tO

ther

G

over

nmen

tPu

blic

Saf

ety

Tra

nspo

rtat

ion

Sani

tatio

nH

uman

Ser

vice

sR

ecre

atio

nSe

rvic

eFi

nanc

ial

Tot

al

Man

ager

$82

242

153

3723

159

9760

858

10%

2818

43

1911

7

May

or–g

ener

al$7

226

716

771

1111

512

636

868

adm

inis

trat

or8%

3119

81

1315

4

May

oral

$71

266

179

679

146

128

5692

58%

2919

71

1614

6

Sour

ce:L

eagu

e of

Wis

cons

in M

unic

ipal

itie

s, 1

996

Whither Local Government Reform? 57

in cities with residual social problems. Economic underachievement generatesa fertile environment of generalized dissatisfaction in which the plan’s oppo-nents thrive despite their lack of political resources and organization. Much of the opposition has focused on “dictatorial managers,” whom critics blame forthe economic stagnation of the city through their faulty planning, professionalarrogance, and fiscal mismanagement. Managers are portrayed as hired handswho instigate costly projects to pad their resumes so that they can move on toa better job in a bigger city. Returning to the traditional mayoral form, however,has not always resolved these economic problems. Five of the state’s cities thatscrapped the manager system experienced growth after the abandonment, butfour others experienced no change whatsoever, and economic decline actuallyaccelerated in the two remaining cities.

Winner-Take-All Stance

Altering the representational system while retaining professional managementwould seem, at least on the surface, to be the optimal strategic response to thepolitical resistance the council-manager system has faced in the state. Never-theless, there have been few efforts to break the link between exclusively at-large representation on the common council and retention of a generalmanagement executive within the council-manager form, even though suc-cessful abandonment efforts in cities such as Ashland and Rhinelander haveturned on the conflict revolving around the demand for a districted municipalcouncil rather than the position of the city manager.

Proponents of reform have resisted legislative changes that might respondto challenges to the managerial ideal and have not even used all the flexibilitywithin the current law.35 In the mid-1980s, the director of the state’s Leagueof Municipalities disbanded the last effort to revise state law, with the obser-vation that legislative change would be “unwise at this time” and that it wouldbe better to “let sleeping dogs lie.”36 Subsequently, supporters have simplyelected to oppose charter modifications in cities where the manager form isstill in place and have risked losing everything in the face of frequent aban-donment attempts.

Local proponents of the council-manager plan seem unaware of or antag-onistic toward the many alternative charter options open to them. Even thoughmayoral cities have experimented with limited structural changes in their char-ters, only two council-manager cities have followed suit. Eau Claire hasadopted a ten-member mixed ward/at-large common council, and Oshkoshhas given its council chairperson the title of mayor and an added responsibil-ity for appointments to boards and commissions.

Civic reformers continue to question the quality of common council candi-dates who might be elected under a district-based or mixed system of represen-tation. These reformers are highly suspicious of the varieties of deal making thatmight reemerge between wards with the restoration of districting.37 They also

58 Simmons

claim that there are too few local people with the right credentials or ability toserve as weak mayors, even on a part-time basis, in the state’s small and medium-sized cities.38 In 1998, when the Oshkosh common council enacted an ordi-nance change within the manager framework that established the position of adirectly elected mayor with just a few new functions and no executive powers,a group of prominent citizens combined with the local chamber of commerce todefend the status quo ante. They ultimately brought this minor alteration in thecity’s charter to a referendum and successfully defeated the change.

Officials within the state’s League of Municipalities have been reluctant topropose legislative changes to the reform statute, Chapter 64, out of concern thatthe state legislature might use this opportunity to restrict the municipal processor alter the procedural options currently available to cities in undesirable ways.39

Opponents of the council-manager plan have also been unwilling to compro-mise thanks to their intense distrust of the “star chamber” establishment theyperceive to be dominant in city hall under this system. For example, mayoralforces opposed the attempt to adopt a highly modified council-manager formwhen it was proposed to voters in Beloit as a compromise against another refer-endum offering the pure mayor-alderman option. Consequently, the predomi-nant Wisconsin version of the council-manager plan remains a “classically pure”form that is not even consistent with the seventh Model City Charter (weakmayor, shared powers, mixed council representation, and so on) currently beingadvanced by the National Civic League.40

Convergence Option

Supporters of professionalism in local government continue to defend thecouncil-manager form in cities where it has been adopted. But in other Wis-consin cities, they prefer to advocate that strong municipal administrators becreated through council enactment of charter ordinance changes, rather thanface the political difficulties of restructuring consequent to adopting a reformplan.41 They can then attempt to create a quasi-reform system by expandingthe powers, duties, and responsibilities of this administrative official and weak-ening those of the mayor.42 Evidently it is less threatening to increase theresponsibilities of a known individual or to combine positions than it is to cre-ate a brand-new structure. This eventually evolves into the position of chiefadministrative officer within the traditional mayor-alderman framework. Thereis no standard formula for this option since the method of appointment andfunctions of these administrators depend on the variable specifications in eachcity’s charter. At least sixty-six of the state’s cities have chosen this option, whileonly West Allis has retained both a strong, full-time mayor along with a full-fledged city administrator.

The irony in all this is that Wisconsin, which has been viewed as an out-rider among the states for resisting the council-manager form, may now beapproaching the institutional mainstream. Many of Wisconsin’s cities are begin-

ning to add professional administrators and weaken their mayors, but otherlong-time stalwarts of council-manager government around the country(among them Kansas City, Oakland, and Cincinnati) have begun to reform thereform in the reverse direction.43 A general administrator working under anonexecutive mayor is becoming more of a norm nationwide. Even the nation’sSunbelt, where the managerial movement has been most successful, has seenmultiple and successful efforts at reforming the reform.44 In the latter region,minority groups have sought to restore district representation and strengthenmayors to give their constituents greater influence over policy and bring racialdiversity to city government.

Perhaps the most important factor influencing adoption and retention of thecouncil-manager plan in the Southwest has been the tremendous growth expe-rienced by cities that adopted it. Given that region’s economic dependence, pro-fessional administrators used their relative insulation from popular pressures toadopt new institutional forms (special districts, commission, authorities) createdby legislative bodies to fund needed infrastructure. This active role by city offi-cials, when combined with lower taxes, less regulation, generous federal subsi-dies, and lower wages, has facilitated rapid urban growth throughout the region.Unfortunately for Wisconsin’s municipal reformers, the state’s council-managerplan has had no such record of economic success. Cities with this governmentalform have generally experienced less visible progress than neighboring commu-nities that abandoned the form, adopted a hybrid mayor-administrator system,or retained the traditional mayor-alderman system. The relative social stagnationand poor fiscal performance of several of the state’s remaining manager citiesmake them particularly vulnerable to local efforts by political dissidents toreplace this system.

Summary and Conclusion

The record of popularity of the manager form in municipalities nationwidestands in marked contrast to the low rate of adoption of this system in Wis-consin. Although in many parts of the country medium-sized cities that don’toperate under the manager form are considered an oddity, only 21 of the Bad-ger State’s 189 cities have ever adopted the plan. No village has adopted it since1957. Urban reformers in recent years seem to have given up on efforts to windirect popular approval of the pure model of municipal structural reform. Atthe same time, opposition thrives. In fact, Wisconsin leads all states with elevenabandonments of the manager form. Moreover, among the ten remaining citiesin the state that still retain the council-manager form, several have beenplagued with periodic attempts by political dissidents to discredit the systemand remove the manager system by popular referendum.

To summarize, Wisconsin’s experience with structural municipal reformhas been exceptional among the nation’s fifty states for certain basic reasons.Social reform sponsored by liberals and socialists had greater mass appeal in

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60 Simmons

most Wisconsin cities during the Progressive Era than retrenchment and thenarrow efficiency, fiscal-austerity, and other political goals of the state’s struc-tural reformers. The advocates of good government through first the commis-sion form and then the council-manager form of municipal government facedgreater ethnic, class, religious, political, and institutional obstacles than didurban reformers in other states. Most cities in Wisconsin have achieved highlevels of honesty and efficiency without changing their form of government,while the reformed municipalities have not experienced the expected growthand development promised by proponents of professional management. Con-temporary municipal reformers have been unwilling to alter state law to makestructural reform more attractive, but they have adjusted to the obstacles theyface in the state by promoting a hybrid system within the mayoral framework.For these and other reasons, the prospects of council-manager government inthe state do not appear to be bright.

The current trend among Wisconsin municipalities that want to create thepost of a full-time administrative specialist has been to induce the local city coun-cil or village board to establish the position of administrator within the traditionalChapter 62 framework. Under this governmental arrangement, municipalitieshave the option of making the mayor’s office a part-time, nonexecutive job andplacing the basic day-to-day management tasks in the hands of the full-timeadministrator without having to substantially alter the city’s charter to formallychange to a manager system. The growing popularity of this hybrid form of gov-ernance system is a direct reaction to the political difficulties that have emergedin cities switching or attempting to switch to the council-manager plan. Thiscouncil-administrator-mayor system is a representational formula that is likely tocontinue to proliferate statewide, moving Wisconsin municipalities closer to themainstream of national trends in general urban administration.

The unpopularity of classic managerialism in Wisconsin is in striking con-trast to the phenomenal success of the form in most of the nation’s southwest-ern states. This Sunbelt success story gives us important insights into thereasons for the relative failure of Wisconsin’s cities to adopt the manager form.Amy Bridges has shown that the form’s proliferation in the Southwest wasbased on a small number of significant factors, such as a restricted electoralfranchise, weak partisanship and political parties, well-organized local elites,and a progressive mantle surrounding reform efforts.45 None of these factorswere operational in Wisconsin. In fact, although active participation by ethnicand working class voters helped promote substantive policy change in Wis-consin, this same mobilization proved to be an almost insurmountable hin-drance to municipal structure reformers.

Nationally, municipal reformers may be grudgingly coming to accept someof the same conclusions that this state’s progressives arrived at long ago: pro-fessionalism in operating cities doesn’t necessarily require all of the specific fea-tures of the state’s managerial model, which is more than eight decades old.46

Elected mayors can be valuable resources since they can use their position to

resolve deeply divisive community issues and react to challenges to the legiti-macy of city programs. In an era when waning citizen support and involve-ment seriously compromises all levels of government, electing a person withthe title of mayor seems to carry weight with a large segment of the public andactivates voters in a way that the pure council-manager form does not. Restor-ing some aldermanic representation by districting may make city hall moreadaptable and responsive.47 Thus businesslike urban administration on the onehand and political responsiveness on the other may not be poles apart, as turn-of-the-century municipal reformers thought.

Notes

1. Elazar, D. American Freedom. New York: HarperCollins, 1984.2. Alford, R. Bureaucracy and Participation. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1969; Adrian, C. “Forms

of Government in American History.” Municipal Year Book 1988. Chicago: International City Man-agement Association, 1988; and Schnore, L., and Alford, R. “Forms of Government and theSocioeconomic Characteristics of Suburbs.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 1963, 8, 1–17.3. Weiss, M. The Clustering of America. New York: Perennial, 1989.4. Lineberry, R., and Fowler, E. “Reformism and Public Policies in American Cities.” American

Political Science Review, 1967, 51 (3), 701–716.5. Simpson, J. W. “Council-Manager Plan.” Wisconsin Taxpayer, 1967, 35 (9), 1–8.6. Goff, C. “The Politics of Council-Manager Plan Adoption and Abandonment in Wisconsin.”

Paper presented at Midwest Political Science Conference, Ann Arbor, Apr. 1958.7. International City/County Management Association. Who’s Who in Local Government Man-

agement 1996–97. Washington, D.C.: ICMA, 1996.8. Kiemel, R. “Municipal Administration.” Wisconsin Taxpayer, 1973, 41 (10), 1–8; Kiemel, R.

“City and Village Administration.” Wisconsin Taxpayer, 1990, 58 (8), 1–8; Kiemel, R. “ElectedLocal Officials.” Wisconsin Taxpayer, 1992, 60 (2), 1–9.9. Schnore and Alford (1963).

10. Donoghue, J. “The Local Government System in Wisconsin.” In 1968 Wisconsin Blue Book.Madison: Department of Administration, State of Wisconsin, 1968.11. Donoghue, J. “Local Government in Wisconsin.” In 1979–1980 Wisconsin Blue Book. Madi-son: Department of Administration, State of Wisconsin, 1980.12. Wisconsin City Management Association. “Council-Manager Plan Questionnaire.” (WCMASurvey.) Madison: WCMA, 1976.13. Wisconsin City Management Association. “A Report on Methods Available for MakingLocally Determined Modifications to Wisconsin Council-Manager City Government.” (Reportno. 41.) Madison: WCMA, 1978.14. National Civic League. Model City Charter. (7th ed.) Denver: National Civic League, 1993.15. Goff (1958).16. Thelen, D. The New Citizenship. Columbia: University of Missouri, 1972.17. Simpson (1967).18. International City/County Management Association. “Average Local Government Salaries byPosition.” In Compensation 97. Washington, D.C.: ICMA, 1997.19. Buenker, J. The History of Wisconsin. Vol. IV: The Progressive Era. Madison: Wisconsin StateHistorical Society, 1998.20. Holli, M. Reform in Detroit. New York: Oxford University Press, 1969.21. McGregor, F. “The Commission Form of Government.” Municipality, 1908, 10 (3), 333–342.22. McGregor, F. “Wisconsin’s New City Manager Law.” Municipality, 1919, 19 (4), 73–76.23. Childs, R. Civic Victories. New York: HarperCollins, 1952.24. Schiesl, M. The Politics of Efficiency. Berkeley: University of California, 1977.

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25. Adrian, C. “Forms of Government in American History.” In Municipal Year Book 1988.Chicago: International City Management Association, 1988.26. Bromage, A. Manager Plan Abandonments. New York: National Municipal League, 1954.27. Marguilies, H. The Decline of the Progressive Movement in Wisconsin, 1890–1920. Madison: Uni-versity of Wisconsin, 1968.28. Alford, R. Bureaucracy and Participation. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1969.29. Ozanne, R. The Labor Movement in Wisconsin. Madison: Wisconsin State Historical Society,1984.30. Weinstein, J. The Corporate Ideal of the Liberal State. Boston: Beacon, 1968.31. Scott, J. L. “Union Politics and Council Manager Government in Kenosha.” Master’s thesis,University of Chicago, 1942.32. Stone, H., Price, D., and Stone, K. City Manager Government. Chicago: Public Administra-tion Service, 1940.33. Wurster, M. J. “Government Structure and Governing Process in Larger Wisconsin Cities.”Master’s thesis, University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, 1993.34. Kiemel, R. “Restructuring Municipal Government Through Home Rule.” Municipality, Aug.1977, pp. 186–196; Kiemel (1992).35. Paddock, S. “The Changing World of Wisconsin Local Government.” In 1997–1998 Wiscon-sin Blue Book. Madison: Department of Administration, State of Wisconsin, 1997.36. York, S. “Statutory Options for the Administrator Position in Wisconsin.” Report of the Leagueof Wisconsin Municipalities, Chapter 64 Advisory Group, Apr. 1986.37. Hintz, S. “City Manager-Led System Is More Efficient, Less Subject to Deal-Making.” Mirror,Sept. 28, 1996, pp. 1–2.38. Propp, K. “Government That Works.” (Position paper.) Oshkosh, Wis.: Community Alliancefor Progress, Oct. 1996.39. Wisconsin City Management Association (1978).40. National Civic League (1993).41. Kiemel, R. “Municipal Administration.” Wisconsin Taxpayer, 1997, 63 (9), 1–9.42. Paddock, S., and Olsen, J. P. “The Municipal Administrator in Wisconsin.” (Report.) Madi-son: League of Wisconsin Municipalities, 1993.43. Hansell, W. “Is It Time to ‘Reform’ the Reform?” Public Management, 1998, 80 (12), 15–16.44. Bridges, A. Morning Glories. Princeton: Princeton University, 1997.45. Bridges (1997).46. Krumwiede, R. “The Mayor-Administrator-Council System.” Report to the Appleton CityCouncil, Municipal Management Study Committee, 1990.47. Welch, S., and Bledsoe, T. Urban Reform and Its Consequences. Chicago: University ofChicago, 1988.

James Simmons is an associate professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin,Oshkosh.