Among the tactics a politician can use to get reelected, none of them tug at the heartstrings of voters like claiming that the candidate was an exemplar of decency, overwhelmed less by their own bad ideas than the established way of doing things. It’s not always effective, as the soon-to-be unemployed Russ Feingold can easily attest. But the fact remains – we tend to like candidates that stick their neck out on principle.
If Ald. Bridget Maniaci, District 2, chooses to run for reelection, she could easily make use of such a playbook. After all, many of her most recent initiatives in City Council have been or will be shot down by hefty majorities. This has been the case even when her ideas seem sensible and fair.
But in Maniaci’s case, the ostensible maverick streak has been defined less by independence than a seeming willingness to see even the most commonsense of her brainchildren go down in flames.
First there was her proposal to force landlords to delay apartment showings by several months. The justification was reasonable – the richest of Madison’s landlords make a massive effort to secure renters during the fall months.
To many students, especially those writing a rent check for the first time in their lives, the marketing blitz amounts to a scare tactic, motivating, or rather threatening, freshmen to rent before they can make anything approaching an informed decision. Maniaci thus proposed moving the period when landlords can start showing and leasing apartments to dates when 45 percent of the current leases had expired.
Entrenched opposition on the part of landlords would have rendered even the most cautious of proposals an uphill battle, but Maniaci did little to help. Instead of permitting compromise in the form of a sunset clause, which would have allowed City Council to vote on the resolution again after an evaluation period, Maniaci at first refused to consider the idea, arguing that an expiration date would simply allow landlords to reinstate the status quo further down the road. She may have been right. But the ordinance may not get voted on until next year.
Worse, however, have been Maniaci’s recent shenanigans regarding the council rules that impinge on her lifestyle.
To illustrate, Maniaci recently took issue with a proposed ethics ordinance that would limit alders from accepting certain extravagancies from third parties. On Nov. 3, she made an argument for relaxing the rules to allow the full benefits of a trip along with complete disclosure. While stricter ethical standards might put a serious damper on Maniaci’s impending trip to Obihiro – Madison’s sister city in Japan – they are being implemented for a reason. An obligation to refrain from the more deluxe aspects of an already free vacation is little reason to kick and stomp one’s feet.
There were also Maniaci’s efforts to secure healthcare for alders without coverage – amongst whose number she is included. When parts of her proposal were leaked to the Wisconsin State Journal, Maniaci engaged in a rather disturbing witch hunt, filing open records requests against every single member of council. Then, when her original proposal was shut down for not being budget neutral, Maniaci proposed cutting the salaries of mayoral aides to fund it, thus attacking the person who expended the most political capital to get her elected in the first place.
Whatever the outcome of her dubiously effective tenure as alder, Maniaci has proven herself willing to take on the powers that be. The problem is that the powers that be, in most cases aren’t so much at odds with her ideas as the confused, uncooperative strategies she uses to hawk them. And that independence of hers might have a little more validity if, as is currently the case, the person who stood to gain most wasn’t Maniaci herself.
Sam Clegg ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in economics.
