Perez Gives New Committee Assignments

The sustained turnover on the Milwaukee Common Council has Council President Jose G. Perez again changing up committee assignments.

Two new members, Jonathan Brostoff and Mark Chambers, Jr., have their first assignments, and Nikiya Dodd is officially no more following her resignation Friday. Dodd, however, effectively quit two months ago when she stopped appearing at committee meetings without public explanation.

With only 12 of the 15 council seats filled, council members will still be called on to attend extra meetings to keep the city’s legislative arm functioning. That includes Perez, who as council president normally wouldn’t be a member of any committee other than Steering and Rules.

Instead of functioning in an executive-style role, Perez finds himself serving on the Licenses Committee alongside chair Milele A. Coggs, vice chair Mark Borkowski and newcomers Brostoff and Chambers. The council president will also serve on the Judiciary and Legislation Committee. The two committees regularly host the longest meetings, with Licenses often a role given to the newest members.

The committee level is where most of the council’s work and debates take place. The committees host formal public hearings and directly interface with city department representatives. The full council receives reports from committees and regularly adopts the recommendations in their entirety.

The council president, elected by their peers, can unilaterally make the assignments and designate the powerful chair positions. Perez was unanimously elected president in April following the resignation of newly-elected Mayor Cavalier Johnson.

Perez, in a reflection of who supported him for president, shifted council power dynamics, shuffling a number of the chairmanships in April. His latest committee assignments maintain those positions, with the exception of formalizing Borkowski as head of Judiciary and Legislation following Ashanti Hamilton‘s August resignation for a role in Johnson’s administration.

Special elections are expected to be called this week to fill the three open seats. A primary would be held Feb. 21 and a general election April 4 alongside the already scheduled spring election. Council seats are non-partisan with the top two vote-getters in the primary advancing to the general election.

Community & Economic Development Committee

• Russell W. Stamper, II (chair)
• JoCasta Zamarripa (vice chair)
• Khalif Rainey
• Marina Dimitrijevic
• Brostoff

Finance & Personnel Committee

• Dimitrijevic (chair)
• Scott Spiker (vice chair)
• Coggs
• Michael Murphy
• Chambers

Judiciary & Legislation Committee

• Borkowski (chair)
• Robert Bauman (vice chair)
• Murphy
• Perez
• Chambers

Licenses Committee

• Coggs (chair)
• Borkowski (vice chair)
• Perez
• Brostoff
• Chambers

Public Safety & Health Committee

• Zamarripa (chair)
• Borkowski (vice chair)
• Spiker
• Coggs
• Rainey

Public Works Committee

• Bauman (chair)
• Stamper (vice chair)
• Rainey
• Zamarripa
• Brostoff

Zoning, Neighborhoods & Development Committee

• Murphy (chair)
• Bauman (vice chair)
• Stamper
• Spiker
• Dimitrijevic

Steering & Rules Committee

• Perez (chair)
• Dimitrijevic (vice chair)
• Stamper
• Bauman
• Murphy
• Coggs
• Borkowski
• Zamarripa