Joint City-County Housing Committee Gaining Support

New houses on the 3200 block of N. 5th Street. File photo by Jeramey Jannene.

Third time’s the charm for an effort to create a task force focused on housing in Milwaukee County.

A Milwaukee County Board committee approved a plan to create a joint City-County Housing Committee Wednesday that will include members of the public, elected officials, nonprofit leaders and officials from the county’s Housing Division and the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee. It is the board’s third time considering a housing committee proposal, but the first time it has been designed as a joint city-county committee.

The committee will have 21 members composed of nine ex-officio members who hold positions in government and non-profit institutions, and 12 members of the public who will be appointed to the committee. The committee will focus on exchanging information between members of the public and government officials related to housing, and developing policy recommendations that can be submitted to elected officials at the city or county.

A national advocacy organization called the Redress Movement has been pushing the proposal behind the scenes and in public meetings. In 2022, Sup. Sequanna Taylor sponsored a resolution creating a housing committee, but it did not garner enough votes to pass at the full board. A similar proposal pushed by Sup. Ryan Clancy as an amendment to the 2024 budget also failed.

During a meeting of the board’s Committee on Health Equity, Human Needs and Strategic Planning Wednesday, Taylor noted that the city was brought into the fold for the latest proposal because some of the challenges related to housing will require the involvement of the city’s housing authority to address.

“This has definitely been a long time coming,” Taylor said. “This shows how when we work as a board together, we come to a collective effort that will impact our city, our county and the people that we are elected to serve.”

Housing Division Administrator James Mathy said he was “very happy” that the latest proposal would involve the city, noting “the city has a lot of influence around housing policy [that] the county does not.”

Dynasty Ceasar, senior organizer for the Milwaukee chapter of the Redress Movement, told Urban Milwaukee her organization has been pushing for a centralized, official venue for conversations that bridge the gap between community members facing housing insecurity and the policymakers and government officials that can have an impact on housing policy in Milwaukee County.

“What seemed to have started as a fight has now ended in a partnership,” Caesar said during the committee meeting Wednesday. “And that is reflective not only of the work that we’ve been doing with the Redress Movement, but also the effort that we’re fighting for; we’re fighting for a collective community-style effort to address the issues related to housing disparities across Milwaukee County.”

Sup. Shawn Rolland, who opposed the previous housing committee proposals, was a co-sponsor of the new City-County Committee proposal. When the first subcommittee was proposed, Rolland opposed creating an additional committee outside of the board’s standing committees to take on housing. He also opposed a second iteration during the budget process that would not have included housing officials among its members. “Uniquely, this Milwaukee County and Cities Housing Committee would have all three legs of the stool – leaders, experts and advocates – coming together to discuss housing issues and opportunities,” he told Urban Milwaukee.

During the committee meeting Wednesday, Clancy said Rolland led the opposition to previous proposals, adding, “We can only imagine the good that a housing committee would have accomplished over the last two years, but I’m hopeful for what it can do moving forward.”

Sup. Tony Staskunas responded to Clancy’s comments, saying, “You know what Sup. Clancy, Rolland did not lead the charge against this, he’s simply a stickler for getting things right and those other versions, the earlier versions, were just not in final form and ready to be passed.”

The resolution creating the committee has 11 co-sponsors on the board. The board’s Committee on Health Equity, Human Needs and Strategic Planning unanimously endorsed creating the committee. It will go to the full board for final approval, and eventually, the City of Milwaukee Common Council will need to review and pass a similar resolution.