When Walker started his reign, he appointed Mike Huebsch as the Secretary of Administration. Huebsch was the State Assemblyman from the 94th district, which is La Crosse County minus La Crosse (the city itself has Jen Schilling, who is challenging Dan Kapanke for State Senate in the first of the five recalls filed so far). Mike Huebsch is one of these scumbag pseudo-Libertarians who think God and The Free Market will solve every problem; but curiously see no problem with government subsidies of corporations (like $2 million to a yacht maker to 'create jobs' a few days ago), except those which go to green energy. Huebsch, as Secretary of Administration, is also the bastard who implemented the police state-ification of the Capitol building. Running for Huebsch's old seat are Steve Doyle, a respected long-time chairman of the La Crosse County Board (anyone want to donate a website?); and John Lautz, a no-name random teabagger who looks like Skeletor. Now that you're up to speed...
Judging from the mail I've been getting, presumably everyone in the County is getting hammered with mailings from the "Jobs First Coalition," a front group with a PO Box in Brookfield, one of the Milwaukee suburbs you may recently have heard about. The only person named on their website is a Brookfield Alderman.
The mailings, which are high-quality and coming at a rate of one every other day, say two things: First, that property taxes have increased "444%" since Doyle was elected, based on the County's levy of ~$5 million 20 years ago compared to ~$30 million now. The implication is that Doyle raised taxes by 444%. This is of course absurd; in fact, they aren't accounting for inflation or the housing boom (suburban sprawl near the river and Interstate). I haven't been able to find the total historical property values of the county, but according to the County government, the County property tax is among the lowest in the State. If anyone has any idea how to figure out what the total property value of the County is and what it's been each year, let me know because that information would be very useful.
Second, the "Jobs First Coalition" claims Doyle paid his property taxes late, and they're a-going to court over it. The "Jobs First Coalition" has a statement with "evidence" from the County website.
This is the first time I've used the La Crosse County Land Records Information website, so I'm not entirely certain how it works; but here's a fun little experiment you can try. Click that link, then click "Real Estate Parcels" over on the left menu, then start looking people up... let's say, longtime La Crosse County Republican Party Chairman Chris Muller. To save you some time, you can just punch in Tax Parcel # 18 542 0 at the top, then hit enter. It should pop up with Christopher J Muller of Onalaska; click his name (you may have to click it a bunch of times, don't expect a County website to be at the cutting edge of technology); click "Taxes" on the top bar; select 2009 on the dropdown selector, and look near the bottom:
Transaction: Receipt Date
Payment to County 2010-07-19
Without doing any further investigation, it looks like Muller paid his property taxes nearly six months late. According to the "Jobs First Coalition," I have sufficient evidence to accuse Muller of delinquency in a well-funded and glossy media blitz. Or, I could maintain some degree of honesty by doing something as simple as sending an e-mail to the County, which I guess would probably show that there's some kind of agreement between the City of Onalaska and the County that shows up strangely on the website.
Those of you who know me are probably wondering why I'm defending any Democrats. This isn't about an election or an office so much as it's about how we do things in Wisconsin. Steve Doyle is a decent person and to insult him in such a transparent way and expect us to fall for it is to insult our intelligence. When someone's lying to your face and you know it, you don't respond by politely refuting their points; you get mad and tell that person to take whatever they're selling and hit the road.
Also, I understand that there are similarly-fraudulent attack ads running on local TV and radio stations, although I haven't seem them yet personally. There might be an opportunity for a flash-mob/crowdsource type thing that you can do from the comfort of your computer chair's buttgroove, so stay tuned.