As a resident of Milwaukee and hunger advocate, I believe the ARPA funds should be directed to address food insecurity experienced by so of the most vulnerable populations in our community. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come.
COVID-19 and its impact on the economy created a significant increase in the number of people requesting nutrition benefits as well as a host of challenges for people enrolling in benefits and the organizations that serve them. For instance, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin, the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee saw an increase of 36% increase in the number of neighbors in need and distributed 79% more food compared to 2019. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
I am a resident of Milwaukee. I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), called FoodShare in WI, is the nation’s largest nutrition assistance program. One key strategy to make a healthy diet more affordable and accessible for families participating in SNAP is to provide produce incentives. As you think about how to invest American Rescue Plan Act funding, please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives.
I am a resident of Milwaukee's Grasslyn Manor neighborhood and I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), called FoodShare in WI, is the nation’s largest nutrition assistance program. One key strategy to make a healthy diet more affordable and accessible for families participating in SNAP is to provide produce incentives. As you think about how to invest American Rescue Plan Act funding, please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives.
The Metcalfe Park community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
The City of Milwaukee's ARPA funds should be used to pilot and lift-up participatory budget (PB) models, similar to those that are already in use across the country and across the globe. This will only serve to enhance relationship-building, create transparency between residents and the electeds who represent them. Our neighborhoods' residents voices know best what improvements their communities and districts need and they should be integral to the process. Not one (1$) dollar should be granted toward enhancing the Milwaukee Police Department. Community safety comes from investment in long-term housing, addressing immediate housing and living needs, alternatives to policing such as mental health funding, infrastructure such as investments in city parks, waste and recycling collection and street maintenance, investment in education and violence prevention programs focused on restorative and transformative justice and more that focus on whole-city health.
Now is the time to move on new ways to address the inequities in the City of MKE and build an inclusive democracy. I support the LiberateMKE coalition's work and their specific demands on PB.
I live in Milwaukee’s Cooper Park neighborhood. I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. It’s the most basic need and our community getting back onto its feet after the pandemic is impossible until those needs are met. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state, is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee and is best suited to make the greatest impact quickly. Hunger has increased locally by more than 25% prior to the pandemic, when we already had a hunger issue in our city. We’re going to feel the effects of the pandemic for years to come and this funding can greatly help shorten that timeline. I ask that we use at least $10 million of this funding to feed families struggling in our city.
FoodShare benefits are also an important and impactful way to keep these families afloat by providing access to healthy food and especially local produce. Please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives to help keep the food safety net intact.
The Arts play a crucial role in supporting the social and emotional health of our children and families. Arts organizations need to be a priority as we are fundamental to the fabric of our communities. In addition, our community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
Funds for: (1) HOUSING. (2) Our parks, as representations and spaces for us to practice sharing/caring, (2) A revamp of waste disposal that shifts our city to zero-waste as quickly as possible, i.e. scaled-up, city-sponsored composting, expansion of recycling, construction of textile recycling facilities and factories/spaces dedicated to upcycling, (3) Creation of neighborhood-based elderly councils that can take over the 'surveillance' function we have traditionally - and dangerously - placed into the Milwaukee Police Department (NO FUNDS FOR COPS), (4) Expansion/establishment of more programs to reduce gun violence and enhance community life.
Channeling funds through existing power structures will only deepen the social inequalities here when we most need a reshuffling of power. Devise competitions for design with cash rewards, open to the public. Support programs that build bridges between existing groups as much as possible and clearly prioritize zip codes with high rates of vacant/deteriorating housing.
We need unprecedented creativity for unprecedented times.
The Metcalfe Park community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
Fondy Food Center and the Milwaukee Farmers Market Coalition is in support of allocating a portion of funds to support the Milwaukee Market Match program, in addition to other initiatives that increase access to healthy food and economic opportunities. In my past experience as a registered dietitian, I have never seen a more impactful nutrition intervention program in getting people access to, and eating more fruits and vegetables. It also economically benefits low-income families and individuals as well as local farmers.
NONE of the ARPA funds should go to the police. Especially after the underhanded passing of the COPS grant. All of the money should go back into the communities that were hit the hardest during COVID-19, the Black and brown working class communities. It should be spent on housing, infrastructure, health, public transit, childcare, and public education.
Among many needs, fixing City streets, roads and thorough-fares, is paramount. The disparity of the Conditions of roads in the technical City of Milwaukee, verses the surrounding suburbs is astounding. The damage to Citizens properties (vehicles), as well as the costs incurred as a direct result of the dis-repair of the City's streets is blatantly unfair to this areas citizenry. This is especially true considering the high tax rates being paid within the City.
ARPA funds should be allocated to support the Milwaukee Market Match program. This program is an opportunity to invest in our local food systems to support Milwaukee residents and farmers. Hunger Task Force indicates that 27.4% of Milwaukee residents live below the federal poverty line, and food insecurity disproportionately impacts families of color. We can address food justice and food insecurity by supporting this program.
ARPA funds represent an opportunity for us to invest in the restoration rather than demolition of City-owned homes. This would create rather than eliminate desperately needed affordable housing, return properties to productive use and the tax rolls rather than reduce them to empty lots, and support jobs. The historically high cost of lumber makes affordable housing through new construction more impossible than usual. By restoring older existing Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing, we can make neighborhoods safer by bringing vacant homes back to life. Restoration is also environmentally friendly. Renovating an older home vs. tearing down and replacing with new construction has the effect of removing 93 cars from the road for a year. An internationally celebrated architect said “Demolishing is a decision of easiness and short term. It is a waste of many things — a waste of energy, a waste of material, and a waste of history. Moreover, it has a very negative social impact. It is an act of violence.” Let’s use this once in a generation funding to change the narrative from ‘why should this be saved?’ to ‘why should we throw this away?’.
Where ARPA funds are used to improve housing on city-owned properties, those funds should go to restoring existing city-owned houses. Demolition of city-owned houses is a pointless waste of serviceable building materials, especially at a time when the cost of new building materials is sky-high. House prices have become untenable for many people in Milwaukee, and the cost of new construction is partly to blame. Landfilling houses that can be perfectly good with some restoration work is not only wasteful in terms of cost, it's also more damaging in terms of climate change. If new houses can be built, do it on empty lots. There are plenty of them. But any city-owned houses that can be restored should be. It's more economical, less wasteful, and better for climate impact.
ARPA funds should be used to for community building and be used to provide housing assistance which includes rent and mortgage cancellation or deferment, long-term eviction moratoriums to address the looming and devastating eviction and foreclosure crisis, and permanent, quality, accessible housing for all including all unhoused people.
How about earmarking a percentage of the cities $400M of the ARPA for a one time bonus for first responders and those public facing ciry employees who had no choice but to work at risk to their own health and that of their families?
As a resident of Milwaukee and hunger advocate, I believe the ARPA funds should be directed to address food insecurity experienced by so of the most vulnerable populations in our community. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come.
COVID-19 and its impact on the economy created a significant increase in the number of people requesting nutrition benefits as well as a host of challenges for people enrolling in benefits and the organizations that serve them. For instance, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin, the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee saw an increase of 36% increase in the number of neighbors in need and distributed 79% more food compared to 2019. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
I am a resident of Milwaukee. I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), called FoodShare in WI, is the nation’s largest nutrition assistance program. One key strategy to make a healthy diet more affordable and accessible for families participating in SNAP is to provide produce incentives. As you think about how to invest American Rescue Plan Act funding, please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives.
I am a resident of Milwaukee's Grasslyn Manor neighborhood and I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state and is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee. As of March 2021, Feeding America estimates that just over 1 in 8 Wisconsinites and 1 in 5 children experienced food insecurity in 2020. That is a 27% increase compared to pre-pandemic in the amount of people facing hunger. The fallout from the pandemic will be felt for years to come. Please use this funding to help provide $10 Million for food to struggling families in Milwaukee.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), called FoodShare in WI, is the nation’s largest nutrition assistance program. One key strategy to make a healthy diet more affordable and accessible for families participating in SNAP is to provide produce incentives. As you think about how to invest American Rescue Plan Act funding, please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives.
The Metcalfe Park community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
Resident of Metcalfe Park
The City of Milwaukee's ARPA funds should be used to pilot and lift-up participatory budget (PB) models, similar to those that are already in use across the country and across the globe. This will only serve to enhance relationship-building, create transparency between residents and the electeds who represent them. Our neighborhoods' residents voices know best what improvements their communities and districts need and they should be integral to the process. Not one (1$) dollar should be granted toward enhancing the Milwaukee Police Department. Community safety comes from investment in long-term housing, addressing immediate housing and living needs, alternatives to policing such as mental health funding, infrastructure such as investments in city parks, waste and recycling collection and street maintenance, investment in education and violence prevention programs focused on restorative and transformative justice and more that focus on whole-city health.
Now is the time to move on new ways to address the inequities in the City of MKE and build an inclusive democracy. I support the LiberateMKE coalition's work and their specific demands on PB.
Resident of District 3
I live in Milwaukee’s Cooper Park neighborhood. I think the ARPA funds should be directed to address hunger. It’s the most basic need and our community getting back onto its feet after the pandemic is impossible until those needs are met. Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin is the largest food bank in the state, is located in the heart of the City of Milwaukee and is best suited to make the greatest impact quickly. Hunger has increased locally by more than 25% prior to the pandemic, when we already had a hunger issue in our city. We’re going to feel the effects of the pandemic for years to come and this funding can greatly help shorten that timeline. I ask that we use at least $10 million of this funding to feed families struggling in our city.
FoodShare benefits are also an important and impactful way to keep these families afloat by providing access to healthy food and especially local produce. Please consider investing $5 million in SNAP produce incentives to help keep the food safety net intact.
The Arts play a crucial role in supporting the social and emotional health of our children and families. Arts organizations need to be a priority as we are fundamental to the fabric of our communities. In addition, our community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
Funds for: (1) HOUSING. (2) Our parks, as representations and spaces for us to practice sharing/caring, (2) A revamp of waste disposal that shifts our city to zero-waste as quickly as possible, i.e. scaled-up, city-sponsored composting, expansion of recycling, construction of textile recycling facilities and factories/spaces dedicated to upcycling, (3) Creation of neighborhood-based elderly councils that can take over the 'surveillance' function we have traditionally - and dangerously - placed into the Milwaukee Police Department (NO FUNDS FOR COPS), (4) Expansion/establishment of more programs to reduce gun violence and enhance community life.
Channeling funds through existing power structures will only deepen the social inequalities here when we most need a reshuffling of power. Devise competitions for design with cash rewards, open to the public. Support programs that build bridges between existing groups as much as possible and clearly prioritize zip codes with high rates of vacant/deteriorating housing.
We need unprecedented creativity for unprecedented times.
The Metcalfe Park community would like to see the following : Create a participatory budgeting trust with a budget of $200 Million ($100 million for each round of ARPA dollars) this money should be distributed amongst all districts, with more funding and priority to marginalized directly impacted districts, that will allow residents from each Aldermanic District to have decision-making power on how this large influx of money should be spent. The Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) receives $0 in funding. Provide housing assistance which includes rent, mortgage, utilities deferment or cancellation, long-term eviction moratoriums, and direct funds to invest in community-led development housing initiatives, and community land-trust. Direct funds to support youth-led organizations that support our youth with access to mentorship, jobs, internships, positive youth development programs, and more. Direct funding to support community-based Mutual Aid groups.
Fondy Food Center and the Milwaukee Farmers Market Coalition is in support of allocating a portion of funds to support the Milwaukee Market Match program, in addition to other initiatives that increase access to healthy food and economic opportunities. In my past experience as a registered dietitian, I have never seen a more impactful nutrition intervention program in getting people access to, and eating more fruits and vegetables. It also economically benefits low-income families and individuals as well as local farmers.
NONE of the ARPA funds should go to the police. Especially after the underhanded passing of the COPS grant. All of the money should go back into the communities that were hit the hardest during COVID-19, the Black and brown working class communities. It should be spent on housing, infrastructure, health, public transit, childcare, and public education.
Among many needs, fixing City streets, roads and thorough-fares, is paramount. The disparity of the Conditions of roads in the technical City of Milwaukee, verses the surrounding suburbs is astounding. The damage to Citizens properties (vehicles), as well as the costs incurred as a direct result of the dis-repair of the City's streets is blatantly unfair to this areas citizenry. This is especially true considering the high tax rates being paid within the City.
ARPA funds should be allocated to support the Milwaukee Market Match program. This program is an opportunity to invest in our local food systems to support Milwaukee residents and farmers. Hunger Task Force indicates that 27.4% of Milwaukee residents live below the federal poverty line, and food insecurity disproportionately impacts families of color. We can address food justice and food insecurity by supporting this program.
ARPA funds represent an opportunity for us to invest in the restoration rather than demolition of City-owned homes. This would create rather than eliminate desperately needed affordable housing, return properties to productive use and the tax rolls rather than reduce them to empty lots, and support jobs. The historically high cost of lumber makes affordable housing through new construction more impossible than usual. By restoring older existing Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing, we can make neighborhoods safer by bringing vacant homes back to life. Restoration is also environmentally friendly. Renovating an older home vs. tearing down and replacing with new construction has the effect of removing 93 cars from the road for a year. An internationally celebrated architect said “Demolishing is a decision of easiness and short term. It is a waste of many things — a waste of energy, a waste of material, and a waste of history. Moreover, it has a very negative social impact. It is an act of violence.” Let’s use this once in a generation funding to change the narrative from ‘why should this be saved?’ to ‘why should we throw this away?’.
Where ARPA funds are used to improve housing on city-owned properties, those funds should go to restoring existing city-owned houses. Demolition of city-owned houses is a pointless waste of serviceable building materials, especially at a time when the cost of new building materials is sky-high. House prices have become untenable for many people in Milwaukee, and the cost of new construction is partly to blame. Landfilling houses that can be perfectly good with some restoration work is not only wasteful in terms of cost, it's also more damaging in terms of climate change. If new houses can be built, do it on empty lots. There are plenty of them. But any city-owned houses that can be restored should be. It's more economical, less wasteful, and better for climate impact.
ARPA funds should be used to for community building and be used to provide housing assistance which includes rent and mortgage cancellation or deferment, long-term eviction moratoriums to address the looming and devastating eviction and foreclosure crisis, and permanent, quality, accessible housing for all including all unhoused people.
How about earmarking a percentage of the cities $400M of the ARPA for a one time bonus for first responders and those public facing ciry employees who had no choice but to work at risk to their own health and that of their families?