“No taxation without representation” was the rallying cry that summed up the American colonists’ main complaint against Great Britain in the 1700s. The concept that the tax-paying voters get to directly choose their tax-levying leaders is a hallmark of American democracy.
Unfortunately, unelected technical college boards are one of the last few entities with the authority to tax without any direct accountability to taxpayers. Members of technical college boards are named through a convoluted appointment process that sets aside slots based on race, gender and employer. These unelected tech college boards have lately been approving property tax hikes that vastly outpace the tax growth of other local governments who, not coincidentally, are run by elected officials.
That is why I have introduced a bipartisan bill that would end the insulating appointment process for tech college board membership and replace it with an election process similar to most other local government positions. The rationale is simple. I believe technical college board members would feel more pressure to lower their taxing and spending if they had to answer directly to the voters who foot the bill.
The situation in Germantown is a perfect example of where the current system is broken. Germantown is part of the Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC) District. Most Germantown residents who choose to attend tech college go to a tech college other than MATC. Germantown property taxpayers send MATC $5 million every year. However, nobody from Germantown is on the board. For that matter, nobody from Washington, Ozaukee or Waukesha Counties is on MATC’s appointed board either, but they still have to pay tens of millions of dollars in property taxes each year.
Technical colleges are one of the key engines that keep Wisconsin’s economy humming. Taxpayers just deserve more accountability in how they are governed.
To provide some feedback on this column, contact me at (800) 863-1113, or sen.darling@legis.wi.gov.
