Nino Amato would like an answer to a very troubling and complicated question: "How can a community as rich and prosperous as Dane County have some of the worst disparities in the country?"
Amato, vice president of Dane County NAACP and president of the Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups, may never get a satisfying answer. But he will at least get a chance to ask the question at a forum with all five of the candidates for Madison mayor next week.
The forum -- sponsored by Isthmus and WORT-FM -- will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 4, at the Rev. Alex Gee's Fountain of Life Covenant Church, 633 W. Badger Road. It will be streamed live on Isthmus.com. The debate will focus on issues of racial and economic disparity, with questions posed by representatives of the Fountain of Life Church, Dane County NAACP, the Race to Equity Project and the Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups.
The event is free and open to the public and will also be broadcast live on WORT, 89.9 FM.
All five mayoral candidates are expected to attend, including incumbent Paul Soglin, former county Supv. Richard Brown, activist Christopher Daly, former Ald. Bridget Maniaci, and Ald. Scott Resnick. The five square off in the Feb. 17 primary, with the top two vote-getters moving onto the April 7 general election.
Molly Stentz, WORT's news and public affairs facilitator, says the debate is a chance to look at pressing issues and see what the city can do about them.
The city's poor record on racial disparities has been on the minds of a lot of people, especially since the publication of the Race to Equity report in the fall of 2013. The achievement gap between white and minority students is also a top issue, as is the treatment of people of color in the criminal justice system.
"That's on the minds of a lot of residents right now," she says. "In Madison, I feel like there's been a lot of malaise about the state government and federal government, but local government is where democracy works best. People can access their local government. They can make changes to improve the lives of residents."
Amato says the issues involve all segments of society. "It's not just about race," he says. "It's about the economic viability of this community reaching out and being more inclusive."
Amato says that the city has grappled with these issues before, after Mayor Sue Bauman created a Task Force on Race Relations in the late '90s. The task force made several recommendations, but only a few were ever acted on, he says.
The task force then made it a campaign issue in the 2003 election, when Dave Cieslewicz beat both Soglin and incumbent Bauman. Amato credits Cieslewicz with supporting the creation of the Goodman Pool and making it accessible to distressed neighborhoods. And the task force was also successful in getting the police department to compile data about traffic stops in order to identify patterns of systematic discrimination. That idea eventually took root statewide, before being cut from the state budget under Gov. Scott Walker, Amato says.
Asking questions, not just of the mayoral candidates but all political candidates, is the first step toward progress, Amato says. "It's time for people to start answering the tough questions."
Following the primary, Isthmus and WORT will also co-sponsor a debate between the two top vote-getters before they face off in the April 7 general election. A date and place for that forum has not yet been finalized. WORT and Isthmus will also moderate in-studio debates with candidates in contested Common Council races.
