A bill is currently headed to the Milwaukee Senate that would strip the city of its right to force quick sales of abandoned, foreclosed properties known as zombie homes by financial institutions, according to an article by Mary Spicuzza and Cary Spivak for the Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel.
The bill narrowly passed the Senate committee last week in a 3-2 vote, taken by paper ballot, according to the article. From here, if the bill wins the support of the Senate, it would head to the desk of Gov. Scott Walker.
From the article:
The move angered opponents of the bill, who said the committee's chairman, state Senator Frank Lasee, R-Wis., who is also the measure's lead sponsor in that house, had recently expressed concerns that the proposal needed work.
"At the public hearing on February 10th, Chairman Lasee was quite clear in his comments that this bill 'wasn't soup yet' and 'needed work,'" Vicky Selkowe, a lobbyist for Legal Action of Wisconsin, wrote in a Thursday email to the committee.
"Yet the bill before you today contains no new amendments or changes to address the concerns raised at that public hearing," Selkowe said.
Many citizens are concerned about the affect that the bill will have on the city. "This would worsen the zombie property problem in Milwaukee and other communities considerably. I don't know why someone would want to worsen that problem," Mayor Tom Barrett was quoted saying the article.
