The budget back then

Editorial intern Anthony Shadid reports on the 12% tax increase in Dane County Executive Richard Phelps' 1990 budget, which would raise taxes on the average $70,000 home by $35.70. Some supervisors defend the hike, which promotes land conservation and environmental preservation, while others bemoan the tax hike as well as its failure to fund their pet projects. Phelps acknowledges that his budget will ruffle feathers but says, "You've got to keep focus on the public's needs and hope you make quality decisions that people who are angry or upset will understand in the long run." Phelps, who left office in 1997, is now a senior vice president at M&I Bank. Shadid won a 2004 Pulitzer prize for his Washington Post coverage of the Iraq War, the basis for his award-winning book, Night Draws Near. He plans to step down as the Post's Baghdad bureau chief at year's end to join The New York Times staff in Baghdad.