Carolyn Fath Ashby
When he was a young man Joe Parisi wanted to be the next Charlie Watts. He dropped out of Middleton High School and played drums in a series of rock bands. Finally, he caught on with a new group called Honor Among Thieves.
Parisi could tell that this band had potential so he poured his heart and soul into the music. They cut an album and did some touring. But by his late 20s the life of a struggling musician was wearing thin. “I got tired of living with my buddies and eating bologna sandwiches three times a day,” Parisi says from his office conference room on the fourth floor of the City County Building.
He’s now the Dane County executive. Five floors below he has a reserved parking stall not far from the elevator.
He wanted to be a rock star, but all he got was the parking.
In the 1990s, while he still played some gigs with the band, Parisi went back to school and picked up his GED and a degree in sociology from the University of Wisconsin. He got a job as a legislative aide in the Capitol and then ran for office himself, serving as Dane County clerk and then as a state representative from Madison’s east side and adjacent communities.
When former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk resigned in mid-term, Parisi won a special election in April 2011 to fill out the remaining two years of her term. He emerged from a crowded primary that year to easily defeat Eileen Bruskewitz, a conservative on the Dane County Board, in the general election. He went on to win a full four-year term in 2013 and he ran unopposed in 2017, garnering about 75,000 votes.
Today, serving alongside a new Madison mayor and soon a new public schools superintendent, Parisi has become the senior local public executive and he is arguably the most powerful. The county’s operating budget is $594 million, about 74 percent more than the city’s $341 million budget.
The county runs the jail, the airport, the zoo, the Alliant Energy exposition center, the landfill, a host of parks and much of the criminal justice system. It oversees a massive human services budget that funds mental health programs, public assistance and homeless shelters. The county governs land-use decisions outside of cities and villages, controls water levels on Lake Mendota and has more to say about surface water quality than any other level of government. The county sheriff’s department is comparable in size to the Madison Police Department.
While he’s made no formal announcement, Parisi seems ready to run again in 2021 and there are no active challengers yet on the horizon. Parisi’s latest campaign finance report shows him with a balance of just under $175,000. He’s still only 59 and he might be county executive for as long as he wants to be.
And yet, how well do his constituents really know this guy?
When it comes to county government, “there’s a certain abstraction involved,” says Rick Phelps, who served as county executive from 1988 to 1997. He points to a building outside a downtown coffee shop where we’re talking.
“It’s different than if somebody’s going to put a building 10 stories high right there,” he says. “The city’s directly involved in the negotiations on what gets built there. That’s real and it’s important. It’s tangible and people get that.”
But while the county has a larger budget and is arguably involved in even more areas with even greater impact, “if you don’t use the [county-funded] domestic violence shelter it doesn’t touch your life, but it’s good to have one. So, there’s a step removed on everything the county does.”
Why don’t people seem to get as worked up about county issues as they do about city matters? “There’s a certain abstraction involved,” offers former Dane County Executive Rick Phelps.
Phelps’ point about being a step removed is probably on target. If you live in Madison you see the Madison police, but when people are arrested they are taken to the county jail and they go through a justice system jointly administered by the state and county. You see the city garbage trucks in your neighborhood, but the refuse is taken to the county landfill. You might enjoy a city beach, but the aquatic weeds are cut by county crews.
You would think that this would be a source of frustration to a county executive. Most politicians want attention, some crave it, and some would trample innocent bystanders to get in front of a camera. Parisi’s office certainly issues its share of news releases and conducts more than the occasional press conference. Yet county government, not just under Parisi but historically, doesn’t get near the attention that the city does.
Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway agrees. “Oh, my God! They can get away with anything,” she says with a laugh. She’s joking but not entirely. She points out that when the county established a new vehicle registration fee, commonly known as a wheel tax, it flew virtually under the radar. But when she proposed a wheel tax for the city it got lots of attention and criticism.
Both taxes were approved, the county’s for $28 per vehicle while the city’s tax is $40. But the $12 difference wouldn’t seem to account for the discrepancy in level of attention.
A politician might appreciate the lack of attention when raising a tax, but the city tends to get more notice for everything it does, popular or not.
“I see the phenomenon,” Parisi says. “I live it. It’s okay with me.”
Now that Paul Soglin is no longer mayor, Parisi isn’t even making headlines for the expected spats between the county and city.
Within moments of taking the oath of office, Rhodes-Conway walked into a joint press conference with Parisi to announce that a deadlock on the reconstruction of Buckeye Road, which is also a county highway, had been broken. It was no coincidence. She says they worked out the deal during her two-week transition and that they were trying to send a message about a new era of cooperation.
“I had talked a lot about cooperation [during the campaign] and I wanted to make it clear that that was real,” says Rhodes-Conway. “We are going to have better relationships with the county and Joe is happy to have a partner in that.”
For his part, Parisi publicly endorsed Rhodes-Conway in her race against incumbent Soglin.
The city and county also resolved a potential dispute over construction costs for Cottage Grove Road and Parisi and Rhodes-Conway have announced joint efforts on climate change and on providing cleaner water at area beaches. Rhodes-Conway says that she and Parisi are also talking about joint solar energy projects and an eventual bus rapid transit station at the airport.
They meet regularly with no set agenda. “Right from the beginning he’s been helpful and supportive,” the mayor says. “The meetings I’ve had with Joe are some of the best I have.”
Being able to maintain that sort of good working relationship may be a challenge. Former Dane County Executive Jonathan Barry got along so well with then Mayor Joel Skornicka that Barry delivered a eulogy at Skornicka’s memorial service in December. But Phelps clashed with Soglin in his second stint as mayor in the 1990s, and Mayor Sue Bauman and Falk had a sometimes turbulent relationship. I started out as good friends with Falk when I became Madison mayor in 2003, but eight years later the relationship was strained. Parisi’s relationship with Soglin in his third act as mayor can best be characterized as icy.
Some of it is personalities, but much of it comes down to overlapping jurisdictions, where one level of government believes the other should pay for services to the same constituents.
I ask Rhodes-Conway about that. She sees the pitfalls but remains optimistic. “It sounds trite but we just agree to disagree.” And she points out that she and Parisi have similar personalities. Neither considers themselves to be the kind of extrovert most people take for granted in politicians.
Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney also gets on well with Parisi. As with mayors, county executives often clash with their county sheriffs, who are elected in their own right.
“I think he does a very good job of managing all the competing priorities in county government,” says Mahoney of Parisi’s governing style. The sheriff says he doesn’t always get the funding he requests each year, but eventually gets what he wants. Because he trusts Parisi, he’s willing to be patient.
He credits Parisi with leadership on a jail project to build an addition adjacent to the current jail in the Public Safety Building and shut down the Huber center, as well as the antiquated facility on the top floors of the City County Building. There will be 91 fewer beds overall, but Mahoney praises the additional mental health services that are part of the project; he says that 42 percent of inmates suffer from a diagnosed mental illness and 80 percent come in with a drug or alcohol addiction.
City of Middleton
Supv. Paul Nelson (right) on Parisi: “I don’t think Joe always saw the board as a partner, but something that was in the way.”
Parisi’s relationship with the legislative branch is not as rosy, though Supv. Paul Nelson of Middleton was the only critic interviewed willing to go on the record.
Nelson, the board’s first vice chair, is not running for reelection this April after six years on the board. He’s known Parisi for a couple of decades and he always found him to be “a likable guy.”
“But when I was elected to the board and started to serve, I started to see Joe in a little bit of a different light. Increasingly, I got a feeling that there was not that much communication between the board office and the executive.
“I don’t think Joe always saw the board as a partner, but something that was just in the way,” Nelson says.
He points to the recent controversy at the Henry Vilas Zoo as an example. Last year Parisi shocked many by announcing that he was severing the long-standing relationship between the zoo and its nonprofit fundraising partner, the Henry Vilas Zoological Society.
“At a minimum, the chairs of the (relevant) committees should have been given a heads up that these contract negotiations were underway,” says Nelson. Instead, Nelson says that negotiations had been going on for months between Parisi’s office and the Society without anyone on the board knowing about it.
Parisi also angered county supervisors in 2014 when he didn’t inform the board’s homeless committee about plans for the county to buy Porchlight’s Hospitality House for conversion into a resource center for the homeless.
Still, Nelson and other critics who spoke off the record say that they can’t point to an issue that went awry because of a chilly relationship between the executive and the board.
Even with regard to the zoo Nelson says, “it really came out quite well. The zoo is in a much better place now.”
“I like Joe,” Nelson concludes. “He does a good job. He gets out in the community. But what he needs to keep in mind is that it’s really important to have a good relationship with members of the county board. If Joe was currently rated from 1 to 10 on a scale of trustworthiness, I wouldn’t venture a guess as to how he would come out, but there would definitely be room for improvement.”
For his part, Parisi says that he makes decisions that affect 540,000 county residents and “it depends on the day. You can’t help but make some people unhappy.”
Asked about how he gets along with the board, he sidesteps relationships and talks about issues. “We agree on 98 percent or 99 percent of everything,” he says.
But the board and Parisi are now engaged in a very public power struggle.
Parisi at home with wife Erin Thornley Parisi (left), who is executive director of the Rape Crisis Center, and daughters Eden and Sadie.
In the 2020 budget Parisi proposed a new mental health and addiction recovery program. The program was approved by the board, which added even more funding. But supervisors also attached an amendment that gave the board oversight over the details. Corporation Counsel Marcia MacKenzie ruled that the board overstepped its bounds and Parisi vetoed the amendment.
In response, board Chair Sharon Corrigan introduced a resolution authorizing the board to spend up to $15,000 to get a second opinion from the Madison law firm of Pines Bach. MacKenzie has now said that the board lacks authority to do even that.
Josh Wescott, Parisi’s chief of staff, says that the questions are now answered and “everyone is on the same page.” Corrigan disagrees: “This is an unresolved issue.”
Parisi does have at least one friend on the county board: Shelia Stubbs, who has represented Madison’s south side on the board for 12 years and in 2018 was also elected to the state Assembly from the 77th district. She is running again for the board and plans to continue to serve in both positions for the foreseeable future. She is the only African American member of the board.
In response to concerns about Parisi’s relationship with the board, Stubbs says, “People have different experiences, but I’ve known Joe for a long time and I’m the kind of person who, when I’ve got an issue with you, I call you,” Stubbs says. “We work through it.”
Many white liberal politicians struggle to make connections with black voters, among the most important constituencies in the Democratic Party. This is a major issue for presidential hopefuls like former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Both have the right policy positions and they say the right things, yet their polling among African Americans is anemic.
But Stubbs is effusive about Parisi, lauding him in particular for his support on actions to promote racial equity. “Being an African American is not just a checkmark for me. It’s my life.” She says Parisi is authentic in his support for the black community.
Ruben Anthony, president of the Urban League of Greater Madison, agrees. He describes Parisi as “one of my favorite public servants. He is one of those guys who’s very humble and authentic. A lot of people do a whole lot of talking around here. But you can count on Joe to get things done.
“Today many people know what to say about diversity, equity and inclusion. Other folks have learned the language, but they’re not getting anything done.”
Hedi LaMarr Photography
The Urban League’s Ruben Anthony says Parisi “doesn’t just talk the talk... He’s a guy who needed a second chance after he dropped out of high school and now he’s giving other people second chances.”
He credits Parisi with championing several partnerships with the League, including a paid training program through the county public works department that helps people learn how to run heavy equipment and earn their commercial drivers license. Other projects include youth training programs, apprenticeships in county parks, mental health initiatives and a program that helps people expunge criminal records. Anthony also points to several hires of African Americans in key positions around the county.
“He doesn’t just talk the talk,” he says of Parisi.
And he says it goes beyond just the funding for his own organization’s work. “When you walk a certain path you build up street credibility. He’s a guy who needed a second chance after he dropped out of high school and now he’s giving other people second chances.”
“I’m really comfortable in every community,” Parisi says. “One of the keys to this job is showing up. The way I’m most comfortable governing is to spend as much time as possible in the community.”
It’s also clearly personal for him. He points out that one of his daughters is black. “The African American community isn’t a mystery to me,” Parisi says.
“Obviously, I’ll never know what it’s like to be African American, but I know what it’s like…” He trails off, looks to the floor and collects himself before he goes on in a barely audible tone. “I know what it’s like to have my daughter come home and tell me she was called the n-word and I know what a soul-crushing experience that is. And I also know that while that may be surprising and appalling to my white friends, it’s not surprising to me.”
County government is a sprawling entity, yet it gets little attention in the media. That has long been the case, but it seems even more pronounced now as all media outlets have cut reporting staff. It’s also true that the progressive super majority on the board, which controls about 34 of 37 seats, is a far cry from the days when board liberals and conservatives fought over slim and shifting majorities in the 1990s and early 2000s. I was on the board myself from 1987 to 1992 and can attest that it was a rancorous time.
And the county structure itself tends to resolve conflict faster than it can be noticed. County board committees are made up exclusively of supervisors so that issues get worked out in committee without making a big splash on the board floor. By contrast, most city of Madison committees have a majority of citizen members and so many alders are seeing an issue for the first time when it gets to the full council.
If open conflict makes for a good story, for the most part the county is boring. There are exceptions, of course. There was a long fight over the jail and there is some ongoing controversy over the future of the Alliant Energy Center. The break with the Zoological Society created some heat.
But the daily business of county government is tremendously impactful and the amount of attention it gets is not proportionate to its importance. So, it’s easy for even the top county official to go less noticed than he should. And Joe Parisi, for all of his press releases and press conferences and getting around, does not often generate controversy. His style is cautious, he chooses his words carefully, and he carries on his fights largely behind the scenes.
Patrick JB Flynn
Parisi (foreground) dropped out of high school to play drums with a variety of bands, including Honor Among Thieves.
But he is now the dean of local leaders and he probably has more to say about the future of this community than any other single person. If Honor Among Thieves had made it bigger faster, he might be playing the Alliant Center rather than trying to figure out what to do with the building.
He seems okay with that. After all, drummers set the tempo and drive a band, but they’re almost never out front. Maybe that’s where Parisi is still most comfortable.
