Hill beats back challenge, will face Crowley for judge
Milwaukee Municipal Court Judge Valarie Hill survived a triple-barreled primary challenge Tuesday to advance to the April 4 general election, where she’ll take on William Crowley, a soft-spoken disabilities rights advocate who, like two other challengers, called for more respect in the court.
Hill was first elected to the bench in 2004. All of her primary opponents stressed the need for a new attitude in Branch 1, where they say Hill has too long ignored rights of those too poor to pay fines for citations, and treated even lawyers and programming staff rudely.
But despite early, active campaigns and issues-oriented websites, none of the political newcomers mounted much of a challenge, as Hill collected nearly 50% of the vote. Crowley took second place ahead of Brian Michel by nearly 500 votes. Assistant City Attorney Kail Decker, 33, placed fourth.
Michel said with a relatively close margin, he wasn’t ready to concede second place Tuesday and may consider seeking a recount.
The challengers claimed that Hill utilized suggestions of alternative sanctions like community service much less often than the two other municipal court judges, and often failed to explain to ordinance violators that if they could not afford to pay fines, they might have other options.
Those who don’t pay fines typically wind up getting their driver’s licenses suspended or having arrest warrants issued, consequences that only compound their problems. Hill said community service is often more difficult to perform than people imagine, and that she frequently gave people the option of searching for work as an alternative.
Hill, 53, is a former public defender and Circuit Court commissioner. She defended her record as Branch 1 judge and said what some consider a brusque, rude demeanor is just her being efficient with her time.
In an interview and at a candidates’ forum, Hill mentioned that for much of last year, she was driving to Ohio most weekends to care for her mother, who suffered a stroke in March.
Crowley, 30, is a staff attorney at Disability Rights Wisconsin and has used a wheelchair since a car accident when he was a child.
“I’m excited and grateful to have the support of many Milwaukee residents,” he said Tuesday night. He said he looks forward to the general election, which he called “a much harder road, facing an incumbent. You have to win, not come in second.”
Crowley sees municipal court as a place for mediation, to get people with small violations back on track through services and programming through partnership agencies, not a place to generate income from fines and land people who can’t pay them in jail.
“These measures only serve to create additional barriers to maintaining or finding employment, not increase a defendant’s ability to pay,” Crowley said during the campaign.
Michel, 34, is a lawyer at the Legal Aid Society and active in Mental Health Task Force, Community Justice Council, Milwaukee Housing Coalition and other organizations. He criticized the municipal court for rejecting suggestions a committee developed for the court to improve its adherence to due process.
Michel said he would push for more restorative justice resolutions to the behaviors that land people in municipal court, to help keep them from becoming criminal defendants in circuit court.
Municipal court judges serve four-year-terms. The job pays $133,289 per year.