Wausau Area News & Opinion Page

Schofield Ave reconstruction in Weston

2005-07-17T19:13:00.000-05:00

The village of Weston started reconstructing Schofield Ave. in order to make it more attractive. It has taken most of the summer to see any real results. Mounds of dirts were placed in the median and then flowers and trees were planted. The result is that when pulling onto Schofield Ave from certain properties, you can't see the traffic coming from the other side. The over all result is not only unsafe, but is not very attractive.

The village plans on wasting more money on redesigning the the sidewalks with not a simple concrete design, but with expensive bricks. While I agree that side walks are neccesary on the stretch of road, the way they are planning on doing it is a complete waste of tax payers' money.

Hopefully the village will wise up and scrap the idea of making a "Round-a-Bout" on the corner of Schofield Ave and Alderson St. If they do decide to go with that plan, I can almost guarantee that people will find alternate routes to get where they are going, thus changing the entire traffic patterns in Weston and making what are now quite side streets into busy roads.

The Village needs to wake up and rethink their stratagy to grow.

Donate your unwanted things

2005-05-01T21:02:00.000-05:00

We all have things that are just stored away. Things we will probably never use. Everything from clothes to furnature to books. Why are we keeping these things in storage? Why not donate them to places like the "Neighbors Place?"

There are hundreds, if not thousands of hard working people in our community that are in need of things. With the little amount of money that the local blood sucking companies are willing to pay their employees, many hard working families can't afford to go out and buy a pair of pants when theirs get worn out. Many families can't afford to buy good furnature. So why are we holding on to quality stuff that we will never use again? Stop paying for storage or using up your valued storage space in your house or apartment and donate these things to places like the "Neighbors Place."

For those of you who may not know who or what the "Neighbors Place" is, they are a non profit, nonreligious organization serving the Wausau area by way of their food pantry and they also offer clothes, books, furnature and other items. They offer these things to any one in need free of charge. They are also one of the few places that don't ask questions. The "Neighbors Place" is there to help the community.

I know many of the people who go there are "freeloaders" that are able to work, but just don't want to, but there are also plenty of people who go there that are contributing members to the community that genuinely are in need of help.

Do your part in helping others while at the same time saving money or space on storage. Did I mention that all your donations to the "Neighbors Place" are tax deductable?

Public smoking ban will hurt businesses

2005-04-13T17:20:00.000-05:00

What is the Wausau city council thinking? The new smoking ban was passed last night by a vote of 10 to 2. What gives the city the right to tell private business owners that they can’t allow their patrons to smoke a cigarette in their restaurant?

There is also a provision in the new ordinance that says if a restaurant can prove that they have lost at least 10% of their business, they can apply for an exception to the ordinance. Give me a break. Take a look at a lot of the restaurants that will be affected. Most are small businesses that can’t afford to loose even 1% of their business. The new law will only make it harder to keep quality, small family restaurants open.

Take a look at communities that have restaurant smoking bans. Many small family restaurants have been forced to close down because of the decline of business. People simply will drive a couple miles down the road to a restaurant that can allow them to enjoy a cigarette while dining. This will be the case with Wausau restaurants.

The new ordinance is nothing more the “big brother” telling us we can’t make the choice for ourselves. The choice is simple. If you don’t want to go to a restaurant that allows smoking, then don’t. There are a lot of restaurants that all ready don’t allow smoking. The big difference is that the owner of the business and not the government decided that his or her patrons would enjoy a smoke free environment.
The new smoking ordinance will do very little if anything to help the public. All it will do is appease a few “holier then thou” people who support it while drive patrons to the restaurants elsewhere. It is a useless piece of legislation that allows the government to intrude even more into our lives.

The Badger Care Crisis

2005-04-12T17:02:00.000-05:00

The Badger Care program has fallen short of its original intended goals. Originally the program was set up for lower income working families whose employers don’t offer insurance to its employees. Unfortunately the program, like many other aid programs, has been severely mismanaged.

While it’s a good idea to have a portion of the program handled by private insurance companies, the state needs to look seriously which companies subsidize what areas. There is more then a few cases of people on Badger Care here in central Wisconsin that get their Badger Care subsidized by Network Health Plan out of Milwaukee. The problem is that 99% of the services and HMO affiliate doctors, optometrists, chiropractors and dentists are only available in Milwaukee and it’s surrounding communities. To be fair the state does have some local HMOs that are from the local area.

Another problem that the program has is there are very few dentists that will accept Badger Care. Looking at the Badger Care website, there is a list of 10 in Marathon County. I called each of these 10 that are on the list as accepting Badger Care and out of that 10 only 1 actually is accepting patients with Badger Care, Bridge Community Health Clinic.

Unfortunately there is a 6 month to 1 year waiting list to get seen by a dentist there. They do offer what they call “emergency care.” The way that program works is that you need be at Bridge Community Health Clinic at 8 am on and sign in. Then you must wait until one of their dentists has time to see you. Emergency care is only available Monday through Thursday.

As you can see there are some very serious issues that need to be addressed with the Badger Care program.

Jobs, Employers and the Cost of Living

2005-04-09T14:50:00.000-05:00

In recent months the federal government has issued statements saying that the job market is growing. This may be true to the extent of certain fields. Unfortunately the job market for semi skilled factory workers has continued to stay in a slump, at least in this area.

Searching through the help wanted advertisements in the Wausau Daily Herald and the Wisconsin Jobs Center Jobs Net website, I have noticed 80% of the jobs that are available in the area are for managerial and other areas which require a college degree.

The jobs in the manufacturing sector that are available are few and the ones that are available start out at around $7.50 an hour. There is no way a working family can make a living at $7.50 an hour.

Other companies that are hiring for manufacturing jobs want an insane amount of experience, but they don’t want to pay for that experience. On average, the jobs that want say 5 years manufacturing experience are only paying $8.50 an hour. What is wrong with these companies?

With the current cost of living and the insane prices of gasoline and basic utilities, companies in this area need to be paying at least $11.00 an hour in order for their employees to have a chance at living. And that is only if there are 2 people in the house working full time.

Taking a very conservative look at what it costs to live in the Wausau area, a family of 2 parents and 2 children would need to make approximately $15,590 just for basics. Let me break this down for you on how I came up with this number.

$4,800 a year for rent. $5,000 a year for food. $2,400 a year for natural gas and electricity. $1,000 a year for clothes. $60 a year for children’s school supplies. $2,300 a year for gasoline and car maintenance to get to your job. These are just the basics. What about unforeseen expenses such as medical bills?
Needless to say currently the job market is not all that great here in central Wisconsin and the jobs that are available need to pay more in order for the people in central Wisconsin to have a chance at doing more then just surviving.

More Ramps Needed for Weston

2005-04-06T00:30:00.000-05:00

The village of Weston is growing at a spectacular rate. Through it’s quality management, businesses are thriving and people are moving into Weston. There are a few issues which need to be addressed.
The first thing Weston needs to address is the limited access from Hwy 29. Currently you have access to Weston from Business 51 via Rothschild, Camp Phillips Road and Hwy J. From Business 51 it is approximately 4 miles to the Camp Phillips Road Exit and From Camp Phillips Road it is approximately 4 miles to Hwy J. There is just too much distance between exits to sustain the growth of the area. One solution to the problem is to negotiate with the state to get exit / entrance ramps put on existing overpasses.
This is probably the most cost effective solution to the existing problems. Unfortunately in order to put these ramps in a few buildings would have to be removed. On Alderson Street there is also the issue of DC Everest High School being located there. We must ask the question “is the increase in traffic on Alderson going to put high school students at risk?” I don’t believe it is going to be much of an issue as the high school is located well off the road and with the proper planning, the road can be safely expanded to accommodate the amount of traffic that would use this route.
Putting exit / entrance ramps on Alderson Street would be a wise move as it would make it easier to get to what is essentially the central business district in Weston. It would make it much easier to get to stores such as Target and Mega Pick N Save thus increasing the desirability of shoppers to go “off the beaten path” and shop at these stores.
The second overpass is located on Ryan Street. This would be an excellent place to put exit / entrance ramps because of its close proximity to the new Weston Technology Park. It will help to boost the businesses in the area by making them more accessible. There are a few drawbacks to putting ramps here though. One being that Cousino’s Auto Salvage has their building right where one of the ramps would have to be. Another being that between the hwy and Schofield Avenue is mainly residential. Also the bridge crossing Hwy 29 here would have to be widened as it is very narrow and was designed to handle only local residential traffic.
The other place that could stand to use Hwy access is the industrial are located on and around Mesker Street. Currently this area has numerous businesses and there are a few vacant buildings. By putting access to Hwy 29 from Mesker Street, these buildings will be bought or leased and grow the business infrastructure.
There are a lot of ideas that could work to continue the growth of Weston, now it’s time for village officials to make some decisions to help sustain the tremendous growth and prosperity Weston is currently experiencing.

What about the Children

2005-04-05T15:30:00.000-05:00

High Roller Family Fun Center announced earlier this year that they will be going out of business. Their last day of business will be June 15, 2005. This brings up a very important question. Where are the kids going to go to have something to do.

I can remember when I was growing up in Wausau, there were a lot of things for children and teens to do. There were no less then 3 arcades, all of which were within walking distance or near a bus line. Marathon Junction catered to the preteen - teen crowd and it seemed that almost every other weekend the YMCA was holding a city wide dance. Where have all the things for children and teens gone.

I know some of you will say, "There's the Boys and Girls Club." The only problem with that is that it's one place and not located where every one can get to it. Also it is severely underfunded and understaffed. So that being said, Where are the children to go to have a safe and fun time?

We as a community have an obligation to ensure that kids and teens have something to do besides walking around aimlessly through the streets. There are quite a few things that can be done and it's up to the adults to find a way to provide them for the kids.

Why not bring back city wide dances? How about building a teen night club downtown? Why not support the Boys and Girls Club and make sure they have the funding needed to provide their essential service? How about offering after school and summer athletics and music programs?

I realize these all take money and time, but together we can make the difference and help kids become productive members of society while giving them the opportunity to have fun in a safe environment.

City has it Backwards Again

2005-03-26T18:20:00.000-06:00

The city council voted 10 to 2 in favor of opening traffic along Washington Street going west between 4th and 3rd Streets. The reconstruction is scheduled to start in June at an estimated cost of $860,000.

Once again the city of Wausau has it backwards. The traffic problems in the downtown area and the subsiquent lack of growth are due to the fact that entering downtown from the west is a virtual dead end. Visitors coming over the bridge onto Washington Street are met with the options of going straight into a parking garage, turning right and going around the Wausau Center Mall to the south or turning left and going toward Scott Street. Thus making it almost impossible to get to most of shops in the downtown area. To solve the current traffic situation in the area, the city council should have voted to open traffic flowing to the east between 1st and 3rd Streets.

The virtual dead end was created mid last year when the Wausau City council voted to allow a private developer to buy 2nd Street in order to build a hotel/convention center. While it is important to the economic developement of Wausau to have a hotel/convention center located downtown, the location is questionable.