Letter to the Editor: Political Preening Again

While I suppose that area citizens are appreciative of our 1st District Senator Lasee visiting his district this coming Monday, Jan. 25, to discuss the Peninsula State Park tower restoration and to present a Wisconsin DOT discussion on the planned roundabouts immediately north of the Bayview Bridge on Hwy. 42, these visits could be opportunities for the Senator to be listening to district citizens on matters much more urgent. Current Lasee-sponsored legislation creating natural environment sacrificial zones, and the further removal of local government control should be the only focus of these visits.

Whether or not roundabouts are necessary or the best solution to easing traffic flow through the unavoidable bridge bottleneck or from the rest of northern Door County, this glaring problem will remain forever in getting through Sturgeon Bay, but will apparently be the recipient of tight state funds thrown at this, “solution,” which will likely only benefit a few state-approved road building contractors performing this work and the legislators getting future campaign donations from them.

Gaining access to or crossing Hwy. 42 between the traffic lights at Michigan Street and the northernmost lights at the Hwy. 42/57 intersection split is where almost nobody travels at the speed limit. Therefore any timed gaps in traffic flow disappear for safe egress onto the highway from any of the side streets – Forest Road, Gordon Road, Egg Harbor Road or County T. Traffic here devolves into a vehicle crap-shoot during shift change, normal end of business day, and heaviest weekend traffic hours nearly year round. Minimal state costs could be incurred with camera-controlled speeding tickets, or another set of traffic lights or two. The temporary traffic signals at Egg Harbor Road a few years ago during the Bayview Bridge painting work were a blessing to people at that intersection with Hwy. 42 heading north.

The state park tower needs to be restored and reopened to the public now, end of story there. How that is accomplished after Senator Lasee and Representative Kitchens both voted to remove state funding of our state parks system should be their duty and their responsibility to which they should accomplish immediately or tender their resignations. Any explanation of how they plan to do it, at this point is window dressing and pandering to the public to play the saviors, grab some positive publicity to obscure their prior votes against the public interest, and to distract from larger attacks against the public trust and the health and welfare of the citizens of this state.

Donald Freix

Fish Creek, Wis.