The Daily Reporter articles from November 2007

The Daily Reporter archives from November 2007

Milwaukee County to create $1M fund for housing.
November 1, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan An amendment added Wednesday to Milwaukee County's proposed budget would set up a $1 million fund for affordable housing projects in 2008. The source of the money would be county's proceeds from selling its second...

Town of Beloit questioning Inman Parkway proposal.
November 1, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Robert Museus says he feels as if he is being ignored. The town of Beloit's administrator is optimistic about the easy highway access the planned Inman Parkway extension could bring to the town, but he also is...

Wisconsin may require qualifications-based selection for project designs.
November 1, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Although it is one of only four states that doesn't have a qualifications-based selection law, Wisconsin soon might leave the other three behind. Rep. Mark Gottlieb, R-Port Washington, is the lead sponsor of AB...

University of Wisconsin-Green Bay relishing new sports center.
November 2, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Jeff Krueger is just one guy who's going to benefit from the $33 million new Kress Events Center at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. Krueger is two months into his job as the center's director of operations,...

Milwaukee's 'Handsome' corner swells with memories, new bright promise.
November 2, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Richard C. Moore established Handsome Barber Shop on the corner of North Teutonia and West Center in 1967, the same year Milwaukee's black community rioted for opportunity and fair housing. His former and current...

Bishop's Creek Community Development Corp.in Milwaukee has a big goal.
November 2, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The Bishop's Creek Community Development Corp. is going for the whole alphabet soup of public subsidy: TIF, BID, TIN and HOME. But it has a big goal. It wants to take a blighted 5-acre former tannery and turn it into...

West Bend battling for $119.3M referendum.
November 5, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan With her city facing a $119.3 million school referendum Tuesday, West Bend Mayor Kristine Deiss said people have a responsibility to know what they're voting about. What bothers her, she said, is that most of the...

Milwaukee Alderman Tony Zielinski says city should help homeowners buy solar panels.
November 5, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Solar energy suffers from this predicament: The homeowners who most need the savings from it usually are the ones who can't afford the $15,000 or $20,000 needed to install the hardware. The up-front cost is...

Appleton wants answers to water-plant woes.
November 5, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Six years have passed, and Appleton's water-treatment plant has yet to make good on some of its promises. When the $54 million plant came online in 2001, the promise was 25 million gallons of filtered water a day...

Developer calls foul on deadline stretch in La Crosse.
November 5, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder What's happening in La Crosse is flummoxing Paul Borsheim. La Crosse wants a hotel on a piece of land at Jay and Second streets and had asked for ideas to be submitted by Oct. 12. Only Borsheim, president of...

Developer calls foul on deadline stretch.
November 5, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder What's happening in La Crosse is flummoxing Paul Borsheim. La Crosse wants a hotel on a piece of land at Jay and Second streets and had asked for ideas to be submitted by Oct. 12. Only Borsheim, president of...

Group alerting West Bend residents about size of school referendum.
November 6, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The phone messages it left about the West Bend School District referendum are just the start, said Mark Block, state director of the Americans for Prosperity Wisconsin Chapter. Now that the state budget's done, the...

The $3M question for Madison Mayor Cieslewicz.
November 6, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz has been talking about bringing change to the Allied Drive neighborhood for a long time. Now he's looking to change a city ordinance to do it. Tonight, Cieslewicz will introduce a...

For sale in Beloit: Old courthouse, two elevators, central air.
November 6, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder At 65, Roger Bryden says there are some things he just can't do anymore, such as redeveloping the former Rock County Courthouse in Beloit. "If you're going to do something like build a housing project or a...

Milwaukee aldermen urge study of race in contracting.
November 6, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Milwaukee aldermen have added $50,000 to the budget to pay for a disparity study that, depending on its findings, could allow the city to legally create a race-based participation program on its contracts. The...

Hines: Milwaukee needs more city contractors.
November 6, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan When reviewing the 2006 participation rates in the city's Emerging Business Enterprise and Residents Preference Program at a Monday morning meeting, Common Council President Willie Hines said the city should look into...

Milwaukee projects slow or stall in autumn wind.
November 7, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan and Paul Snyder The moral of the story is: Don't carry plywood on a rooftop on a windy day. Jeff Beiriger, executive director of the American Subcontractors Association of Wisconsin, heard the story of a guy who...

As Milwaukee struggles with lead, jury sides with paint-makers.
November 7, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan As cases against lead paint manufacturers continue to fail in Milwaukee, the city is ramping up its fund-raising efforts to remove lead from houses. Whether the attention garnered by Monday's verdict in the Steven...

Madison public market still just an idea.
November 7, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Although it has been more than three years since David Boyd helped put together a preliminary feasibility report for a year-round public market in Madison, his optimism hasn't dimmed, but the project hasn't come close...

Milwaukee County Supervisor De Bruin alone on parks-spending idea.
November 8, 2007... Byline: Daily Reporter Staff Milwaukee County Supervisor Lynne De Bruin was alone on this one. The County Board had voted to remove $1 million in bonding from the 2008 budget because the project it was earmarked for, construction of a...

Fourth Pabst Brewery building in Milwaukee sold.
November 8, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The developers of the Pabst Brewery in Milwaukee have sold their fourth building, which the buyers plan to convert into offices. The buyers, working under the company name BC Pabst Holdings LLC, are former Green Bay...

Noise, congestion will yield 'model' school in Janesville.
November 8, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Dale Carlson says Parker High School in Janesville is looking at a little more than two years of inconveniences. "We know what the payoff will be, though," Carlson, the school's principal, said. "This will be a...

Not just 'a squirrel park': Myrick Park Zoo in La Crosse to become Myrick Hixon EcoPark.
November 9, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder La Crosse is finished with the idea of a traditional zoo. Sure, animals such as spider monkeys have their appeal, but they're really not natives of the La Crosse area or the northern part of the country. On that...

Veto overridden, Kenosha to get longer pier.
November 12, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder In Kenosha Harbor, the tide is not changing, but it soon may have a less detrimental effect. The harbor is just one Wisconsin waterway that benefited from the first Congressional override of a veto by President...

Two Milwaukee's Housing Trust Fund Advisory Board members sidestep potential conflicts.
November 12, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan One member of Milwaukee's Housing Trust Fund Advisory Board has stepped down and another has recused himself from judging to avoid any potential conflicts of interest in the award of the fund's $2.5 million to housing...

State of Wisconsin: Watercraft must be cleaned.
November 13, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan A mindless, minuscule killer from Europe is changing the rules for some Wisconsin contractors. The killer first showed up in the 1930s, infecting European fish farms and feeding on their trout. It has spent the...

Plaques shine light on Milwaukee County Parks System.
November 13, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The Park People spent $1,200 to create 11 bronze plaques celebrating the Milwaukee County Parks System's 100-year anniversary. The price was small compared the estimated $360,000 that the group has raised this year...

Contractors chase any form of recognition that includes the word green.
November 13, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Green is turning to gold these days, but in construction a question is emerging as to the value of winning awards for greenness. From being green to seeing green, from building green buildings to using green...

Perilous economy stalls biodiesel plant project in Evansville.
November 14, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Construction on a $46 million biodiesel plant in Evansville is coming to a halt, and it's not because of winter's looming deep freeze. Commodity prices are up, the economy is down and the money simply isn't there...

How can Milwaukee County coax more Chicago-area residents to move north?
November 14, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Officials in Walworth and Kenosha counties had a few ideas on how Milwaukee County could coax more Chicago-area residents, and their money, to move north. A Public Policy Forum study of census data from 2001 through...

Five-story staircase at 35th Street Viaduct in Milwaukee reopens.
November 14, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The most unnerving thing about the five-story staircase leading down to the Menomonee Valley from the 35th Street Viaduct is that it shudders when trucks and buses drive overhead. The chain-link fence fixed to the...

EcoEnergy seeks to ride Dane County's first wind farm.
November 14, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder The wheels are in motion to build Dane County's first wind farm. The owner, Elgin, Ill.-based EcoEnergy LLC, is steering the $20 million wind farm through the permitting processes of Dane County and the town of...

House for sale in Hartford ... not that anyone cares.
November 16, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The housing market was still in good shape when Tom and Sandy Artzberger decided to build a new house for themselves in the town of Pagosa Springs, Colo. They said they figured they could unload their house in...

Midwestern Regional Greenhouse Gas Reduction Accord sets lofty goals.
November 16, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder While the public's focus was on Milwaukee Wednesday and Thursday as 10 Midwest leaders signed the Midwestern Regional Greenhouse Gas Reduction Accord, Alliant Energy was looking west toward Cassville. The small town...

Janesville rejects U.S. Cellular's attempt to build cell phone tower.
November 16, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder U.S. Cellular customers might just have to deal with the patchy reception in Janesville. After almost five years and multiple attempts to get a cell phone tower built on the city's east side, U.S. Cellular has been...

St. Catherine Residence in Milwaukee gets money from county for inclusive housing.
November 16, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Affordable housing should be a government priority because it's fundamental to many residents' well-being, Lynne Oehlke said. A majority of the Milwaukee County Board appears to agree with her. "My bias and my...

Butte des Morts near Oshkosh recovery draws more money.
November 19, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Funding just expanded for what the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources considers the country's largest PCB cleanup. The Menasha Corp. lent its support to cleaning PCBs from Little Lake Butte des Morts near...

Biodiesel project in Minnesota fuels flashback.
November 19, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan In an attempt to reclaim some of its 1960s glory as Eco-U, the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay is going to try heating its buildings with biodiesel. The college was one of four UW campuses that Gov. Jim Doyle wanted...

State money boosts Construction Career Academy in Wisconsin.
November 20, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Peter Scherrer expects the Construction Career Academy to be up and running in nine schools by 2009. How, exactly, that will happen remains to be seen. But it's off to a good start with three schools running the...

Verona watches its town land disappear.
November 20, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Chuck Elliott is passed the point of impatience. Almost three years ago, the vice president of Middleton-based Elliott Construction Inc. first pitched a plan to the town of Verona for a 43-acre subdivision of...

ACG of Greater Milwaukee says propane's explosive nature limits use.
November 20, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Dan Burazin once saw a propane tank turn into a flamethrower. The safety director for the Associated General Contractors of Greater Milwaukee said he was driving along the highway one day and noticed a job trailer...

City of Milwaukee, Miller Park settle disagreement over road access.
November 20, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The city of Milwaukee and Miller Park have settled a disagreement over road access, removing the last big hurdle for the planned $10 million new headquarters for Derse Inc. Derse is planning to move into the Menomonee...

Denver firm breaks into Madison market.
November 21, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder All it took was a stable economy and an old friend's advice to bring Denver-based Old Vine-Esser Partners LLC to Madison. "We have a partner that works in our Phoenix office that grew up in Madison and went to the...

Senior partner at Milwaukee-based Graef, Anhalt, Schloemer & Associates Inc. dies at 80.(Obituary)
November 21, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Richard N. Hay, Oak Creek's first city engineer and a senior partner at Milwaukee-based Graef, Anhalt, Schloemer & Associates Inc., died Saturday. He was 80. Richard Wanta, executive director of the Wisconsin...

RTA backers battle on in Wisconsin.
November 21, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Transit system proponents aren't happy that it'll take passage of a referendum before they get money for their systems. But, with the majority of state legislators adamantly in favor of the referendum, groups like the...

Janesville's dog days could be nearing an end.
November 21, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Sara Van Galder is a big fan of Janesville's dog park. She lives right across the street from its Palmer Park location and often takes her labrapoodle, Roscoe, over for a bit of exercise. "It's great for the...

'Leave it blank' in Waukesha's Tallgrass neighborhood.
November 26, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Jeff Franks doesn't want to look out over his back yard every morning and see "Waukesha" written in big black letters 93 feet in the air. "I just figured that anybody that didn't know where they were at this point in...

Edgerton copes with pieces of history.
November 26, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder At Edgerton's City Hall, a couple of two-by-fours brace a wall above one of the building's few windows. It's a sign of a job left unfinished, not because of a contract dispute or some similar discrepancy, City...

Sun Prairie tackles big-city challenges.
November 26, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder A lot of interested parties are keeping their eyes on Sun Prairie. The most recent set belongs to Value Place Hotels, a Wichita, Kan.-based franchise, which will go before the city's Plan Commission Tuesday to...

Price seems right for Kickapoo bridge in Soldiers Grove.
November 27, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The bridge over the Kickapoo River has been useless to the Crawford County village of Soldiers Grove since the late 1970s when Trout Creek Road, once a back door into town, closed down. The village tried to sell the...

Oregon's sports complex shrinks to ice rink.
November 27, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder In planning for a sports complex, the Oregon Community Sports Arena Board's eyes did not get too big for its stomach. They did, however, get too big for the Village Board. "They were afraid of it," Bob Strycharske,...

Milwaukee Alderman Bauman wants to trade I-94 lanes for rail lines.
November 27, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan Milwaukee Alderman Robert Bauman wants to rebuild Interstate 94 without additional lanes, and use the $200 million in savings for public rail projects. Bauman pointed out the opposition to creating new car-rental or...

Saving Rock County farmland means spending money.
November 27, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder As Rock County tiptoes into regulating development on its farmland, officials recognize the difficulty of finding the money to fairly compensate farmers wooed by developers. Doug Marklein, one of the principals of...

Edgerton edging closer to new hospital.
November 28, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Nancy Hoffman says that finally being able to see the plans for Edgerton's new hospital campus Tuesday was nice. But that full feeling of relief may not yet come until shovels hit the ground. "This is something...

Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District to require local workers on its projects.
November 28, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District is creating a system to ensure that builders hire workers from its service area. District staff members will spend the next few months working out the details, but the...

Wisconsin State Treasurer's Office to open bidding on sad, abandoned items.
November 28, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The loot ranges from diamonds to dirty tissues. There are baby teeth and umbilical cords, canceled checks and family photos and, in one safe-deposit box, some old pornography. "We don't auction those off on eBay,"...

Environmentalist rips PCB cleanup in Wisconsin.
November 28, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder Rebecca Katers is going to try very hard not to let her discouragement show, but she's tired, to say the very least. With the PCB dredging efforts having ceased on Little Lake Butte Des Morts and the Fox River for...

Technical glitch delays Mitchell Street TIF in Milwaukee.
November 29, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan This fall, the Mitchell Street tax incremental financing district plan cleared the Milwaukee Common Council without a single alderman voting against it. And this month, Milwaukee aldermen will get the chance to...

Loud voices in Milwaukee City Hall favor cutting lanes, adding rail.
November 29, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan The groups that waged an aggressive campaign against wider freeways in 2003 reunited in Milwaukee City Hall Wednesday morning to support more state money for public transit and less for highways. They came out to...

Wal-Mart on hold in Stoughton.
November 29, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder When a city's plan commission receives a two-sentence letter from Wal-Mart saying plans for a supercenter are on hold, eyebrows will rise. "We'd been meeting two times a month since May about this proposal,"...

Madison plant empty, but holds promise.
November 29, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder The city of Madison might not want to buy a vacant industrial plant, but city officials still want to know what may happen there in the future. "We didn't want companies interested in purchasing it dealing with...

Associated General Contractors of Wisconsin to offer blueprint-reading courses in Madison.
November 30, 2007... Byline: Paul Snyder There are some things that people just assume. Comedians are always funny, dentists have great teeth and construction workers read blueprints. It's their business, it's what they do. So when the Associated...

OSHA finally proposes safety rules for confined spaces in construction.
November 30, 2007... Byline: Sean Ryan In 1980, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration first announced plans to create safety rules for confined spaces in construction. On Wednesday, it finally published the proposed rule in the Federal...

With new judge, Monroe County needs new building.
November 30, 2007... Byline: Jack Zemlicka Now that the state has granted Monroe County a third judge, the county needs space to accommodate him or her. The Monroe County Board on Wednesday listened to a proposal for a new $30 million justice center to...