fbpx
Connect with us

As I See It

Gov Walker finally makes fixing roads a priority

Published

on

When elections approach, politicians tend to do things they wouldn’t normally do. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has been cutting money for public education during his 8 years in office, but in the last budget, finally provided more money for education and promptly declared himself the education Governor. During a stop in La Crosse for a speech at a meeting of the Wisconsin Counties Association, Walker dropped a bombshell when he announced he had suddenly found more money for road repairs. Walker told leaders of those counties that he would be providing an additional 50% in state aid to counties for road repairs. That certainly is good news. But what took so long? Walker has been cutting back on road spending since he first took office, while our roads have continued to crumble to the point that they are among the worst in the nation. Walker says finding the money in the budget to fix our roads was a matter of priorities. Why suddenly now is fixing our roads such a priority? While La Crosse County leaders welcome the additional state funding, it appears it is too little too late. La Crosse county will get an additional $1.3 million in road repair money from the state, but that money won’t go very far. It would cost more than $100 million to fix all the roads that need repair in La Crosse County. Hundreds of miles of roads in our county are in poor shape. This extra money will allow for the fixing of perhaps a couple of those miles. It is good that Walker has finally prioritized fixing our roads, but the fact remains that has not been a priority until Walker found himself in a tight political race.

Scott Robert Shaw serves as WIZM Program Director and News Director, and delivers the morning news on WKTY, Z-93 and 95.7 The Rock. Scott has been at Mid-West Family La Crosse since 1989, and authors Wisconsin's only daily radio editorial, "As I See It" heard on WIZM each weekday morning and afternoon.

Continue Reading
1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. William J Feehan

    September 27, 2018 at 11:21 am

    Scott you opinion is a lot of drivel. First off the Governor and Republicans funded roads by $1.2 billion to fill the whole left by Jim Doyle https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/promises/walk-o-meter/promise/1199/work-legislature-repay-raids-transportation-fund-p/

    Secondly, the Governor’s current budget is the largest increase in local aids in 20 years.

    Thirdly, Tara Johnson wants a $5-6.6 million tax increase, so $1.4 million (the number she used on WPR with me on Tuesday) is a huge help.

    Lastly, the county has seen revenue increases of $6 million in the last six years and guess what? Road funding has not gone up much. In fact they didn’t even spend the whole $60K increase this year on roads, the highway budget went up $51K.

    When are you going to do a little research and hold Tara Johnson and county board accountable?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *