The research in your paper is magnificent

Dear Editor,

I just wanted to write to say I recently decided to subscribe to the Bay View Compass because of the quality of the research and writing I have seen in it. I also have a specific compliment on the [February 2010] issue. I don’t often submit comments, but I feel I must.

Prior to subscribing, I would pick up a free copy from the “freebies” rack at Stone Creek Coffee and Wild Flour Bakery. The first time I read it, I found it had: 1.) stories unique to Bay View that I would not find anywhere else, and 2.) really excellent research and quality of writing on Bay View historical topics of interest.

After a few months, I found myself making a conscious effort to look for the Bay View Compass. The outstanding reporting, research, and writing continued. Finally, I felt I could not miss an issue, so I paid my $25 and subscribed.

The February 2010 issue points this out. Of the many really good articles inside, the one that made my jaw drop was “Three ships wrecked off St. Francis coast” by Anna Passante. Tremendous original research, well written. Just excellent. Even pictures of [similar] ships. Magnificent. I haven’t seen reporting like that in years, and I have two college degrees and grew up in the newspaper business.

I stopped reading the Journal Sentinel long ago because its reporting lacks research, the headlines are poorly written, and the writing style is no longer professional but conversational, which is inappropriate for a serious journalistic publication. I feel uplifted that somebody in America still knows how to actually do research and write professionally. A breath of fresh air, at last.

A good description of a successful restaurant is this: “Good food, good price, good service.” Likewise, a description of a successful newspaper is this: “Professional research, professional writing, subject matter of interest to its readers.” Stay focused on Bay View, stick to the fundamentals, and you’ll continue to grow.

Doug Mintline
Bay View

Call your representatives to support transit

Dear Editor,

Kinnickinnic Avenue has struggled over the years to develop a vibrant and useful business district. The possible end of Milwaukee County Transit looms as yet another warning to each business owner (and their customers) along our business “strip.” In fact Bay View is served by four bus lines, which bring customers and employees from South Milwaukee, Bayshore, the airport, Riverwest, the western edge of the county, and neighborhoods between. The bus is ideal because our street does not (yet) have large swaths of parking lots.

This vital transit service could come to a screeching halt if our bus system is dismantled. It could happen.

But we can take action today.

All four funding sources for transit are drying up: property tax, fare box, federal and state support. Most cities use a small sales tax dedicated to transit. The bill in Madison provides this remedy. As the economy renews itself the sales tax in Milwaukee County will deliver money to fix old buses, purchase new ones, and rebuild the kind of service that will draw people out of their cars as gasoline prices soar again.

If the bus system collapses-and it will without dedicated funding-100,000 jobs will be inaccessible to transit (according to UWM’s Center for Economic Development), isolating whole neighborhoods from jobs.

Urgent legislation is pending in Madison. It is important for legislators to hear from their constituents now. Keep in mind that this transit bill will take transit off the property tax, a net benefit for Milwaukee County property owners.

Bay View voters should call Representatives Jon Richards and Chris Sinicki, and Senator Jeff Plale. While these three are on record in favor of this legislation, your urgent calls to save our buses will help our reps convince other reps to vote “Yes.” While it’s clear to Milwaukeeans what must be done, we have yet to persuade our elected representatives. Your call will make a large difference.

Sincerely,

Bill Sell
Bay View

The kindness of strangers

Dear Editor,

Please let me acknowledge the kindness that was extended to me Tuesday, Feb. 16 at Hi Fi Cafe. I went there to meet with a guy who was going to help me with a technical question. He did not show up, but there was a very helpful guy named Gary who ran the software that I had questions about. I just wanted to make a sincere comment about the nice kids we have here in Bay View. I offered to buy him a cup of coffee but he declined. So I gave him a tangerine.

Joyce Grant
J. Grant Painting
2201 S. Allis St.
Bay View

My homemade electric vehicle

Dear Editor,

There is a lot of talk about electric vehicles that are coming to the market soon such as the Chevy Volt, Audi electric, etc. At $100,000 a pop, current electric vehicles such as the Tesla Roadster are simply too costly for the average consumer. Many people, like myself, have taken it on ourselves to build our own electric vehicle instead of waiting for an affordable electric vehicle.

My first attempt at electrifying a vehicle is on a reverse trike. A trike is a three-wheeler, two wheels in the back, one in the front. A reverse trike has two wheels in front, one in the back. The trike is powered by a 48-volt DC shunt mount motor rated at four horsepower. Three 12-volt batteries supply DC power to the motor and are controlled by a 36-volt Curtis controller. The Curtis controller basically pulses the battery power that is supplied to the motor through a 5,000-ohm potentiometer (variable resistor). The potentiometer is mounted on the handle bar and is controlled by the thumb.

One of the reasons I decided to electrify a trike is that it’s an open-air vehicle much like a motorcycle, but it does not require balancing. The power-to-weight ratio of a trike is close to a race car, so the performance is much better than a typical car. It’s a lot of fun to ride around.

A key feature of this trike is that 90 percent of the parts are reused. The fenders are from old rain barrels. The motor is from an electric forklift that was deemed fit for the junkyard. The controller came from an old electric golf cart. Batteries are from a computer UPS (uninterruptible power supply). Cables are used from an industrial company. Frame came from a Honda 750, old bed frame, and some new DOM (drawn over mandrel) tube steel. The front tires and wheels came from a race Acura. The speedometer is actually an airspeed indicator from a Cessna.

To me there is no such thing as junk. Imagine, if you will, living in a spaceship. You cannot throw anything out to space and you cannot take anything in; whatever you produce will stay with you in the spaceship. We live on this spaceship, it’s called Earth. Whatever junk we produce we have to recycle-put to good use in the next reiteration of its life. This trike is a example that it can be done-we can make something out of so-called junk.

It took me about six months to scrounge around for parts and one year to build the trike. There is a wide range of expertise one would need to build an electric vehicle: welding, electrical, mechanical, hydraulics, pneumatics, project management, plus a lot of perseverance and ingenuity.

The final cost was $800. This trike has been ridden the whole summer of 2009, mainly in Bay View, but it’s made a few trips between downtown Milwaukee and Bay View.

This trike does not produce any tailpipe emissions, does not need any gas station, but the most wonderful thing is that it is totally silent. It takes six hours to charge this trike using the mains and it can be ridden around for 20 miles.

Swee Sim

Future Green, Bay View

Sim tells the Compass at least three people have expressed interest in him building them a similar trike, which is licensed as a moped. If 10 or more people expressed serious interest, he said he could get a factory to make the frame and he could assemble the vehicle.

Asian carp could be golden spike in Great Lakes’ coffin

Dear Editor,

I am a third-generation commercial fisherman, and have watched and lived the pain that these wonderful lakes are experiencing. Unfortunately, the negative events the lakes are experiencing have been caused by the intelligence (or lack thereof) of mankind.

Once again, from my wheelhouse chair I sit and watch as, even with the warning signs up about the carp for the last several years, nothing really gets done until it’s too late. The system mankind has developed to “manage” our natural resources has once again failed us and the Great Lakes. Even after the facts are before us, nothing gets done.

It started with the seaway, allowing invasives in from overseas, and now they’re invading from the back end of the lakes via a manmade sanitary canal. The lakes are now under siege-directly related to man allowing things to operate at the status quo (for the benefit of big business) at the expense of our magnificent lakes and what they had to offer.

With the dramatic change in the lower end of the food chain (documented to have been caused by the European invasives) most of the Great Lakes native species are in serious trouble-the carp will certainly be another nail in the coffin, if not the golden spike. The food chain problems have been directly linked to the population problems that our commercial species have had and continue to have. In nature, everything is dependent on the start of the food chain. Once our commercial species fail, the sport and recreational species will soon follow. So how can we continue to let this happen?

The status quo is not acceptable. Unfortunately, as a shepherd of the herd of fish out here, I think it’s all too late. The Anderson family will not have a fourth-generation Great Lakes commercial fisherman, unless it’s fishing for invasive species (maybe as a type of bounty hunter)-soon that’s all that will be available. Only if they can figure out how to survive after all the native species are completely displaced.

Daniel Anderson

President, Paragon Fish Corporation

5405 S. 23rd St.

Milwaukee, Wis.

Two dogs rescued at Stone Creek

Last August and again last November, a different dog was rescued at Stone Creek Coffee, 2266 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., according to Stone Creek Vice-President Athena Agoudemos.

Here’s the story about how we rescued the first dog. Natalie and I were wrapping up all of the things that we needed to do just before opening the doors on Wednesday morning. The lights were on, the music was playing and the juice had been set out. The only thing left was to carry the plant stand outside. Just before we lifted the steel stand, I noticed a stray dog standing near the bus stop across the street. It quickly noticed us and ran across the street.

The dog was a very friendly beagle, and it was very excited to see us. It had a collar, but not a tag. Natalie held onto the dog, and I ran across Allis Street to talk to one of our neighbors who was walking his dog. I asked him if he could spare a leash for the day, and he said that he couldn’t. After that, I went inside to find some twine that could maybe be used to hold the dog. While I was looking for twine, our first customers of the day started to trickle in. I helped them as quickly as I could, and the neighbor from across the street must have had a change of heart, because he came in with a leash for us to use.

While I was helping customers, Natalie made sure we still had a dog to turn in. He tried to run up the street, but she chased him down, and he tried to run into the store, too. After we got the leash we tied him up to the railing near the front door. The trickle of customers was becoming more steady, so Natalie and I didn’t have a lot of time to call the police or the animal shelter. It turned out, however, that we didn’t need to, as a regular customer recognized the dog as his neighbor’s. He got his mocha and then went to go knock on their door. We didn’t even know if the neighbors would be home, so we were still trying to figure out who to call to take care of the matter all the while making drinks. Not much later, the neighbor, a woman with tears in her eyes, came to be reunited with her best friend. It wasn’t easy to figure out what to do with this dog or how to handle this unusual situation, but with everyone pitching in, it sure made for a great ending.

Ben Bowman

Manager, Stone Creek Coffee

P.S. I’m a sucker for these things, but I just wanted to let you know that it’s happened again. A stray dog wandered to us, and instead of not caring, Kelly took the dog across the street to her apartment. Unlike the last time we rescued a dog here at the store, however, this dog had a tag. The dog spent the morning in Kelly’s bathroom; meanwhile Kelly called the owner a few times. Finally on lunch break, the owner called the store, and said she was on her way. I watched the counter while Kelly and the dog’s owner went across the street, where she was joyfully reunited with her puppy.

Fire department closings are an unnecessary risk to taxpayers

On Dec. 27, 2009, fire department administrators began the practice of fire apparatus “brownouts” around the city. A brownout is the temporary closing of an engine or truck company to try and save money, staying within the 2010 budget handed to the fire department by the Common Council.

What it means to the taxpayers is it will take a little longer in some cases for the fire department to respond to you, or your neighbor, in time of need. In Milwaukee, the fire department responds to anything you determine to be an emergency-anything! The reason for responding to everything is the response time. No one gets there faster than the fire department when you call 911 and say, “I have an emergency.” Firefighters are equipped with the ability to, at the minimum, remove or rescue people from any hazard. Seconds count when responding to a rescue. Any time a fire apparatus is being closed within the city, precious seconds or minutes could be added to the response times.

As of this writing, fire administration has announced the closings for the first two periods, a period being 27 days. Engine 23 (2130 W. Oklahoma Ave.), Engine 39 (8025 W. Bradley Rd.), and Truck 9 (1551 N. 30th St.), have been closed down starting Dec. 27, and will be closed through Jan. 31. The next cycle has Bay View’s Engine 11 (2526 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.), Truck 15 (5335 N. Teutonia Ave.), and Engine 24 (4927 W. Fiebrantz Ave.) closed.  »Read more

Respect old Pieces of Eight look and feel

Dear Editor,

What do you want the old Pieces of Eight restaurant (located on Municipal Pier north of Discovery World, most recently doing business as Harbor 550) to look like when it is scheduled to reopen next spring?

The restaurant’s corporate parent, Specialty Restaurants of Wisconsin, Inc., closed the facility last year. This past August, Milwaukee’s premier philanthropist, Michael Cudahy, bought out their lease (reportedly for around $1 million). The expectation then was that the site would be used for a new building for UWM’s School of Freshwater Sciences, and/or by the Milwaukee 7 business boosters for a water institute (representing an estimated 120 companies in southeast Wisconsin doing business in the freshwater industrial sector), or some combination of the two. Shortly thereafter, the relationship between Mr. Cudahy and UWM soured, apparently because of disputes about who would control the development.

With the larger plans for the site scuttled, on Oct. 6, Mr. Cudahy came before the Finance and Personnel Committee of the Milwaukee Board of Harbor Commissioners with concept plans for remodeling the restaurant so that it could be opened next spring. Both the committee and the full board (two days later) approved the plans, allowing them to move to city departments for permitting.

The concept plans included a new kitchen, new windows, converting the existing two-level dining area to a single level (with a balcony opening in the center of the north wall), a garden area in place of the pond, extension of the shoreline trail around the building’s east end to connect with existing trails, and replacement of the windowed cupolas with spire-like cupolas similar to those seen in American Colonial-style architecture. No representation of the color/paint scheme was presented.

Mr. Cudahy’s restaurant partners are Bartolotta’s restaurants, operators of several local top-end eateries, including Lake Park Bistro. Mr. Bartolotta suggested average checks would be in the $45 to $48 range. A few harbor commissioners suggested a café section with lower prices to allow a wider clientele to enjoy the facility.

If you have fond memories of the look and feel of Pieces of Eight as it has been since it opened in 1969, with its sea-green, low-slung 1960s beach-house profile, reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie School, and want to continue enjoying the restaurant with the same look and feel until the lease expires in 2018 (along with an opportunity for a more affordable menu), then it is important that you contact your elected officials and the city of Milwaukee Historic Preservation Commission (286-5707), and tell them you want an upgraded restoration, and not a style-changing remodel.

Gregory Francis Bird
Bay View

KPOW: Protect public water

Dear Editor,

The Milwaukee Water Works drinking-water system is one of the best in the nation. Our water is clean and inexpensive. We are situated on the most bountiful source of freshwater on the globe. But in a desperate response to our city’s financial crisis, the Milwaukee Common Council is considering giving up control of our city’s most valuable and essential resource: our water.

KPOW, a coalition of local organizations that stands for Keep Public Our Water, stresses that the privatization of our city’s most critical resource is not the way to solve the city’s financial problems. Bay View residents are on board-over 200 people rallied at City Hall in June to show alderpersons that their constituents would not tolerate the loss of control of the future of our water. Residents cited rate increases of up to 200 percent, decline in water quality, and system deterioration as classic marks of privatization in other cities.

After the rally, the Milwaukee Common Council’s Steering and Rules Committee voted June 15 to put on hold a proposal to hire an advisor to help the city solicit multinational corporate bidders for a 99-year lease of the Milwaukee Water Works. While that action will in theory stall the effort to privatize Milwaukee’s drinking water, alderpersons have made it clear that the proposal may resurface very soon. And Milwaukee residents are not sitting easy.

Over 60 people met with Third District Alderman Nik Kovac in August at the Urban Ecology Center to ask him to sponsor a resolution stating that the city of Milwaukee will continue to own and operate the Milwaukee Water Works as a public entity and will not privatize the water utility in any manner, nor lease the utility’s operations to any private entity either through a concession or management lease.

Kovac told the group that he would work with KPOW to sponsor the resolution. He is currently in the process of getting the resolution scheduled for a committee hearing where a vote can take place. It is important that the council pass this resolution to send a clear message to the citizens of Milwaukee and members of Mayor Barrett’s administration that the Common Council is not interested in pursuing privatization of the water system as a mechanism to solve the city’s financial problems.

As Milwaukee leaders work to solve the city’s mounting budget problem, they should consider an array of ideas and solutions. However, giving up public control of Milwaukee’s most precious public resource, water, should not be one of them. We have built one of the highest rated public water systems in the country. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has endorsed Milwaukee’s drinking water quality as among the highest in the nation. The plan Milwaukee’s leaders are now considering, however, puts that distinction at risk by giving one private company control of our entire water operation for the next 99 years in return for general operating revenue.

For decades, public control and ownership of Milwaukee’s water operations has resulted in a system that reflects our values and priorities. We’ve decided to put a premium on water quality, access, and cost efficiency, which has made our city a national leader. Handing over control to a private company will surrender Milwaukee’s water to a vastly different set of priorities. In the hands of a private corporation, we will have little say and little ability to make sure that our values don’t take a back seat to a company’s profits and the bottom line.

In these tough economic times, we need to be able to trust our elected officials to safeguard our most essential resource to life and future economic growth in Milwaukee by keeping Milwaukee Water Works publicly owned.

KPOW is urging you to call your alderperson at 286-2221 to express your views on this critical issue. For more information and to get involved, contact KPOW using the information below.

Corinne Rosen, KPOW

Corinne Rosen is a Milwaukee resident and member of KPOW, a diverse coalition of Milwaukee area organizations working together to fight the privatization of Milwaukee’s Water Works. The coalition includes environmental groups, neighborhood associations, faith-based organizations, civic activists, unions, youth groups, and other concerned citizens. To get involved, email corinnerosen@yahoo.com or call (414) 460-3389.

Steve Skalecki’s green giants

Dear Editor,

One of my favorite summer daily rituals is strolling my Bay View neighborhood with my red wire coat Irish Terror (oops, I meant terrier but my neighbors would say I had it right the first time). I admire the gardening creativity and artistic diversity applied so aesthetically in the small urban spaces in the yards of Bay View. I never stop at the curb appeal of the front yards because the back and side gardens are too good to miss, so the red canine and I weave through alleys and up and down side streets endlessly.

For the Luce, the main objective is squirrel watching. As for me, I enjoy soaking in the visual beauty created by our community of talented gardeners.

When friends visit, I take them for garden walks and show them the neighborhood gardening gems. They are always impressed with the effective use of space and the fabulous diversity of plants and designs. Mostly though, they are awed by the green giants.

While it is hard to say which garden in Bay View is the most visually interesting because there are so many beyond-gorgeous yards, the most impressive gardener is easy to choose. Hands down, it is my neighbor Steve Skalecki. Steve is a master gardener who would make the horticultural designers at Boerner Botanical Gardens turn green with envy. Seriously! This guy is a gardening genius! He is responsible for the green giants in Bay View.

After years of envying his prolific gardening successes, this year I practically begged Steve to help me with one plant. “Just one plant, Steve. A tomato plant. Please help me grow a tomato plant.” Steve mulled it over for moment, remembered how my tomato plant from last year fared, and accepted my request for gardening help.

Steve bought a six-inch Mountain Fresh tomato plant from Stein’s for $.50 in April and nurtured it along in his own greenhouse before planting it in just the right spot in my yard. He found the spot that had the optimal sunlight conditions, but he shook his head when he tested the soil. “You have bad soil, Lynn. I’ll need to get rid of it and bring in topsoil and peat moss. Where do you want to go with it?”

He removed soil, added soil, worked the soil, and planted the tomato plant in late May. He built a greenhouse of clear plastic and kept control of the plant’s climate conditions. By June the plant was taller than my grandson. By July the plant was taller than Steve.

My attempts to help Steve nurture the plant were futile. One day I put the clear cover over the plant on a 85-degree day and nearly fried it. Another day, I accidentally dropped a rock on it, knocking off the main shoot. Yet my plant grew amazingly tall and wide until it looked more like a tree than a plant. Steve says my plant is an A-minus. (My neighbors across the alley, Lorena, and Steve’s parents Art and Clara, have grown plants much taller than mine, earning the grade of A-plus.)

Steve has a multitude of gardening giants, marigolds the size of azaleas, beets the size of melons, canna lilies the size of high school basketball players, and pansy plants that are larger than my dog. Incredulous, right? No one believes it until they see his green giants. And then they take pictures of themselves next to his tomato plants or marigolds because they know no one will believe them.

Lynn Rinderle

Bay View

Loosen tree border planting restrictions

Just what is a garden? For some it’s a lawn and perhaps a few “traditional” horticultural plants like marigolds, petunias, or geraniums along with the ubiquitous foundation shrubs of yew and juniper highlighting a building rather than the landscape.

For others, including me, gardens are an opportunity to participate in a deeper process-to nurture and be nurtured by a part of the natural world. Gardens offer a spiritual high, alleviating the stresses and anxieties of urban living without recourse to addictive substances or mind-numbing behaviors.

Gardens with native plantings, as opposed to lawns which are essentially sterile deserts, become microscopic ecosystems. These pearls of the emerald chain of this Earth also provide other environmental services. They retain and absorb rainwater, reducing the risk of flooding. They create habitat, attracting and feeding butterflies, bees, dragonflies, and those sweet goldfinches. They even cool down our neighborhoods in summer.

Because they perform these beneficial services, the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District promotes rain gardens. National Wildlife Federation certifies residential yards that provide wildlife habitat. And cities like Portland, Seattle, and our neighbor Chicago are encouraging their residents to plant on the so-called parkways-the area between the sidewalk and the street (in Milwaukee, they’re known as tree borders).  »Read more

Please save the Hoan Bridge

Dear Editor,

We should keep the Hoan Bridge and not replace it with a lower height bridge. If a lower height bridge were to replace it, then a drawbridge would have to be raised every time a boat came into Milwaukee Harbor.

What good is a freeway when even a small boat can stop all vehicle traffic at inconvenient times? The freeway system was created to move traffic through all areas with minimum interference. I can just picture rush-hour traffic being held up so that a small boat can go under the bridge while traveling to open water. Where are your realities?

Many years ago, the Bay View Rolling Mill offered to build a bridge to cross over the Milwaukee Harbor. The city of Milwaukee refused this offer. Why go back to the horse-and-buggy days and install a bridge that has to be raised any time a boat wants to enter or leave the harbor? It would make as much sense as making the speed limit 20 mph on the freeway to prevent accidents from happening.

Where are we getting these geniuses who do not want progress and only want to waste money of ours on useless projects? Our leaders should use their God-given brains to think this matter over.

Do you want traffic to move smoothly or do you want it to move like our politicians in answering our problems? Please contact your local politicians to protect the Hoan Bridge and to repair it rather than replace it.

John Manke

South Milwaukee

Next Page »