Closing of DNR centers is meaningless stunt by state government March 27, 2009 We have a name for the bureaucratic syndrome of breathlessly announcing the need for cuts at various levels of government, and then targeting the most highly visible areas for reductions.
We call it “closing the waysides.”
It dates backs a few years, when the Department of Transportation announced that many of the north’s traveler stops would be shuttered due to budget shortfalls. These wide spots in the road, usually with a hand pump, outhouse and no staff, were simply too expensive to maintain, the department said.
The public protested, the lawmakers pushed, and the DOT got extra money for a few of the waysides.
It’s happening again.
The Department of Natural Resources has decided that, in order to meet the governor’s deficit reduction requirements, it will close most of the state’s 24 service centers, saving about $3 million annually.
This comes at a time when the DNR is proposing an overall $584.4 million budget for 2009-10 along with $75 million in fee increases for everything from boat registrations to bobcat permits (done, presumably, by mail or Internet).
We have worked with the DNR in Antigo for decades, following them as they marked trees, monitored wolves and hibernating bears, registered whitetails and ensured a healthy fish population.
We cannot say enough about their professionalism, abilities or concern for natural resources.
We have also dealt with the folks in Madison, usually when they come to Antigo mandating one thing or another, inspecting to make sure we haven’t damaged a square foot of wetlands or haven’t pulled any cattails from Antigo Lake. We understand that what they do is important for the resource, but they can be hard to like.
So now, just over a decade after the DNR announced the creation, with great fanfare, of the local service center concept—and after they spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to construct new buildings—those same people have decided to take the “service” out of the centers. Maybe they’ll set up a computer kiosk instead.
Assemblyman Don Friske, in the Republican minority, suggested the lack of local, public faces will enhance the public’s adversarial relationship with the agency.
“I think this is a public relations and a public service disaster,” he said.
But State Sen. Jim Holperin, a member of the Democratic majority, said the closure is an “all-or-nothing” decision that he’s not going to press. The Antigo Daily Journal isn’t fielding the telephone calls from all the people in Madison losing their jobs, he said, and is instead focusing only how Antigo and the northwoods will be affected. Simply put, we don’t get the big picture.
Maybe we don’t...know any good waysides for sale?
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