The Milwaukee Post

16 • Milwaukee County Post • May 2, 2014 Question of the week The Public Service Commission has ruled the city of Milwaukee must pay to move utilities for a proposed downtown streetcar. Should the city spend the money? "Words cannot truly express mine and oth- ers' utter disgust for Mayor Barrett and his plans to resurrect the last century's electric trolley system, which we called 'the Hinky- Dinky Line.' It was relevant for the times. After ripping out all the old rail lines, repaving the streets affected, removing the electrical lines, poles and whatever, he is going to use the government's pork-barrel money to re-create what will eventually be known as "Barrett's folly." Streets, business- es and utilities will become disrupted by never-ending detours, delays and inconven- iences. We as taxpayers will pay dearly, whether it be through city or county levies or utility rates increases. I choose not to spend the money on this project." – J. R. Zmuda Milwaukee "The city of Milwaukee should not pay for any utilities for Barrett's field of dreams. It should be put to the road and the sewers in Milwaukee." – MIke Guerreo Milwaukee No, no. No also to the downtown streetcar." – Pat Bristow St. Francis "The streetcar to nowhere. Why move any of the facilities? – Mike Bourdo Milwaukee "Yes, Milwaukee should pay to move the util- ity lines for the streetcar. Why should the utility company (have to pay for it)? Barrett is the one who wanted and just about the only one wants it. Most of the people are against it, and the utility shouldn't have to pay." – Marilyn Fedrin Milwaukee "No, Milwaukee should not pay to have util- ity lines moved for trains that nobody I know wants, and that's hundreds of people. Nobody wants this thing. Nobody wants their taxes raised. Nobody wants a trolley. We have a bus system." – John Wozniak Milwaukee "No. The city is dying. Poverty, crime and unemployment care basically ignored by the mayor and his puppet chief of police. Where is the leadership? Where are the tours of the neighborhoods? Where is the demand for better schools? Tom Barrett's legacy rather than a trolley is and will con- tinue to be a failed city. Poor leadership and no imagination." – Noah Borkenhagen Franklin This week's question Should tougher laws be passed to restrict predators from schools and parks in Milwaukee? Editor's note: When responding to the Question of the Week, please include your full name with spelling, phone number and city where you live. Phone numbers will not be published. Anonymous responses are no longer accepted by the publication. Call 744-6370, Ext. 15 and leave a brief answer. Readers may also send an email with a brief answer to: dbutler@conleynet.com. Post Staff MILWAUKEE – Milwaukee County Supervisor Patricia Jursik has introduced an ordinance that would require county shopping malls to provide full bus access to their main entrances. The measure was introduced after numerous attempts to convince Southridge Mall management to re-estab- lish bus service to the mall's main entrance. Simon Property Group, owner of Southridge, made the decision Nov. 1 to relocate the county's bus stop 1,000 feet away from the doors leading into the mall – a scenario that has caused controversy, particularly for seniors and persons with disabilities who might have mobility chal- lenges. Mary Mokwa, Southridge's general manager, previously issued a statement that the mall would "remain committed to everyone's safety" and the change "has improved pedestrian safety and traffic flow for our visitors." Since the decision, a number of efforts have taken shape, including a series of public events known as Get on the B.U.S.S. (Bus User Safety at Southridge). Members of the group protested last month with a walk on the north side of the Southridge mall parking lot. "If we allow Southridge to get away with this blatant discrimination against bus riders – many of whom are elderly or disabled – how can we be sure that other malls won't follow suit?" Jursik said in a statement. "We need to ensure that our bus riders have equal access not only to Southridge, but to all malls and public facilities in Milwaukee County. The resolution states that owners of shopping centers routinely allow trucks and large delivery vehicles to access their properties. The resolution also states that disorderly conduct would include interfer- ing with any Milwaukee County transit bus, including pickup or discharge of pas- sengers, on any roadway or parking lot that is held out for use of the general pub- lic for vehicular travel or on any roadway or parking lot made available to delivery vehicles of 20,000 pounds gross weight. "This ordinance would not only affect Southridge, but any other shopping center that engages in such outrageous discrimi- nation against the elderly and disabled," Jursik said. "Everyone should have equal access to our shopping centers and other public facilities. Huge delivery trucks use the mall parking lot. Why not buses? Supervisor introduces measure to restore bus access to malls By MATT MASTERSON Conley News Service WAUKESHA – Ray Cross, president of the University of Wisconsin Systems, gave the keynote speech at UW-Waukesha's annual Student Research Symposium at the school's campus on Saturday. Cross, who took over as president in January after serving as the chancellor of the UW Colleges and UW- Extension since 2011, spoke about the impor- tance of developing curiosity in students and building working relationships between undergraduates and their faculty advisers. "It begins with – do we as adults demon- strate this in front of our students?" he said. "It is a model of behavior, so as facul- ty, do we also show that curiosity for them to emulate?" More than a dozen students and faculty members gave presentations at the sympo- sium – the culmination of months of research on topics ranging from the bacter- ial antibiotic resistance of chicken to a post-mortem look at metastatic lung cancer. Cross said these are exactly the type of projects that the UW Systems need to be embracing as a whole. "Proportionally, (UW-Waukesha) is a small institution, but this number of stu- dents participating is impressive," he said. "My goal is to see this become much more commonly practiced on every campus. We know that this kind of a process, when it does well, really has a significant impact on the success of students and their future careers." Scott Silet, the library director at UW- Waukesha and organizer of Saturday's symposium, said the research projects were mostly students' ideas and they worked with faculty advisers to get their research completed. "The goal is to get them exposed to the things that they will need to be familiar with in their future jobs," he said. This spring, the UW Colleges are devel- oping a research journal in which students will have the opportunity to write a paper based on results and research that were pre- sented on Saturday, according to Silet. Cross – who has previously worked at colleges such as Ferris State, Northwest Technical and Morrisville State – said it will be the first such journal that he has come across. "I do not know of any other institution that is going to have their own research journal that they publish." he said. "It is amazing." Contact Matt Masterson mmasterson@conleynet.com UW Systems president urges research curiosity Cross

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