CONLEY COMMENTARY (WSAU) – Some of you will say, ‘Really, Chris, over a parking ticket?” Yes, over a parking ticket.
Last Friday morning, Wausau police send their automated parking-ticket car into my neighborhood. I was ticketed at 3:30 in the morning for parking at the curb, outside my own home, on the “even” part of the street on an “odd” numbered day. I’ve lived here for 19 years and was completely unaware that Wausau has odd-even parking. So, for nearly two decades I’ve parked incorrectly. And now I’ve received my first ticket and a $25 fine.
This begs some questions. Why does Wausau have odd-even parking? Why is enforcement so… non-existent? Did it have something to do with leap-day night, into March 1st… the only two-odd days in a row? And, who in city leadership decided that last Friday was a perfect night to enforce the law? Everyone who parked on my street was ticketed – several hundred dollars for the city coffers.
A day later, two items arrived at my post office box. One was my most-expensive-in-the-state water bill; $200 for someone who lives alone and is a low-usage customer. The other, a notice of a zoning violation. Some of my shrubs have grown beyond the chain link fence in my backyard and into the vacant, abandoned alley behind my property. I’m told to trim them back, or the city will do it for me and send me the bill.
Wausau is a high-contact city. Multiple times a year I get a notice from the city about… something. And the level of contact I want with city government is zero.
So now I will say it: I regret buying a home in Wausau. The people who live here are friendly. I have a satisfying job here. The schools are good. But city government stinks. Taxes always go up. You will dread opening your water bill each time it arrives. If you have an older home, the city has a partnership with political shysters to remove your lead pipes. The city has little minions who are busy, busy, busy snooping around the alleyways behind your home, lording over the people who live here. We have a woke mayor who focuses on issues that normal people don’t care about.
Here’s what would happen if the city had better leaders with common sense. The mayor would be on the phone with the police department after the ticket blitz, and would say something like “hey… we just don’t do that. There’s no reason to tick off dozens of residents by issuing middle-of-the-night parking tickets on an otherwise vacant side street.” Why needlessly antagonize our own residents? They’d say the same thing about minor zoning violations. “Hey, let’s apply some common sense to alleyways that no one uses.”
Well, I’ve reached my pestering breaking point. From now on, when my company hires new employees from out of town, I’ll encourage them to live in Weston or Schofield or Rothschild or Mosinee, where these things don’t happen. If you are considering buying a new home, trust me, you’ll be happier in a neighboring community. As for me, I regret not buying the home near Kraft Cheese, just outside the city limits.
Chris Conley
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