Category Archives: South Milwaukee

Come support our local law enforcement professionals … and bring the family!

Check out these South Milwaukee headlines, including word the Violent Femmes have scheduled a second show for the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center …

• Violent Femmes Add Two More Shows to its Wisconsin Tour (Milwaukee Journal Senitnel)
• South Milwaukee Might Triple Opioid Paraphernalia Possession Fine (NOW)
• Oak Creek Restructures Health Department, Decides not to Merge it with South Milwaukee (NOW)
• “Completely Destroyed”: South Milwaukee Couple in Puerto Rico Moved from Hotel Tower Amid Maria (Fox 6)

Also, Broofield police are searching for a man who allegedly robbed an Aldi store there, the same person South Milwaukee police suspect is responsible for a June robbery of our Aldi store.

And NOW has published a new police blotter.

From the Engineering Department …

The City of South Milwaukee has contracted with Earth X, LLC for installation of a 48″ diameter storm sewer to replace a deteriorating box culvert built in the early 1900’s that crosses 5th Avenue, just north of Drexel Boulevard. To complete the work, 5th Avenue will be closed to thru traffic between Drexel Boulevard and Manistique Avenue, starting September 25 or shortly thereafter. 5th Avenue will be detoured to Manistique Avenue and Drexel Boulevard to 8th Avenue. Signs will be posted along the detour route. The City anticipates a 4 week closure to complete the storm sewer installation and pavement replacement. Parking restrictions may be installed along the route. 

For more information on the project, click here.

This is a terrific monthly event, on many levels.

Please stop by for a free meal this and every third Thursday at First Congregational Church, 1111 N. Chicago Ave. This month, the South Milwaukee Lions are serving.

Want to get your organization involved in serving a meal? Contact the Revs. Tom and Debbie Payden at firstcongsm@att.net.

I say this a lot, but I believe it wholeheartedly: We will bring new life to our city center one property owner, one building, one business at a time. And there is some tasty news brewing in the 1200 block of Milwaukee Avenue.

Three food-based business — a bakery and two restaurants — are all making major investments in that block. Let’s head east to west …

• 1224 Milwaukee Ave. With help from our Downtown Revitalization Grant program, China Chef has brought new life to their facade, opening the front of the restaurant with the installation of new windows, as well as installing a new granite base, restoring the building’s masonry brick, and new paint. The transformation is significant. If you haven’t driven by lately, please do — and then stop to enjoy some tasty sesame chicken.
• 1232 Milwaukee Ave. Lee and Yang Lue, the new owners of this building, are hard at work on renovations ahead of the opening of their new ice cream parlor. Yep, an ice cream parlor downtown. I stopped by last week, and spent a few minutes with the Lues, as they took a break from laying the new tile floor. Things are starting to take shape, and it’s exciting to see another small local business open here. Stay tuned for more details on an opening.
• 1234 Milwaukee Ave. Schroeter’s Gluten Free Bakeshop is expanding, with owner Tim Schroeter recently purchasing the former Moxie Fitness/PJ’s Variety Store for use as additional baking space and potentially a small retail operation. Their pizza crust business is booming, and they need more space — and they’ve chosen to expand downtown over other options. That’s the best endorsement we can get.

More details to come on these projects — and others across our downtown.

I love a turn of phrase that Green Bay Packers Coach Mike McCarthy uses, when he references his teams “stacking success.” We are starting to stack success on Milwaukee Avenue, with much more to come.

What a great way to start Rocketober!

From all of the homecoming festivities to the sold-out Blues Brothers show at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center to the South Milwaukee Lions/Educators Credit Union lunch to the Beach Walk to the Food Truck Festival, it was great to see the community (and plenty from outside South Milwaukee) come together at some amazing local events.

Here is the schedule the rest of the way. New additions to this version:

• Saturday, Sept. 23: Police and Fire Department Safety Days
• Saturday, Oct. 14: Friends of the Mill Pond and Oak Creek Watercourse fall cleanup
• Sunday, Oct. 29: South Milwaukee National Honor Society Haunted Hallway

The search for a new South Milwaukee police chief is officially underway.

The Police and Fire Commission approved advertising the position at its meeting last week. You can see the advertisement here.

The goal, in working with McGrath Consulting Group, is to have a final group of candidates in for testing and interviews in late October, and a new chief chosen and in place by early January. Current Chief Ann Wellens is retiring effective Jan. 19.

Chief Wellens leaves big shoes to fill, but I’m confident we will find the right leader for this department going forward, in large part because we have the right process in place, and the right people making the decision. The mayor and council are purposely kept out of this apolitical selection process. Instead, my and our job is in many ways done — naming good, talented people to the Police and Fire Commission who are committed to doing what’s best for our community.

With that in mind, I thank Beth Blackwood, Heather Page, Rick Borowski, Kate Bernovich and Dr. Darrell Francis for their service, and wish them well in filling this critical role.

I’m bringing back Meet the Mayor, with two events starting later this month.

Here is the lineup …

• Thursday, Sept. 28: 4-6 p.m. at the South Milwaukee Downtown Market, 11th and Milwaukee Avenues. Look for City Administrator Tami Mayzik and me in the seating area near the stage.
• Saturday, Oct. 28: 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Parkway Floral, 1001 Milwaukee Ave. Stop by before you take the kids out trick-or-treating downtown.

I’d love to hear your feedback and questions on the Nov. 7 public safety referendum and any other (hopefully local) issues you see fit. Or just stop by and say hi.

Thanks to the market management and Leah and the gang at Parkway for hosting!

I’m really proud of the work we’ve done – led by our city attorney, police department, health department and others across the community – in combating drug use in South Milwaukee.

In the past year, we’ve done it through education and outreach, perhaps through our Addiction Information Resource Fair, showings of “Chasing the Dragon,” or informational sessions by the police department, with more to come.

We’ve done it by increasing many amounts in our court deposit schedule – the amount of money lawbreakers may have to pay when they commit crimes (drug crimes and otherwise).

Now we are toughening our ordinances around drug and tobacco paraphernalia.

As we stated in the ordinance to create Section 24.01(E) of our code, given its initial passage by the South Milwaukee City Council last week …

WHEREAS,  in 2016, over 300 drug overdose deaths occurred in Milwaukee County.  It is determined by the Common Council that certain paraphernalia that is used to inhale or ingest potentially fatal controlled substances, such as heroin, should carry a higher forfeiture amount relative to paraphernalia used to ingest or inhale marijuana in an effort to deter and make more difficult the use of potentially fatal controlled substances;

WHEREAS, the Common Council of the City of South Milwaukee has determined that it is in the best interest of the City’s health, safety and welfare and morals to categorize certain drug paraphernalia offenses in terms of forfeiture amount;

WHEREAS, It is determined by the Common Council that the open display and availability for sale of instruments used for inhaling or ingesting controlled substances in places of business within the City suggests and encourages the illegal use of drugs and other controlled substances by the youth of this community; that to protect the health and safety and general welfare of the youth of this community, it is necessary that the regulations herein provided be enacted;

WHEREAS, Upon the recommendation of the Chief of Police, the Common Council having found and determined that creation of such an ordinance adopting certain State offenses as municipal ordinance violations is necessary to protect the public health, safety and welfare.

What are the specifics? The council voted to …

• Adjust our deposit schedule to reflect higher “fines” for those caught with opioid paraphernalia ($1,308, up from $439) vs. cocaine paraphernalia ($565, up from $439) and marijuana paraphernalia (stays the same at $439). The opioid paraphernalia amount is an especially significant increase, in hopes of deterring people from using the drug as we, like many other communities, deal with this epidemic. This “categorized” approach to fines is pretty unique, and requested by our police department.
• Outlaw the sale to consumers of drug paraphernalia, defined as “all equipment, products, and materials of any kind which are used, intended for use or designed for use in planting, propagating, cultivating, growing, harvesting, manufacturing, selling, distributing, delivering, compounding, converting, producing, processing, preparing, testing, analyzing, packaging, repackaging, storing, containing, concealing, injecting, ingesting, inhaling or otherwise introducing into the human body a controlled substance.”  This law would now make illegal the sale of items clearly not meant for tobacco use, including bongs and certain types of pipes.
• Ban the sale and possession of tobacco paraphernalia to minors. We already ban sales of tobacco to kids; this adds products like rolling papers and pipes. We also moved to ban the sale and possession vapor smoking products pertaining to minors.

Final passage of these changes is expected at our next meeting, and I wholeheartedly support them. While combating drug use is more than just fine amounts, we have to be proactive in dealing with these issues legislatively, and we are. And I don’t want to stop here – we will always be looking for ways to make our community safer.

Rocketober is here!

The celebration of fall in South Milwaukee begins this week with Homecoming festivities, a sure-to-be-terrific concert at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center, and a full day of activities on Saturday. Then it’s food trucks  on Sunday.

Check out the schedule below, and be sure to like the Rocketober Facebook page.

• More details on The Official Blues Brothers Revue here.
• More details on the food trucks here.

One of South Milwaukee’s longstanding organizations has a new home — and with it a renewed commitment to the city it has called home for more than 50 years.

Mary Linsmeier School recently completed a move from Grant Park Plaza to South Milwaukee United Methodist Church, 1327 Marshall Ave.

I recently got a tour of the facility from David Linsmeier, son of the woman who founded the nonprofit, and I left impressed.

This is their third location in South Milwaukee after opening in 1965 at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, shortly after Mary Linsmeier began offering preschool and kindergarten classes to children in Wauwatosa — work that has grown to include full-day child care, programming and other “wrap-around” services.

From their website …

Mary Linsmeier began teaching when her own eight children were young. Having taught elementary school, she was well aware of the child’s interest in learning if the lessons were taught in a simple and interesting way. After studying other methods of teaching, including Montessori education, she concluded that the more the senses are involved in learning, the more the child would enjoy and retain the concepts.

The first mary linsmeier school was started in 1964 in response to many parents who wanted a first rate early childhood education for their children. Since that time, additional programs have been established. The success of the program is best demonstrated by the reputation that mary linsmeier schools has throughout Wisconsin.

Today, there are 10 Mary Linsmeier locations in schools, educational wings of churches or near hospitals. The South Milwaukee location is licensed for 50 kids, and they currently serve 39.

Learn more about Mary Linsmeier Schools on their website and Facebook page.

Thanks for calling South Milwaukee home!

It’s budget season, and here are some key dates to keep in mind in the weeks ahead …

• Oct. 10: Executive budget review, 6 p.m.
• Oct. 25: Proposed budget published.
• Nov. 20: Public hearing on proposed budget, 6 p.m.
• Nov. 21: City Council meets to adopt budget, 7 p.m.

All meetings are at City Hall, and I encourage you to be part of the debate.

Remember, we will be preparing two budgets this year, one accounting for the two potential results of the Nov. 7 public safety referendum.

Both versions will be bring some amount of pain, as we face continued challenges due to rising costs and reduced revenues.

To illustrate this, I give you two numbers around the property tax levy, our biggest source of operating revenue, and the impact of state-imposed levy limits …

• $10,774,142: the amount of our 2017 operating levy.
• $9,688: the amount we are allowed to increase that levy in 2018.

So, we are faced with essentially no increase. Again.

This is a challenge (and many other fully developed, small-growth communities) have been confronted with for a decade. We have met this challenge with responsible budgets that have done their best to preserve our core city services. That is getting increasingly difficult, and our budgets in recent years have reflected that.

And barring reasonable changes to levy limit law, this will continue to be the case for 2018 and the years ahead.

This is our reality. The budget is that reality in writing.

I encourage you to learn more throughout the budget process this fall.

News from around the South Shore includes a story on a proposed self-storage development at the former South Park Lanes site and the retirement of our police chief.

• City Unenthusiastic About Self-Storage Development at Former South Park Lanes Site (NOW)
• After 28 Years Police Chief Ann Wellens About to Hang up Her Badge in South Milwaukee (NOW)
• St. Francis Apartment Project Looking for  $4.8 Million in TID Assistance (NOW)
• Oak Creek Moving Polling Locations out of Schools (NOW)
• Angelic Bakehouse Expansion Breaks Ground (BizTimes)
• Zimmers Landscaping Gets Final Approval for Move to St. Francis (NOW)

Also, NOW has published a new police blotter.

The South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center keeps raising the bar on the acts it brings to our city.

The latest big name to come: the Violent Femmes!

The group is playing at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 20. The show was announced today.

From the press release …

It has been 19 years since the Violent Femmes did a special tour of small theatres around Wisconsin. That tour resulted in the live CD, ”Viva Wisconsin”. This fall they will visit 5 cities again playing small, intimate theatres. All shows go on sale Friday September 8.

Peter Jest will again be the promoter for this tour. “I am very excited and proud to be promoting these dates. I have been promoting 34 years and it is an honor to bring Wisconsin’s most famous and internationally known band back to their home state to play. The Milwaukee band that was “discovered” outside a Milwaukee Theatre by the Pretenders now will go inside 5 Wisconsin theaters playing before intimate crowds. I was at the Pretenders show in 1980 and I have promoted many Violent Femmes dates over the years. They never put on a bad show. Violent Femmes are a band that you could bring a person to one of their concerts who never heard of them and they would become an instant fan. The songs and musicianship are very unique and entertaining.”

The group has a local connection, too. Its drummer, John Sparrow, is a South Milwaukee graduate. Here is Milwaukee Journal Sentinel coverage of the news.

And here is information on the SMPAC season series, which starts Sept. 15 with the Official Blues Brothers Revue. Get your tickets now!