The Wisconsin DNR is up to no good again
Yup, the Department of Natural Resources wants to come after your piers
Way back when, in the 1990s, when Democrat Jim Doyle was governor, the state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) was run by a bunch of cutthroat bureaucrats who were ruthless in their determination to capture for the state (and for their private use, often enough) as much private property as they could. The agency was as close to being a criminal enterprise as a state agency could be, and they were ruthless when it came to what they did. We even had a saying: Pull the DNR zipper, out pops Jack the Ripper. They made up law as they went along, they broke their own rules for their private benefit, and they ruined many lives. I wrote a book about it—How the DNR Stole Wisconsin. Hundreds of people gathered in remote locations night after night on a book tour I did around the state, not because I wrote such a damn good book but because the agency had punished so many in so many ways over the years. The victims were legion, and exposing the agency through their stories finally gave all of them voice. At the end of this piece I will post just one of those stories for those who want to see just what the agency actually did to people back then. But it’s alarming stuff.
I bring it all up because we must remember the past so as not to let it happen again. For sure, after 2010, after Scott Walker was elected governor and the Republicans gained control of the Legislature, the agency was forced to settle down. But of course, as they say, elected officials come and go, bureaucrats mostly stay forever. And all through the Walker years, radical bureaucrats burrowed deep inside the agency, just waiting for their time to come again. When Democrat Tony Evers was elected, that day came. Though not nearly as outrageous as the DNR was back in the 1990s, the agency is still up to no good, as it turns out. I’ll have more reporting on that in the coming months, but for today the issue is piers.
And the DNR wants yours. Let’s take a look.
Rulemaking again, it sounds like the good old days …