Congratulations to Dick & Milissa

Well, the election is over for now. Our candidate's Woulfe & Hamann are going to go onto the big election day that will soon be upon us.

I hope everyone takes the time to really look at these two. The amount of time and dedication they both put in researching and providing the "true" numbers and stats is what this school district needs. With this school study project really taking all kinds of turns we need people like these two to sort it all out. I am amazed that this firm hired to look into this has basically said we need 30-40 million dollars worth of remodeling and or building. I am not convinced.

I have read on the Observer a comment about if this firm Plunket and something or other is going to do more that just do this study. That is, will they be the ones we use if something is built or remodeled? Well, I believe they will. Should the district have had someone else to do a study? What about our own people from within or in the district? I am sure there are many people that are well qualified that could have assisted. The district is always having public committee's doing one thing or another such as the budget process this year. Why not this study?

Twenty four thousand dollars was spent by this school district to have the study done. Money that I believe was not well spent. The study pointed out many issues that could and probably were already on the minds of the staff and others. I still can't believe that this study says a classroom needs to be such and such a size. My goodness, classes have been held in all of our schools for years and everything seemed to be just fine. Now Plunket says they are too small. I never have seen anything like this.

People, you need to pay close attention to this issue and become involved. This is your school district and money. You need to let the board members know what you think.

You need board members like Dick and Milissa to help a couple of the other board members keep things in check.

I wish I had a job of a weather man

As my old buddy use to say "Holy Cow" . I heard on Friday from our local Madison weather guys everything from 3-5 inches to 20 inches for the entire weekend. Charlie Sartino said maybe an inch or so on Friday evening. Well let me tell ya we got about 7 inches in Evansville last night.

I have been saying for years that they should put a window in the weather office at all of the TV stations so they could see what is going on. Maybe, they might want to give one of us in Evansville a call or better yet set up a weather station in Evansville. Maybe they would get better information for those of us "down south".

The roads were not too bad this morning. That is, the main ones. The side roads had not even been touched much in the early hours of the morning. Tonight is yet another story.

They are calling for a lot of snow tonight. The wind is going to be blowing and that will make it real bad for anyone that HAS to be out. You know there are the people that work evenings and the old night shift. Be careful.

Hey, take a look at the web site I posted as a link today. It is about the best one I have seen yet. I set it up just for us in Evansville. You can switch radar sites easy on this site. One of my buddies put me onto it. I like the labels it puts on the storm cells and shows you what way it is moving to. Have fun with it.

Angus House is gone, AKA (The Old Coach House)

I am saddened to see this old restaurant gone. At least no one got hurt. There was 3 apartments upstairs that people lived in. It looks like about everything was destroyed in the fire from those apartments. The owners now are from Brodhead. I would like to say to them my thoughts are with them. I know it must be very hard on them. When you have a business and try to build it up it involves your hopes, dreams and way of life. That all went up in smoke and flames on February 13, 2007 in the early morning hours.

I remember this restaurant as the Coach House. I can remember when Lonnie Gregnono, (spelling may be off) owned the restaurant. I remember that you could hardly move in there on Friday and Saturday nights. It was the place to go out to eat. The food was great, the people were friendly and the staff knew how to serve you. After Lonnie left the Allens owned it. Tom and Terry kept a fine tradition going. People still gathered just as before but, maybe a little smaller crowd. Things change ya know, over the years on going out for dinner. Also, people started going to Janesville and Madison for dinner too. Years later Brady Bauer and his mom and dad got into the restaurant business. Brady fixed things up and changes things around inside in the bar area. It really looked nice.

I can say that many a business and people had gatherings in that restaurant over the years. I know of at least 2 waitresses that have been working there for more than 25-30 years. Mrs. Falstad and Kathy Crull. They were so nice to you when you went there for your meal. It says something when people like this would stay working at the same place for many different owners over the years. They must have loved the job. The people that ate there also were faithful all of these years.

The old place will be missed.

Wisconsin Basketball Badgers Are #1

Hey, this is a first for the badgers. Never before has the Badger basketball team been in this spot before. Hard work and dedication by the players, coaches and fans made this all possible. What an honor for everyone.

Keep up the good work guys.

Get out And VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tuesday is the day to vote for our school board. I recommend Woulfe and Hamman. They have the time and have gotten involved long before the election was thought of. I like how they both research and provide facts not fiction at board meetings. I know they have provided cost figures on the 1/2 day kindergarten and the 4 year old kindergarten issues.

They have the time to dedicate to this position. Please get out and vote on Tuesday, February 20Th. It is your right and obligation. How else can you make comments for or against something that interests you if you don't even vote for someone to represent you. Thanks.

Get Involved in Your School District

A study was just completed not to long ago on the needs for space and projections on the growth of our student population. The study also told us the problems with maintenance issues and what room the company and the staff thought was needed. Many people don't have good thoughts on this study.

Now is the time for you to get involved. Meetings are coming up at the building and grounds meeting and others. People, you must start paying attention to what is going on. Many say they do not agree with what is being brought out. Please take a look on the Observers web site and learn more. I don't want to repeat things so see Dick's site.

If you don't watch out we may be building a new school. I don't think we need one. I can't believe that the company that did the study is the same one that will be used to build a school too if that was to happen. Does not make sense to me but, we will have to wait and see. Start attending meetings and let the board members know what you think.

When do the schools close due to bad weather?

Many have commented on this very question this week. Evansville School District finally decided to close school Monday because the buses would not start according to Supt. Carvin. The issue many people have is what would have happened if the buses would have started? School would have been held?

First of all the bus company said they can always get the buses going but, it was too cold to have the kids out. Parents and others said it was too cold to have kids out waiting for a bus and for kids to be walking to school. The Supt. of schools says they use a windchill thing and how many minutes you should be out. Well let me tell you some kids are out longer than this 10 minute thing Supt. Carvin talks about. Some kids walk for 20 minutes. They don't have buses to ride.

I think the School Board should take a look at this policy. Common sense goes a long way here I think, and it was not used in this case. The parents also had a problem about how long it took for our district to call school off. They would like to have more notice so they can arrange for daycare. I don't blame them in this case. There was at least 30 schools that already said on Sunday that schools were closed. Our Supt. Carvin did not make the call until after 5am Monday morning. That is just not right.

Now the kicker is that this day that was missed will have to be made up. What ever happened to having 3 or 4 days built into the school year for bad weather days? Ya know, the teachers have all kinds of "Staff Developement Days" and those are built in. What do you think??