Mayor’s Column Febaury 15, 2025
Rohn Bishop, Mayor of Waupun
Hello Waupun!
Being mayor is a most unique job! On a school visit early in my first term a kid asked me what the most surprising part of the job was. After stumbling around for a good answer, I realized what it was. The most surprising part of this job is that the things the mayor worries about and works on at City Hall are almost totally different from what the average citizen cares about.
When I go into work as mayor, I spend my time dealing with important issues like next year’s budget, long term planning, and prioritizing projects we need to complete. I lose sleep over personal issues, how to pay for some (always expensive) needed piece of equipment, health insurance, or some unexpected issue that came up. I worry about our employees and residents, too. I don’t show up at many emergency situations as to not be in the way, but when I heard an officer fell through the ice on the Mill Pond, I rushed to the scene. I was concerned about his safety. When the apartment fire broke out, I knew it would cause several folks to be displaced, so I showed up. When our fire department had to miss a Packers game to fight a fire in subzero temperatures, I showed up to experience what they have to go through. Remember a couple years ago when we had that tactical situation on W. Brown St. and our officer had a gun pointed at him, and almost fired before the guy took his own life? I showed up at that, talking with Sheriff Schmidt at 10:30 at night.
Then there’s weather events. Severe storms, planning for snow, etc.
The goal is always to continue to keep Waupun a safe city with great services, first responders, delicious water, maintain our history, while continuing to grow, while at the same time being a responsible steward of your hard-earned tax dollars.
But, when I check my messages to call a person back, what is he upset about? A parking ticket. It’s always the parking ticket, or some other small rather insignificant thing we get the most upset about. I’m guilty of it, too, but now into my third year as mayor, dealing with all this job has to deal with, someone’s parking ticket complaint is an annoyance.
I know winter parking restrictions are a challenge. They’re a real challenge in some parts of Waupun. But our city does allow for on street parking all winter long, which most cities around here ban on street overnight parking all winter. The only restriction is if it snows, you cannot park on the street that night, or the next night, to allow the plows to clean up the city. If you’re unsure when it stopped snowing, please don’t park on the street, then you won’t receive a ticket.
The other parking issue I hear about is not being allowed to park in your front yard. This was passed because we had to many (mostly rental) properties that had more cars than available parking, and front laws were turning into mud pits. The mud was spilling on to sidewalks and it was a big slippery mess, and the properties were starting to look like Sanford and Son were opening up shop in town. The parking restriction has cleaned many of the properties up. Under the restriction, you can’t park in the front lawn, but if you have a hard surface, like concrete, pavement, pavers, block, or even gravel, you can park on that.
A Tip: If your yard isn’t a hard surface and it’s snowing, the cops can’t tell. They can tell if you’re parked in the street, and during a snow event, that’s our priority, keeping the streets clean.
Tip #2 We’re a nice city. If you have a legit hardship for parking, or have guest over for an event, if you call it in to WPD with some advance notice, they’ll cut you some slack. We’re not out to be the gestapo here. If your parking struggle is long term, come see us, I do try to help people, but if you’re just going to call me all upset and yell at me, “Where am I supposed to park my car?!” I’m not interested. Life is too short, and I’m way underpaid to put up with it. The reality is, whatever the parking rules are, some people will not like them.
Complaining is easy. Leadership is hard.
Mayor Rohn
