After an initial struggle attracting tenants, the strip mall at Rawson and Howell avenues appears to have found its niche. Parlour Salon & Spa is the latest business to open in the multi-tenant building, 7001 S. Howell Ave. Owner Nikki Ramseier relocated her South Milwaukee salon to the bigger space in Oak Creek about three weeks ago. Parlour joins Affiliated Health of Wisconsin, Great Lakes Dermatology and Hyatt Chiropractic as tenants of the building, which sat empty for most of 2012. In addition, an ophthalmology business will also open soon, according to Ramseier. She noted the building …
We tackled a lot of topics in Wednesday night's State of the City with Mayor Steve Scaffidi, who got an unofficial total of 41 questions from the 50 or so people in the audience, those following our live blog and Patch users who submitted questions ahead of time. Unsurprisingly, the Drexel Town Square development was the top issue on residents' minds, and not just the details of the project itself: the event also showed a great concern about how the development will impact traffic. Most of the traffic issues—like the placement of new stoplights on Howell and Drexel avenues, right and left …
It hasn't felt like it lately, but summer really isn't far away. For the Oak Creek Community Center, that means the start of the summer concert series. And this summer marks the 10th year of free outdoor concerts on the community center grounds, 8580 S. Howell Ave. Shows will be held on five Wednesday nights in June, July and August. The city's Celebrations Commission, which helps organize the concerts, wants to make the series' 10th anniversary a special year and is asking for the public's input on this summer's lineup. Last year's slate featured AARPer's Bizarre, the Beatles tribute band …
The way Oak Creek city leaders see it, the community is heading into a new era. As it embarks on major development projects at the former Delphi site, lakefront and Oakwood Road, the city has released a new logo as part of a major re-branding of the community. It's the first logo change in more than 20 years and will slowly begin showing up on street signage, welcome signs, business cards and all other city-branded materials. And the logo is just the start. Over the coming weeks and months, the city will unveil a new website, a "My Oak Creek" YouTube series and a social media campaign called…
A possible 2014 referendum on slashing salaries of Milwaukee County supervisors—essentially making them part-time positions—has gotten a lot of headlines in recent weeks. But as those attending a forum Thursday in South Milwaukee heard, it's far from the only part of state Rep. Joe Sanfelippo's proposed legislation reforming county government. Sanfelippo, himself a former county supervisor, explained the rationale behind his legislation to what appeared to be an evenly-split audience of roughly 200 at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center. County Supervisor Theo Lipscomb provided counter…
Update 11 a.m. Wednesday: see an animated video and renderings of the Drexel Town Square site here. Though numerous components make up the Drexel Town Square development project, it's the Meijer store that continues to be the central focus for Oak Creek residents. More than 200 residents turned out at a public meeting Monday night and got a closer look at the plans and an opportunity to ask questions of the people leading the project. Over about 90 minutes, a few general opinions about the development seemed apparent. Many people looked favorably on plans for the new downtown, where first-…
As initiations to state politics go, it's hard to think of a more chaotic way to enter than as a staffer for Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald during the 2011 Capitol protests. But that's exactly how it was for Oak Creek High School graduate and former radio host John Jagler, who became communications director for Fitzgerald right before the controversial Act 10 was introduced. With Fitzgerald one of the faces of the legislation, which put limits on collective bargaining for many public employees, Jagler and other staffers were often yelled at, threatened and followed to their cars. By the …
Those who came to Saturday's community forum ready for a fight on gun control—and judging by the NRA pamphlets distributed outside East Middle School, some were—probably went home disappointed. The forum was a departure from many of the debates happening around the country and in high levels of government following the Dec. 14 school shooting in Newtown, Ct. Five months after Oak Creek was shocked by the mass shooting at the Sikh temple, community leaders discussed how these events happen and the things any person can do to help prevent them in the future. "I wanted to make sure this wasn't a…
Just in time for Christmas, the Marathon gas station reopened at the corner of Ryan and Howell. An employee at the gas station told me the business reopened Sunday under new management. It had been closed since November; the employee said the owner had some sort of issue with the previous management, but now new management is in place and they plan to be open for the forseeable future. I've been told the owner is Mohammad Nazer, and that he also owns or used to own the building across the street that was La Terraza (He also owns Smile's Liquor, 7872 S. Howell Ave.). Nazer has not returned any…
Several major players will join Oak Creek's Drexel Town Square project, with announcements likely coming after Jan. 1, according to a story from BizTimes Milwaukee. The BizTimes report is in line with that I have been hearing as well, although BizTimes was able to get a lot more specifics: the newspaper reported that Zilber Ltd., a prominent Milwaukee residential real estate firm, and Barrett Visionary Development, which recently completed The Moderne in downtown Milwaukee, will participate in the project. Officials are also "close" to obtaining commitments from key retail tenants and have …
You can't talk about how Oak Creek was born without talking about LaVerne Gutknecht. It was Gutknecht and six others who were at the center of a now-legendary story of Oak Creek's founding: they went into hiding to stave off Milwaukee's annexation attempt and allow Town of Oak Creek residents to vote on incorporating. Because of their efforts, Oak Creek officially became a city in 1955. Gutknecht, 86, died Nov. 23. A visitation will be held from 4-7 p.m. Friday at Heritage Funeral Homes, 9200 S. 27th St. Gutknecht was the last surviving member of the group that went on "vacation," as a …
A restaurant across the street from Wheaton Franciscan Hospital is undergoing its second makeover this year. Woodside Pub & Eatery, which just opened in June at 10166 S. 27th St., has closed and will be replaced by Mazatlan Mexican Restaurant. It's not clear when the new restaurant, which was granted an alcohol license by the Oak Creek Common Council last week, will open. It appears some renovation work (including a new paint job) is under way. The new owners couldn't be reached for comment. No one was around when Patch stopped by Monday afternoon; the phone number listed to the business is …
City Clerk Catherine Roeske had one word to describe how things went at Oak Creek polling places when we spoke late Tuesday afternoon: "Strange." It certainly seems apt. West Middle School was the first stop of my day Tuesday shortly before 9 a.m. Much to my surprise, I didn't find long lines of voters waiting to cast their ballot — only about 10 people were in line when I showed up. The chief inspector told me that lines stretched out the door and down a hallway shortly after the polls opened at 7 a.m., but dissipated after that time. The same story was told at the other five polling places …
City Administrator Gerald Peterson knows Oak Creek residents have heard this all before. For more than a decade, Oak Creek has sought to redevelop the city's lakefront from long-shuttered factories to something its residents can actually use and enjoy. And for just as long, the city has been stymied, with blame pointed to the environmental problems caused by those factories. But starting next month, residents will actually start to see some semblance of progress. Crews are expected to begin working on the southern end of the 250 vacant acres along Fifth Avenue, just north of Bender Park, …
When Oak Creek police took a 25-year-old South Milwaukee man into custody in connection with a bank robbery Saturday, they did so in large part thanks to an alert security guard at Caterpillar who saw someone matching the suspect's description. Earlier this week I exchanged a few emails with that security guard, Josh Najda, and asked him how he spotted the man. Najda is a firefighter with the town of Vernon who was off duty at the time but listening to his police scanner about 11 a.m., when word came of a robbery of TCF Bank in Oak Creek. He heard the initial description of the suspect — a …
Discussions over grading practices and scales in Oak Creek will continue over the next several months, as disagreement between parents, teachers and school administrators is still evident. Teachers and administrators presented an overview of new grading practices, some of which have been the subject of criticsim within the community, in a meeting Monday night. School officials say the practices are designed to give a true indication of a student's achievement in any given class, as well as provide more consistency throughout Oak Creek High School and the district's two middle schools. Some of…
I had the honor of participating in a Milwaukee Press Club panel discussion called "Lessons Learned From Oak Creek," which took a look at the Sikh temple shootings and the city's response. The forum, held Tuesday at the Oak Creek Community Center , featured Mayor Steve Scaffidi, Police Chief John Edwards and Fire Chief Tom Rosandich. I was one of three journalists — John Diedrich of the Journal Sentinel and Kathy Mykleby of WISN-TV the others — who asked a wide range of questions about what happened Aug. 5 and the days that followed. Having the benefit of hindsight and more than three weeks …
When it comes down to it, behind just about every small business is an entrepreneur hoping to turn their passion into a paycheck. But, as many wise business advisers have noted: Hope is not a strategy. Business owners need support to turn dreams into reality. That's why Patch is pleased to announce a new partnership with SCORE, a nonprofit organization with 12,000 business experts nationwide who provide free mentoring to small business owners. The partnership makes sense because we believe that when local commerce grows, the whole community gets stronger. Patch already provides free listings …
I was finishing up a conversation with Tejpreet Kaur, a community organizer with the New York-based Sikh Coalition, when I asked her if there was anything else she wanted to say. "We're thoroughly inspired by the community in Oak Creek," she told me last week. "The courage, the strength, the optimism they have shown has been inspiring." That's funny, I said. Oak Creek residents feel the exact same way about the Sikh community. The tragic events of Aug. 5, when a lone gunman entered the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin and killed six members and injured four others, deeply impacted both groups. And in…
Farmers' struggles growing crops and dangerous conditions for fires have been two of the more high-profile effects of this hot and dry summer. Now, add stink to the list. The area on the far east side of Oak Creek has been plagued by foul odors for the past several weeks. City officials and the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewage District, which operates its wastewater treatment plant at 8500 S. Fifth Ave., have fielded complaints from residents living in the neighborhood. Jason Smith, who lives about three miles from the MMSD plant, said it reached far enough to put a cramp on his Fourth of July …
