WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:05.300 Everybody's just going like this. Please hurry. Come on. No, exactly 00:26.540 --> 00:28.540 Sure 00:30.000 --> 00:52.000 As the nation honors fallen service members this Memorial Day on Monday, the tourism industry marks the start of the summer season. 00:52.000 --> 00:59.000 A bill in the U.S. House would re-designate the Apostle Islands as Wisconsin's first National Park. 00:59.000 --> 01:07.000 The 21 Islands and 12 miles of mainland off Lake Superior in Northern Wisconsin is already a national lake shore. 01:07.000 --> 01:13.000 Supporters say the designation as a national park would boost tourism and local economies. 01:13.000 --> 01:19.000 Republican Congressman Tom Tiffany introduced the measure and it passed committee this spring. 01:19.000 --> 01:26.000 But local governments in and around Bayfield County and the red cliff band of Lake Superior Chippewa opposed the re-designation. 01:26.000 --> 01:31.000 The county and the tribe drafted a formal resolution together opposing it. 01:31.000 --> 01:37.000 We asked Bayfield County Board Chair Jan Lee, why? And thanks very much for being here. 01:37.000 --> 01:39.000 Thank you for having me. 01:39.000 --> 01:48.000 So we've done some reporting in Bayfield kind of during the summer season and the crush of tourists can be difficult for small businesses. 01:48.000 --> 01:53.000 How would a national park designation increase those crowds? 01:53.000 --> 02:11.000 Yes, thank you. So I think to start, like you said, the tourism area here in Bayfield in particular at the gateway to the Apostle Islands hasn't been a problem in the summer times. 02:12.000 --> 02:23.000 There's never been a problem with not having enough tourists up here in the late spring, summer, early fall, basically through Applefest every first weekend of October. 02:23.000 --> 02:32.000 As a matter of fact, we're pretty much bursting at the seams in terms of what we can accommodate in terms of lodging and restaurants. 02:32.000 --> 02:38.000 And that affects workforce, of course, and we don't have housing for people up here. 02:38.000 --> 02:45.000 It's hard to have to have workforce come in that can accommodate all these tourists for the businesses. 02:45.000 --> 02:59.000 So I know that Mr. Tiffany has touted this re-designation as a boon for tourism, but we're basically looking for tourism in other directions. 03:00.000 --> 03:13.000 I think as a whole, we've done a lot of work over the last 15 to 20 years trying to create tourism in an industry up here, getting people all the way up to Northern Wisconsin to enjoy Lake Superior and the inland lakes that we have. 03:13.000 --> 03:24.000 And we've done a really good job of that, but what we've really been trying to do subsequently also is to try to do that in the shoulder seasons and in the winter to expand tourism in those areas. 03:24.000 --> 03:34.000 And the big problem with Mr. Tiffany's bill at this point in time is that we don't know where the infrastructure is going to come to support it. 03:34.000 --> 03:44.000 Infrastructure like roads and lodging and parking, but wouldn't the federal park service be responsible for that? 03:45.000 --> 03:55.000 Well, we are responsible as a county for our roads and I mean in the highway department for our county roads and County Highway 13 is what gets you up to Bayfield. 03:55.000 --> 04:07.000 It runs through Washburn, which is also a small city about 12 miles south of Bayfield, and that is also sort of a gateway point to the Apostle Islands, as well as the north of Bayfield where the red cliff, 04:07.000 --> 04:13.000 Lake Superior Band of Ojibwa live about two miles north of Bayfield is where the reservation starts. 04:13.000 --> 04:16.000 And they have treaty rights, of course, to the area. 04:16.000 --> 04:28.000 Another issue that we've been sort of trying to address is the treaty rights and then the fact that we've invited Mr. Tiffany to come. 04:28.000 --> 04:30.000 We want to be a part of the dialogue. 04:30.000 --> 04:36.000 We want to share our concerns and have our questions heard, but he hasn't come. 04:36.000 --> 04:51.000 And so we received about a year and a half ago, or we, and by that, I mean the county board and the red cliff tribal council first heard about Mr. Tiffany's bill or resolution HR 911. 04:51.000 --> 05:00.000 And when we heard about it, we found out that the resolution had basically already been written and was already on its way to Washington, D.C. 05:01.000 --> 05:08.000 Without consultation with the county board or the city of Bayfield or the tribal council. 05:08.000 --> 05:13.000 And so we never got a chance to express our concerns or ask our questions. 05:13.000 --> 05:22.000 And that pretty much left us in an area of the only option that we have left at the federal level is to enact some resolution. 05:22.000 --> 05:23.000 So that's what we did. 05:23.000 --> 05:27.000 We don't normally like to enact negative resolutions. 05:27.000 --> 05:29.000 We like to work in the positive. 05:29.000 --> 05:36.000 But this is an instance of where we felt that since we hadn't been heard or consulted that we really didn't have another option. 05:36.000 --> 05:44.000 What would you be seeking from the federal government or the federal park service to make this thing work? 05:44.000 --> 05:58.000 I think, first of all, what we've never heard is a deeper explanation of why the national Lakeshore designation is already a part of the parks. 05:58.000 --> 06:04.000 It's a part of the national parks programming of designation of land matter and bodies of water. 06:05.000 --> 06:16.000 And right now, as the national Lakeshore, it is one of the highest, if not the highest level of protection because it is a wild area. 06:16.000 --> 06:17.000 It's a wilderness area. 06:17.000 --> 06:27.000 Even though people live in these small communities on the shoreline, the lake itself and the islands are subject to very dramatic weather shifts and very cold water. 06:28.000 --> 06:46.000 As we know, if anybody who knows this area knows has been responsible for hundreds of deaths, either in ships or boats or people out kayaking or canoeing who aren't familiar with how unpredictable this very big lake, which is actually more of an inland sea. 06:46.000 --> 06:54.000 How quickly the weather can change, how cold the water is and how prepared and knowledgeable you have to be in order to embark on it. 06:54.000 --> 07:00.000 So that's one of our concerns, is just the safety of it, of it all as well. 07:00.000 --> 07:09.000 Well, we will watch this bill as it moves through and prepare to visit and do some field reporting up there. 07:09.000 --> 07:11.000 I'd love to have you come up. 07:11.000 --> 07:13.000 Take a look and join the area. 07:13.000 --> 07:14.000 All right. 07:14.000 --> 07:16.000 Jan Lee from Bayfield County. 07:16.000 --> 07:17.000 Thanks very much. 07:17.000 --> 07:18.000 Thank you. 07:25.000 --> 07:27.000 That was great. I didn't consider. 07:27.000 --> 07:37.000 Yeah, I didn't consider that piece about, you know, the safety of it, because obviously you're absolutely right. That is, yeah. 07:37.000 --> 07:42.000 The other thing I'm going to say besides the county, the other county responsibility is EMS. 07:42.000 --> 07:53.000 So if you can somehow in your future visits or arguments about it, we are, we just, and it's not a failure of the people here because we've run on a voluntary EMS system because our. 07:53.000 --> 08:01.000 Bayfield County, many people don't know is the second largest county and the most rural. We only have 16,000 people here. So our tax base. 08:01.000 --> 08:05.000 We are responsible for providing emergency services. 08:05.000 --> 08:12.000 And but in order to cover that, excuse me, we have to, you know, raise our levy. We have to raise the taxes. We have to do something to be. 08:12.000 --> 08:15.000 It's a responsibility statutorily that we have to do. 08:16.000 --> 08:20.000 And we want to do and require to do and it's the responsible thing to do. 08:20.000 --> 08:30.000 But we are shifting in our demographic to older and older people up here, more and more people are, you know, aging out of the workforce and more people are coming in retirement age. 08:30.000 --> 08:37.000 And we're trying to address the housing issue to get more working families and also to increase the workforce to help with more tourism. 08:38.000 --> 08:46.000 But what we, what we're failing at is EMS because our volunteers are aging out and we don't have a county run system. 08:46.000 --> 08:57.000 And because we're so rural, the expanse of the state, you know, we're missing calls. We don't mean to be, but we don't, we're having trouble manning our EMS. 08:57.000 --> 09:00.000 We're already in a pretty dire situation. 09:00.000 --> 09:07.000 Some of our county is doing great or doing fine, but other stations or areas of the county are really not. 09:07.000 --> 09:17.000 They are tapped out. And so that's one of the major things that we're going to try to be addressing over the next few years with the county board here within the next year or two. 09:17.000 --> 09:25.000 It's to figure out what kind of program we need to implement, whether it's a combination of local control and the individual stations and the county's involvement. 09:25.000 --> 09:30.000 Because right now it's been solely local control with individual stations and volunteers. 09:30.000 --> 09:42.000 And now we need to really, you know, ante up and we have to figure out how we can get from a failed system to a functioning, responsive 100% of time, EMS system. 09:42.000 --> 09:53.000 So that's a big concern of mine personally. That's my own personal take. Not on record as a board member necessarily, but on behalf of the board, the resolution that we pass two of them now. 09:53.000 --> 10:03.000 In 24 and 26, 25 and 26. And they both passed by significant majority, you know, 11 to 2 or something like that. 10:03.000 --> 10:11.000 So we and as well as working with the tribal council on this as our very respected neighbors. 10:11.000 --> 10:14.000 So that's those are our concerns. 10:15.000 --> 10:34.000 That is super interesting. We have a new project. Well, it's not really a project, but we have a new emphasis on rural reporting with a Wisconsin public radio reporter and a designated PBS Wisconsin reporter and videographer. 10:35.000 --> 10:43.000 And the story, the issue you just talked about, about Bayfield County and EMS is right in that wheelhouse. 10:43.000 --> 10:48.000 So expect a call on that, Madam Chair. 10:48.000 --> 10:54.000 Well, we're pretty overrun at the moment with trying to figure out we're heading into budget season. 10:54.000 --> 10:59.000 So we're trying to work with our EMS. We knew have we knew for the first time in the state. 10:59.000 --> 11:07.000 This is news. I mean, you may have heard of this already, but we have, I know you probably have to get going, but Bayfield County and Ashland County are the first. 11:07.000 --> 11:12.000 We are the first counties to collaborate and combine our dispatch service. 11:12.000 --> 11:15.000 And we just started that last year. 11:15.000 --> 11:20.000 So we're still transitioning and making that work. The transition has happened. 11:20.000 --> 11:25.000 It's going. Ashland and Bayfield County are functioning out of one dispatch center. 11:26.000 --> 11:35.000 But of course connected to that is this EMS situation. So that's the next sort of piece that we're, we really have to try to solve. 11:35.000 --> 11:42.000 So yeah, so I don't know if immediately is a, is a, is a, is a great opportunity for option for us. 11:42.000 --> 11:47.000 But I think because people are pretty, pretty consumed right now and busy with trying to figure out solutions. 11:47.000 --> 11:58.000 But yeah, anytime you could talk to Megan, Megan, Megan, quanderer is our dispatch coordinator for Bayfield County and EMS. 11:58.000 --> 12:05.000 And I could, you know, we could reach out to her and suggest that I mentioned her and. 12:05.000 --> 12:06.000 Great. 12:06.000 --> 12:08.000 Make connection if you'd like. 12:08.000 --> 12:12.000 Great. Well, thank you. No, super interesting. Really appreciate the information. 12:12.000 --> 12:15.000 Thank you for all you do. Thank you. Okay. 12:16.000 --> 12:18.000 Thank you. 12:18.000 --> 12:21.000 You too. Happy Memorial Labica. Thank you.