Time for a change

Change doesn’t sit well with some people.

They like the status quo. They can rely on it. They know what to expect. People find comfort in predictable outcomes. And when somebody comes along and messes with that comfort zone, people tend to get angry.

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources would do well to keep that in mind as it pursues a permitting process for piers throughout the state. The DNR has omitted hundreds of thousands of piers from permit consideration, but it’s still targeting about 80,000 piers for oversight. That oversight and those permits will cost money.

And even though 80,000 is only a fragment of the total number of piers, it still represents a lot of potentially angry people. The DNR’s proposal will hit homeowners, home builders, marine contractors, marinas, realtors and probably a handful of kids with fishing poles who won’t be happy when the family pier gets yanked for a shorter one, putting that fishing hot spot out of reach of even the best cast from a young arm.

Anger is just a pitfall of change. It doesn’t mean change is always bad, although in the case of the DNR, that remains to be seen.

And the fact that a story on the DNR’s pier regulations even appears in the pages of Wisconsin Builder represents a significant change on our part. You can read the story in a new section of the magazine called On the Home Front. It replaces City Lights, and it’s our way of reaching out to the state’s residential construction industry to stay on top of the stories that mean the most to them.

On the Home Front isn’t the only change in the magazine. Candace Doyle wrote her last The Last Word column two months ago, and we’ve since replaced it with A Page from the Past, a calendar feature that explores the history of the construction industry, Wisconsin and the world each month.

We did our homework before making these changes, keeping your interest as a top priority. But change won’t succeed without input, so we turn to you for your thoughts on the magazine additions, but, more than that, we want your ideas. We want ideas for calendar entries, On the Home Front topics and anything else you would like to see in the magazine. Send your comments and ideas to chris.thompson@dailyreporter.com.

We’ll remain optimistic that the response to our changes will take a more positive spin than that directed at the DNR.