Parks, tourism agency proposed

0 Comments | Milwaukee Sentinel, Feb 7, 1995 | by STEVEN WALTERS

Madison Gov. Tommy G. Thompson will ask the Legislature to create a new State Department of Tourism and Parks, two state government sources said Monday.

The new agency will be part of Thompson's plan to recommend the most complete restructuring of state agencies since the 1960s.

Thompson will outline the new agency and the justification for it in his Feb. 14 budget message to the Legislature, controlled by Thompson's fellow Republicans for the first time since 1971.

The new agency would combine the parks division of the State Department of Natural Resources with the tourism division now in the State Department of Development. It would be headed by a Thompson appointee.

"There are a lot of similarities" between the missions of the parks and tourism divisions now in separate agencies, said one source familiar with Thompson's formal budget proposal.

For example, many of the visitors lured by the tourism division visit state parks, said the source. The merger would better promote parks, the official added.

Parks are "destination points for travelers," added another official who insisted on anonymity. "But parks are precarious, financially. Parks need better promotion to remain fiscally viable."

The plan for the new agency still would leave the DNR in charge of environmentally fragile areas areas that must be protected and that the DNR does not want ruined by visitors, the second source said.

Monday, State Rep. DuWayne G. Johnsrud (R-Eastman) questioned any move to remove parks from the DNR, but Johnsrud said he was not aware of what exactly Thompson will recommend.

"Our parks are not man-made Disneylands," said Johnsrud, chairman of the Assembly's Natural Resources Committee. "They are vital natural resources that need to be managed carefully."