Heavens, guys. If you are going to try to BS your way through a controversy, don’t leave public records in your wake.

Gov. Jim Doyle and his major embarrassment, WisDOT Secretary Frank Busalacchi, are acting like the decision to reconstruct and unnecessarily expand North-South I-94 before reconstructing the Zoo Interchange was made before Doyle ever set foot in the governor’s mansion.

That’s total crap.

In February 2004, a good year after Gov. Jim Doyle took office, his Wisconsin Department of Transportation set priorities for freeway reconstruction. First came I-94 from the state line to the Mitchell Interchange, then came the Zoo Interchange to Richfield, then came I-94 from State Highway 16 to the Marquette Interchange.

These three projects were in “Bucket A.”

Said the WisDOT spreadsheet:

“Bucket A will be the first group of Corridors to be started depending on funding approval and resources available. The order or priorities within Bucket A is the order in which they are listed. This order has been chosen based on the Freeway Implementation Team’s recommended strategy to prioritize, SEWRPC’s recommendation, District 2 Leadership Council’s recommendation, and District 2 SE Freeway Team’s recommendation, which is based on additional research done in District 2…”

Another spreadsheet indicates that SEWRPC made its recommendations in July 2002 and WisDOT weighed in in January 2004. Doyle took office in 2003. Citizens Allied for Sane Highways, which I co-chair, obtained these records in 2005. Click on the pictures below to make them larger.