The Fox Valley Initiative is alarmed about the creation of the Fox–Wisconsin Heritage Parkway:

The proposed Fox–Wisconsin Heritage Parkway (FWHP) stretches from Green Bay to Prairie du Chien.  It will include 1,444 square-miles which run through the heart of 45 communities and 15 counties.  If the proposal is approved by Congress and the President, 1,382,293 Wisconsin property owners, citizens and businesses will suddenly find themselves within the boundaries of a National Heritage Area (NHA).

This designation has been requested by an unelected, local special-interest group — Friends of the Fox (FOTF).  Since about 1997, federal funds have been provided this group, along with planning expertise, to develop the parkway plan.  Only now, a full 15 years later, is this plan finally coming to the attention of Private-Property Owners (PPO) whose property will fall within the designated area.  The planner’s decision to include land owners within the boundaries, without notifying them, immediately confirms their lack of concern for the rights of these individuals.  To have thousands of individuals wake up one morning and, without warning, find their property is in a federal park is the ultimate violation of private-property rights.

U.S. Rep. Tom Petri (R–Fond du Lac), who has a primary opponent Aug. 14, thinks the concerns about the FWHP are overstated. Jerry Bader has the Fox Valley Initiative’s blog and Petri’s (actually, a Petri staffer’s) response.

Bader reports; you decide.