Gas Station Owners Do They Really Care?
As
you can imagine this weather has been a beast for us Wisconsinites. Whether you are pumping gas, checking oil or putting air in your tire you
really don't won't to be outside too long. For some reason, in my
neighborhood and around the city we are offered the worst gas/service stations
that will either have you outside for longer periods of time or have you
traveling across the city to fill up.
In
my neighborhood, I actually live across the street from a gas station and have 5 more in a 5-block radius. The number of stations double within a 10 block radius.
These terrible gas stations have just about everything wrong with them
that you can imagine. Broken gas and air pumps, cracked and broken
screens and receipt machines and out-of-order bathrooms. Other problems
include: sidewalks and parking lanes not shoveled, broken fencing and landscaping that's not maintained. One item I can not stand, is that I and many of my neighbors, cannot go over $50 when using our debit and credit cards to purchase gas. 
These
gas stations usually have dirty sidewalks, cluttered windows and broken
signage. These environments speak to the lowest of the social economic
groups in the City and encourage loitering, panhandling and illegal activity
such as drug sales and prostitution. People who are paying close to $100
a week in gas are not going to these gas stations. Thus the cycle
continues with the gas station servicing the lowest social economic groups and
complaining about how bad it is for them.
The
major problem is that many of these gas stations have food dealer license and
operate 24 hours a day. The owners rarely attend meetings and get
involved with the community related problems they bring to the community.
When these gas stations open the landscaping is beautiful and staff is
courteous, however, 5 months later it is a different story. I know some
may blame local communities for some of these issues. However, there is no
involvement from these business owners at all. The owners blame the
neighborhood despite the the fact of operating a business in the same
neighborhood for many years.
Each
year home and property owners plant, decorate and maintain their lawns.
Gas station owners do not feel they have to do this and will let destroyed
landscaping sit for years. I spoke with a gas station owner recently and
he said that his fence was knocked down 4 years ago so he is not going to put
up another one. Can you imagine if all our homeowners did the same thing?
Here
are a few recommendations that could assist the gas station owners, residents
and the City of Milwaukee. Gas stations owners should attend community
meetings and stop with the hands off approach to management. Residents
should demand more and document and report these problems to the City.
The City needs to review the code and update license and zoning to
reflect the new business environment for these gas/stations. For example,
many gas stations are selling more junk food which leads to more trash but do not provide the number of trash cans needed to deal with the increased trash.
