Molly Beck

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

MADISON - Signs championed by former Gov. Scott Walker that welcomed visitors to Wisconsin as a state "Open for Business" are being turned into detour signs.

An official in Gov. Tony Evers' administration said in a letter this month that the signs donning Walker's economic development mantra will be turned into signs used for detours and directions in emergency situations.

"Therefore, the old signs will be cut in half with no material wasted," said the Feb. 1 letter from Department of Administration enterprise operations administrator James Langdon to Republican Rep. John Macco of Ledgeview.

Langdon was responding to Macco's inquiry about what the Evers administration would do with the signs that were installed under Walker.

Walker introduced the signs in 2011 as a symbol of his plan to create thousands of new jobs in Wisconsin. He touted the phrase relentlessly in the early years of his time in office.

Macco, in a Feb. 11 letter to constituents, said the action of taking down Walker's signs and replacing them with signs bearing Evers' name as is common in other states was "merely immature and petty yet his prerogative."

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"The Evers administration is literally sawing them in half and making 46 'Detour' signs," Macco wrote. "Ironically that is exactly the result his policies may produce."

Evers defended the move, saying he was handling the signs the same way governors before Walker did.

"We wanted to go back to what it used to be, essentially a 'welcome to Wisconsin' sign," Evers told reporters.

"Having the sign reflect what it used to reflect in the past is where we wanted to be and so we made sure those signs are re-purposed in a meaningful way. It’s not a controversy from my vantage point."

Evers has been critical of Walker's approach to economic development, once proposing to eliminate the state's jobs agency created under Walker.

The agency has been under scrutiny since it began — when it lost track of millions of dollars in loans carried over from the state department it replaced — and as it awarded loans to businesses not properly vetted, which failed to create jobs or repay what was borrowed in some cases.

Evers also has been critical of a state tax credit for manufacturers and agriculture producers because the vast majority of the recipients earn $1 million annually or more.

Patrick Marley of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.