Rock County Sheriff is THEE AUTHORITY for No Wake

Hi Brian,
Every time local government throws a 'temporary no wake' on the ROCK RIVER in the Town of Fulton, the Janesville Gazette fails to mention if this includes LAKE KOSHKONONG in the Town of Fulton. and whether or not there is a 'distance from shoreline' no wake restriction on the lake. No surprise, huh?

Seems as though most people call the DNR office in Janesville for this info. I did just that, to find out this information, an here are the results.

The DNR office said ' We don't have that information, you'll have to call Rock County Parks & Recreation'. I asked for their phone number, and they gave me the number 757-5458 for snowmobile trail info, and I was told 'they should have information on who to talk to in Parks & Recreation'.

Next, I just looked the number up in the phone book (757-5450) and called. This is what I was told, ' We're not in charge of that ...you'll have to call the DNR'. I told her that the DNR told me to call Parks & Rec and she said 'all we know is what is in the paper'.

I suggested that maybe I should call the sheriff's dept. The sheriff's dept said this; 'the no-wake is in effect for the entire rock river in the Town of Fulton'. I asked if this included Lake Koshkonong in the Town of Fulton and he said that 'it just says the river and thats all the information they have'.

I told him that I will just assume that Lake Koshkonong is not under the restriction, and the call ended.

Just as I thought, and my sole purpose for calling around.

Everyone was lost to a certain degree regarding this subject (and I'm not even going to try calling Jefferson County regarding this matter).

I know this confusion will arise again and again, until the water goes back down and the temporary 'river no wake' restriction is lifted. People will file complaints to local law enforcement, and people may even be wrongly ticketed.

We risk negative publicity regarding recreational use of our lake because of misguidance.

We all know that boat wakes from distances off-shore will never reach shorelines, and that wind & wave action have more of an adverse effect on the shorelines. We realize this, but unfortunately a lot of lake property owners do not.

It's still summer and sooner than later the sun will shine and people will want to go boating. Lets clarify the boundaries of this temporary restriction for people using our waterway. We need to channel questions to one location.

We need to supply complete and correct information to organizations such as the DNR, Rock County Parks & Recreation, the Sheriff's Dept, and the 'greatest source of lake misinformation' our local Janesville Gazette.

Maybe we, the RKLD, should be the first authority regarding temporary no-wake information. Let's tell-em' ...please step aside, this is our lake.
Tom

The Chairman of the town of Fulton "advises" the Rock County Sheriff's Department re: No wake on this portion of the Rock River.

Not the DNR....Not the Janesville Parks Department....Not the County Board....the Sheriff's Department posts the Slow/No Wake and no one else.