MILWAUKEE — The surge of potholes following last month's deep freeze has surfaced more than two months early according to Milwaukee's Public Works leaders.
"Capitol Drive as bad. Sherman is bad," said Ronnie Fleming.
"Some are deep holes. You got to go around them," Terrence Fleck added.
During a committee meeting on Wednesday, Common Council members said they want the Department of Public Works to lay out a plan focused on addressing potholes and cutting down the time it takes to fix them.
Currently, with around 70 workers in street maintenance, it takes DPW about a week to fill a pothole request. That is down from 120 workers about 7 years ago when it took 2-3 days.
"It's first come first serve as best we can. And we try to be efficient about scheduling crews. Sometimes we get to things a little bit earlier or a little bit later," said Kevin Muhs, city engineer with Milwaukee's DPW.
Muhs says they are actively filling vacancies to get them up to the 85 budgeted positions.
When it comes to staffing crews, some cases require more people because of reckless driving after a worker was killed a few years ago.
"That is a change and it does make us less efficient, but obviously the safety of our employees is the number one priority," Muhs explained.
DPW believes a new software system will streamline their response to potholes. They are also getting ready to bring on new equipment to patch roads that should help with response times, but those trucks will not be in the mix until March.
Drivers hope improvements come soon.
"I'm retired so I don't need to be having to pay extra expenses because of the potholes," Fleming said.
Since the city's response to potholes is based on requests the city strongly encourages you to report potholes over the phone, online, or the MKE Mobile Action App.
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