SELL YOUR HOME EASIER! Local, Experienced & Trusted Get the RIGHT Real Estate Advice... Get Geiger JASON GEIGER It’s your paper! (608) 277-2167 Friday, September 12, 2014 • Vol. 1, No. 7 • Fitchburg, WI • ConnectFitchburg.com • $1 Office Next to Great Dane - Fitchburg GeigerRealtors.com adno=368693-01 Verona Road Inside Long crossing distances and fast, heavy traf- Fitchburg girl is fic can make crossing Verona front-runner at Walk Road difficult for Wishes for neighbors. Pedestrian Page 2 underpasses aim to make travel safer New Metro route for people serves Swan Creek without cars who need to Page 5 cross the major thoroughfare. Photo by Mark Schools Ignatowski 5 things to watch for each district Page 8-10 A long road ahead Sports Regional traffic and neighborhood concerns meet at Verona Road MARK IGNATOWSKI be frustrating and full of Unified Newspaper Group delays. Businesses see In brief fewer customers. Commut- When Nancy Lopez ers add time to their drive. A six-year needs to get to the west Residents hear more noise reconstruction project side of Madison, she has to and have a hard time get- continues to reshape the take a twisting maze of par- ting around because roads interchange of Verona tially closed roads through are closed and drivers are Road and the Beltline. a series of temporary traf- looking for alternate routes. The project creates fic signals onto a congested While the six-year, $175 travel delays for drivers Verona Road. million construction proj- and poses health risks ect ultimately was designed “Ohhh, it’s a mess,” to neighbors living in Lopez said. “It’s compli- to keep the highway traffic cated – it’s a lot of roads away from the neighbor- the area. Madison West closed. It’s not too loud, but Photo by Mark Ignatowski hood, in the meantime, it’s The construction there’s more traffic in this Nancy Lopez and Angel Anguiano live near Verona Road. Added adding traffic to residential zone will move south football starts 2-1 area.” traffic from the construction makes it hard to get around the neigh- streets and adds to concerns along Verona Road Lopez – a resident of about safety and acces- Page 15 borhood and to places beyond the construction zone. toward McKee Road nearby Allied Drive who sibility. Nearly a decade starting in 2017, where was cooking out with her – shares the same struggle traffic corridor each day. of planning went into the businesses are already parents-in-law on Thurston as thousands of other driv- Living, working and project – and neighborhood preparing for detours Business ers. Nearly 60,000 vehicles traveling through the Lane just a few blocks east and fewer customers. of Verona Road on Sept. 7 pass through the major Verona Road corridor can Turn to Verona Road/Page 22 Neighborhood, church unite after double homicide when former Dane County Sher- through both her work and in the glowing characteristics and how Former deputy with ALS iff’s deputy Andrew Steele, 39, Highlands of Seminole neighbor- she had impacted their lives in a charged with killings allegedly shot and killed his wife, hood, where they resided. positive way. Ashlee Steele, and sister-in-law, Those who knew Ashlee Steele “First and foremost, I remember Elements brings SCOTT GIRARD Kacee Tollefsbol. took a step toward dealing with Ashlee as a warm, effervescent Unified Newspaper Group The Steeles had lived in Fitch- their grief, though, with an Aug. 31 woman, beautiful both inside and personalized burg for more than a decade, and candlelight vigil at Rosecommons out,” said 14-year neighbor Pam massage approach No community is immune to as a preschool teacher at The Park in the neighborhood. There, Baumgartner. “Up until Andy’s tragedy. Church at Christ Memorial for six neighbors, coworkers, city officials recent diagnosis, I never had a Page 26 The City of Fitchburg was years, Ashlee Steele had made con- and those whose children had gone reminded of that Friday, Aug. 22, nections to hundreds of families through Ashlee’s class recalled her Turn to Killings/Page 23 PRSRT STANDARD ECRWSS Fitchburg Senior Center, we challenge you US POSTAGE PAID to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge! UNIFIED NEWSPAPER GROUP See our video at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=u81aPys8DC4 adno=368694-01 303 S. Jefferson Street, Verona (608) 845-6465 2 September 12, 2014 The Fitchburg Star ConnectFitchburg.com A Wishing ‘Star’ Fitchburg girl is front runner in annual Walk for Wishes fundraiser SAMANTHA CHRISTIAN Unified Newspaper Group If you go Friday is a day most peo- What: Walk for Wishes ple look forward to because When: Sunday, Sept. 14; it signals the end of the 8:30 a.m. school or work week. But for Events: One- or two-mile Fitchburg’s Kendall Oberg, walk, 5K and wheelchair 9, all that day brings is anxi- races ety over a weekly routine of Where: McKee Farms shots. Park, 2930 Chapel Valley Kendall, who is this year’s Road Walk for Wishes front run- ner, is battling a rare, life- Register: Free at www. threatening autoimmune dis- walkforwishes.com ease. Takayasu’s arteritis is a Info: wisconsin.wish.org type of vasculitis that causes inflammation, narrowing and weakening of the large blood Keeping up vessels. Since she was diagnosed in with Kendall 2011, much of her childhood Updates: facebook.com/ has been consumed with doc- KendallsjourneywithTA tor appointments, procedures Video: youtu.be/ and surgeries, including five W5k6N2IsT7o angioplasties. Kendall typi- cally goes to the doctor once a Info: vasculitisfoundation. week for injections and every org six weeks for IV treatment. Photo by Samantha Christian She also takes three different Kendall Oberg, 9, of Fitchburg, will be back at McKee Farms Park on Sunday as this year’s Walk for Wishes front runner. Oberg is living blood pressure medications with a rare type of vasculitis. and surgeries, and that’s all every day. we can do at this point until Although she dreads them, in the Bahamas for a week awesome. I’ve seen wishes actually diagnosed. She had high her blood pressure was, there’s more research into the needles are necessary to last summer. that a lot of other kids have symptoms like stomach pain, Kendall was admitted to the disease and they can fig- help keep her from having “We went swimming with wished for – some crazy fatigue and dizziness, and Meriter Hospital overnight ure out something better.’ flare ups that can damage her dolphins and played with stuff – and they just go all doctors told her she needed and then transported to the So it’s just frustrating know- arteries. sea lions,” said Kendall. Her out. Any way that they can to eat more fiber or just had American Family Children’s ing that that’s the life she’s “That’s kind of going to favorite memory was watch- possibly pamper the kid they a virus. Hospital. going to have to deal with,” be her life,” said her mother ing a sea lion go up to her just do it,” said Lori. She “No matter what I would “At that point I knew … said Lori. Lori. “She just wants to be a dad, Rick, and kiss him with said Kendall was originally say, it was always explained that I was right that some- Lori wants to bring aware- normal kid. Her favorite thing its tickly whiskers. deciding between meeting away by everyday ‘normal’ thing was wrong with her,” ness to the disease, because is to just go outside and run “It was nice to not have Disney Channel actors or kid things,” Lori said. “But said Lori. the reality is, many people around with her friends and to think about anything. No going to a big cat sanctuary. intuition just kept telling me, Kendall stayed in the ICU don’t find out they have vas- have playdates. I think the doctor appointments, no run- “My real wish would be something isn’t right, this for a month while doctors culitis until it’s too late. part that’s frustrating for her ning around. It was just real- to not have to go to school shouldn’t be normal.” tried to figure out what was “A lot of people pass is ... she will still try to do ly nice to see her laughing and never have homework,” It wasn’t until Kendall and going on in her body. It took away because they don’t things she probably shouldn’t and happy and relaxed,” said joked Kendall. “My mom her older siblings, Piper and doctors two weeks to deter- know they have it. Some- because it hurts her.” Lori. “For kids that’s such an wouldn’t let me do that.” Ostara, all got sick that Lori mine she had renal stenosis, times they don’t find out Lori explained that her amazing thing, because they Lori said the application took Kendall directly to the but that was only a symptom until after the autopsy what daughter has a difficult do get depressed and have to process for Make-A-Wish ER. Whereas her sisters were of the disease. caused their death, because time keeping up with other deal with so much more than was fairly straightforward. getting better, Kendall’s “She was diagnosed (with on the outside they look children because she gets most kids ever have to think “You need a referral from fevers kept spiking and she Takayasu’s arteritis) at 6, completely normal,” said fatigued easily and the lack about, unfortunately.” a doctor to specify that (the was complaining of pain. but by (that time) she was Lori.