Have you visited and ventured inside the historic buildings at Franklin’s Lions Legend Park?
On its official website, the Franklin Historical Society (FHS) writes:
Our historic village includes a cabin, a school, a chapel, the Franklin town hall and a smokehouse.
What is greatly missing is a barn that would represent the rural family farming culture of Franklin.
The FHS wants to have a historical barn built as part of the living museums in Lions Legend Park. They’ve requested the city of Franklin use its budgeted $20,000 and labor provided by the Department of Public Works to install the barn’s foundation. According to city documents the FHS believes that once the foundation is put in place, that will fuel donations to collect the full amount needed. If that doesn’t happen fast enough, the FHS says it would borrow the necessary funds and transfer them to the city.
Not everyone agrees the effort by the FHS has merit.
At the April 4, 2016 meeting of the Franklin Common Council there was friendly, respectful opposition. Mary-Jane Ingersoll is a park neighbor.
“You do not have the money to complete the project,” Ingersoll said who fears neighbors might be “looking at a hole in the ground for years to come.”
Another resident living near the park, Pat Murray was skeptical.
“If it (the project) was so popular fundraising would have been successful already,” said Murray.
“Let’s be honest,” Murray continued. “This barn is a four-car garage. It has no historical significance to the city other than it’s an example of a barn.”
Patrise Selkey posed this question. “And who really cares about that horse barn anyway? It’s an eyesore.”
One member of the FHS said the proposal isn’t a barn, it’s a museum, although the FHS website calls it a barn project.
Funding appears to be a big issue at this point, along with the lack of an approved site plan.
Finally, I close with this. A member of the FHS argued that the barn would draw more visitors to our community. As opposed to the Ballpark Commons?
This Just In... From Franklin, WI 
Who cares what the neighbors want. It is for the rest of the 33,000 members of the city.
As Tommy Thompson said “stick it to them”.
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I could be wrong, but I don’t sense a groundswell of support for this project.
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