Yabba Dabba Dough: WI spends $30K on ‘Flintstones’-style training video

By Adam Tobias | Wisconsin Reporter

MADISON, Wis. — Close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and let your mind go blank.

Now picture, if you will, a group of motorists navigating traffic, only their cars are not powered by gas, solar power or electricity.

Nope, the only way to get around in these vehicles is by extending your feet through the floorboard and skipping your toes across the pavement, a la the “Flintstones.”

But you would be incorrect.

What I’m talking about is a two-minute roundabout training video produced by the Wisconsin Department of Transportation that features actors walking around in a circle with what appears to be cardboard automobiles hanging over their shoulders with straps.

And it cost you $30,000, according to DOT spokesman Steven Olson.

But wait, there’s more.

Olson told Wisconsin Reporter that $30,000 also paid for four shorter breakout videos, one of which consists of matchbox cars speeding around an LP record.

While $30,000 may seem small compared to the billions of dollars the DOT spends each year, the roundabout video was released months before the state agency asked for $750 million in new fees and taxes in the next budget cycle.

Chris Kliesmet, president of the Milwaukee-based Citizens for Responsible Government, said it’s important to watch over all government spending, no matter how minor the dollar amount.

“If you make it clear the small stuff is not going to get tossed under the rug, it sends the message that don’t do the big stuff,” Kliesmet told Wisconsin Reporter.