Electric Vehicle Charging Stations Planned For 5 County Parks

Veterans Park. Photo taken June 23, 2025 by Graham Kilmer.

Someday, you might be able to charge an electric vehicle in a Milwaukee County park.

Five county parks and the Milwaukee County Zoo are on a list of sites for future publicly accessible electric vehicle charging stations. The sites are part of a City of Milwaukee program building electric vehicle charging infrastructure at 53 unique locations across the city.

The list of sites includes: Lincoln Park, Washington Park, Veterans Park, Mitchell Park, Wilson Park and the Zoofari Center at the county zoo. Each charging station would include four ports. With the exception of the Veterans Park station, they will be built out on existing parking spaces. In Veterans Park, concrete will be poured over grass at the eastern end of the lot near the Gift of Wings Kite Store.

In 2023, the city applied for funding through the Charging and Fueling Infrastructure (CFI) Discretionary Grant Program, which was a federal grant program created under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) passed under former president Joe Biden. Two years prior the city also changed the zoning code to prepare for a growing number of EV charging stations.

The county recently finished a long-term plan designed to guide the government to carbon neutrality by 2050, following a 2021 resolution by Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson. Supervisors also adopted a resolution authored by Sup. Anne O’Connor in 2024 calling on the county to collaborate with the City of Milwaukee on climate related grants and projects.

The city’s charging stations will be built out and operated by a private contractor, who will “accept the financial risk on the project, provide 20% matching costs, and maintenance costs in exchange for user fees from EV owners paying to charge,” according to a recent report by Sarah Toomsen, Parks director of planning, and Grant Helle, director of the Office of Sustainability.

The private contractor has not been selected. However, revenue sharing with site hosts — like the parks department — will be a consideration when bids start coming in. “Proposers who provide the greatest share of revenue sharing will receive higher scores,” according to the county report.

The contractor will be responsible for the stations for five-years, after which Parks and the Zoo will be able to decide whether or not to continue operating electric vehicle chargers on the property.

“Sites on park land have been chosen for visibility to residents of diverse backgrounds, proximity to Parks amenities as well as private attractions, and requirements of the City’s grant have included selecting some sites in Justice40 neighborhoods within the City,” according to the report.

Justice40 was a Biden-era federal policy that sought to connect investments in infrastructure through the BIL and the Inflation Reduction Act with social justice goals. The Justice40 initiative was included in an executive order that set a goal for 40% of the “overall benefits” of federal climate and housing related investments.

The EV stations are being made possible, in part, by recent changes in state law. 2023 Wisconsin Act 121 allowed EV Stations to charge fees for electricity by kilowatt-hour without being regulated as a public utility. Previously, only registered public utility companies could install and operate such infrastructure.

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