Saving The Roads

Wisconsin State Senator Dora Drake began her career the way many Milwaukee-born senators do, with roots that run deep and a community that she has never been able to turn away from. “I lived in the district I represent now, the 4th Senate District,” she said. “It comprises the north portion of Milwaukee to the city limits… parts of Harambee, Riverwest, Glendale, Shorewood, Wauwatosa, and Brown Deer.”

Her connection to the city is more than political; it’s personal. “Even though I was a product of MPS, very much a product of this city, I come from a blended family,” she explained. “My parents divorced. One got remarried, while the other did not. But I was the first in my family to graduate from college.”

Milwaukee shaped her early life, but it also shaped her purpose. At Marquette University, she found her footing through the Educational Opportunities Program, which supports first-generation and low-income students by opening doors to educational and economic opportunity.

Through that program, she earned her bachelor’s degree in social work and social justice, grounding her future in service and advocacy. That foundation led her into the courthouse as a pretrial caseworker.

“I made sure people followed their conditions while facing pending cases, but I also addressed their real issues, mental health treatment, employment, and housing,” she said. She saw firsthand how systems fail people long before their names ever appear on a docket. Politics came next, almost by accident.

A local school board race opened her eyes to the realities of public education, revealing both the powerful work happening within MPS and the immense challenges caused by chronic underfunding and limited support.

The mentor she met through that campaign shifted her trajectory, pushing her deeper into public service. Within a year, she found herself inside MSDF during COVID, witnessing firsthand how deeply the criminal justice system was strained: people who should have been released remained incarcerated, others took on dangerous jobs because they had no other options, and alleged voter suppression during the April election unfolded in real time. The accumulation of these injustices was impossible for her to ignore, she said. So, she ran for office. In 2020, she won a seat in the State Assembly.

Four years later, she became a State Senator, now serving on committees tied directly to the issues Milwaukee can’t escape: Judiciary and Public Safety, Health, and Criminal Penalties. But one issue feels the most immediate, the most unavoidable. Reckless driving.

“Regardless of political beliefs, people just want to feel safe,” she said. “Safe going for a walk. Safe at school. Safe in their neighborhoods.”

That longing for basic safety is behind one of her hallmark proposals: a traffic enforcement camera bill she helped craft for Milwaukee. “This bill would allow Milwaukee to create a pilot program,” she explained. “It gives law enforcement a tool to capture who the bad actors are.”

She knows the concerns well, privacy, misuse, and inequity, because community members shared them directly. People fear that their information could be mishandled, that fines could be issued to the wrong person, or that low-income neighborhoods could face disproportionate enforcement. Those worries were central to shaping the legislation, and she made sure each one was addressed in the bill’s design.

The bill’s guardrails are strict. Only the most dangerous intersections. A maximum of five cameras per aldermanic district. A five-year testing period. Public transparency. And crucially, fines cannot become a profit machine.

“Any money from these cameras can only go to traffic calming infrastructure, education, or law enforcement. Nothing else,” she said.  But for her, the deeper goal is cultural change. “If you know you’re entering a community that values safety, you behave differently,” she said. “It’s not an end-all, be-all solution. But it’s a tool.”

She believes reckless driving stems from forces far deeper than bad habits. At the core, she sees poverty and mindset as driving factors when people feel they lack opportunities or a path forward; their actions often reflect that sense of hopelessness. Families stretched thin, with parents working multiple jobs just to meet basic needs, face pressures that shape the choices made on the road and beyond. The disinvestment she sees devastates young people the most. Driver’s ed programs have evaporated. Safe recreation spaces have disappeared. Entire neighborhoods lack a single place for teens to gather or families to relax.

“If I want to go to a movie or bowling alley in my own district, I have to leave the city,” she said. “That’s a problem.” And yet young people take the blame. She emphasizes that reckless driving isn’t solely a youth problem; in fact, she has seen many older adults engaging in the same dangerous behaviors, sometimes even more frequently.

She believes young people have become convenient scapegoats, which distracts from a larger issue: adults failing to model responsible behavior. At the same time, she notes that today’s youth are carrying burdens far heavier than those faced by previous generations. Many are navigating loss, violence, sexual assault, homelessness, and other forms of trauma, all of which they bring with them into school and daily life.

Her understanding of public safety spans the full system from the ACLU’s Collins Agreement, which she calls “a lawsuit the ACLU won because police were targeting Black residents far more than white residents,” to the unintended harm caused when pursuits returned (police traffic and field stops plummeted after the Collins Agreement).

“When the city brought police chases back, people said, “Finally.’ But now innocent people are being killed. It’s complicated.” Last summer’s street takeovers revealed a deeper reality. What initially seemed like isolated incidents soon became clear symptoms of a city that offers too few safe spaces or activities for young people. To her, these gatherings reflected a simple truth: many teens and young adults have nowhere constructive to go.

She believes Milwaukee cannot rely solely on policing or legislation to solve this crisis. Real, lasting solutions must come from the community itself, built through local investment, shared responsibility, and the creation of meaningful spaces and opportunities.

“Local leaders need to create spaces for families and young people,” she said. “Because at the state level, it becomes politicized. And frankly, some legislators don’t care about Milwaukee.”

For her, the work is deeply personal. “I lost a brother to gun violence and suicide two years ago,” she said. “I never want to lose sight of the issues that plague our community.” Senator Dora Drake wants a call to action that feels both urgent and hopeful: “Support, engagement, and the belief that change is possible because it is.”