BELLEVUE, WI (WTAQ) – Gas prices continue to rise as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. And the wallets of people in our area are stretching thin.
We drove around the community on Monday afternoon to check things out for ourselves. Every stop we made in the Green Bay area had regular unleaded priced at $4.09 per gallon. For the folks filling up, it was an unwelcome sight.
“It’s awful!” Michelle laughed. “I go to Chicago quite often, my parents are there, and it’s even worse there.”
“It sucks, and I hope it goes down soon,” said Nathanial Taylor. “It’s going to be like $55-$60 right now, and that’s for three-quarters of the tank…This car isn’t very light on it – so doing that two or three times a week isn’t fun either.”
“Well, I’ll just put in so much and then go from there. But prices are outrageous,” said Roger. “You’ve got to go to work, so you’ve got to fill it up. There’s nothing you can do – but there’s more the government can do about it.”
Michelle visited a popular spot in Bellevue to fill up on Monday. Even with a coupon giving her about 50-cents off per gallon, the tank still racked up a bill of about $58.
So we asked: At what point do you just start driving less?
“I don’t think that’s really a possibility when they know you’re going to pay it. So you don’t have a choice, really. If you have to get somewhere, you have to get somewhere,” Michelle said.
Two pumps over, Nathanial had an idea.
“When my spending for gas is starting to cut into other things, I feel like that’s the point where you kinda have to [change something]. You might want to find a different car pool or other people who work at the same place as you and live near you or something. Something around those lines,” he said. “You’ve got to weather it, and it’s going to suck. But at some point, I feel like it really starts to cut other things. It’s always best to find a carpool, you can always find people doing it because you’re gonna have somebody else in the same situation – so it’s gonna be a win-win for both you.”
As for Roger, he might just have to leave the truck in the garage for a while.
“I’ll start taking my wife’s car because it gets better gas mileage, I guess. But you’ve just got to put up with it until something changes. There’s nothing we can do unless the government does something,” Roger said.
The frustration was apparent on everyone’s face. Even the attendants at the filling stations we visited were having a hard time grasping the numbers on the sign in front of the store.
Both Michelle and Roger pointed to the potential for American oil independence, but say it’s up to those who make those calls to actually do something about it.
“We mine our necessities a lot cleaner than Russia or Iran. So really, in the grand scheme of things, it just makes more sense,” Michelle said. “I think their grand scheme is to get us to drive less and buy electric [vehicles].”
“There’s plenty of oil in the United States. I wish that they’d start drilling our own oil,” Roger said.
But for now, prices will likely continue this unprecedented rise as oil prices jump to their highest point since 2008. The national average price for regular is also the highest it’s been in 14 years.
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