Mayor Mike Wiza gives update on RoboCop statue

We’re all just friends and neighbors. If it takes something like RoboCop to bring us together, I’m all for it.”

Mayor Mike Wiza

STEVENS POINT - After a recent news release from the Detroit Free Press confirming the RoboCop statue’s location in the Eastern Market of Detroit, Stevens Point Mayor Mike Wiza shares his thoughts on its significance to our community.

Stevens Point’s involvement with the RoboCop statue began in 2021, when Mayor Wiza saw a news article about it online.  At that time, the 11-foot-tall bronze statue of Dr. Peter Weller’s iconic movie character had been completely constructed, but the organizers still did not have a confirmed location for its’ public display.

“Being that Peter Weller was from Stevens Point, I made some calls, contacted the people involved, and said, ‘Listen, if you don’t have a home for it, we’d love to have it,’” said Mayor Wiza. “It was a long shot, but it gained some traction and even some national attention.”

Now, three years after Mayor Wiza’s first contact with the owners and 14 years since they started fundraising for it, the RoboCop statue still has not been publicly installed.

“The answer from them is still no. We’re not getting the original RoboCop statue,” said Wiza. “We never wanted to purchase it—we didn’t have the funding for that. But if RoboCop didn’t have a home, we would certainly have given it one here.”

Mayor Wiza is leaving the door open for the future potential of another statue in tribute to RoboCop, if a reasonable opportunity arises. “Since we won’t get the original, maybe a resin replica,” said Wiza. “We would never use taxpayer money for something like this, but we’re a pretty generous community, and if push came to shove, I’d put it out to the community as a fundraiser, and I think we could raise the money.”

If a new RoboCop statue does find a home in Stevens Point, Mayor Wiza has some ideas of where to put it. “We would be looking at locations that meet the significance of the RoboCop statue,” said Wiza. “It could be somewhere downtown, in a park, or potentially on the grounds of City Hall.”

Displaying a statue of RoboCop might serve as a reminder from one of Stevens Point’s own that even someone from a smaller town can do big things with their life if they work hard.

However, Mayor Wiza believes that the real significance of RoboCop to Stevens Point is the unifying pride it gives locals. “We are so divided, not just as a community, but as an entire country, and beyond the country’s borders,” said Wiza. “When it came to the RoboCop statue, I noticed that the community stopped bickering and they rallied around the same thing. We were united again.”

Although Stevens Point will never be home to the original statue, Mayor Wiza has no hard feelings and remains enthusiastic about the project. “When they put it up, I’m going to come out there, I want to see it,” said Wiza. “It’s the culmination of all these years of RoboCop jokes, so I feel obligated to go visit once it’s installed.”

In the end, Mayor Wiza wants to share this message with the community: “We’ve got a lot of things to be proud of in Stevens Point, with or without RoboCop. I wish more people would realize that and understand that. We are a community, and we’re all in this together. We’re all just friends and neighbors. If it takes something like RoboCop to bring us together, I’m all for it.”