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Author: jnweaver

Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research opens first tower

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Capital Times

Although it was mostly gray and rainy around the Madison area on Thursday, nothing was going to dampen the enthusiasm of those who attended the grand opening ceremony for the Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research.

“It’s pretty obvious I’m not a weatherman, but as far as I’m concerned, today is actually a wonderfully bright, beautiful, sunny day,” said Robert Golden, dean of the UW School of Medicine and Public Health. “And I say that because we are basking in the sunlight of a remarkable, glowing new gift which will help us melt away the cold, dark shadows of cancer and other horrible diseases.”

New Zimmermann Reward Fund Created

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WISC-TV 3

MADISON, Wis. — Authorities are hoping a new reward fund will help investigators solve the killing of a University of Wisconsin-Madison student from Marshfield.

At a news conference Thursday morning, Madison police announced the reward fund through the Carole Sund/Carrington Memorial Foundation for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for the death of Brittany Zimmermann.

The fund will start at $5,000 and increase as more donations come in, WISC-TV reported.

Power restored on west side

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Capital Times

Power has been restored to an area of Madison’s west side after being out for about an hour due to a failure of equipment at a substation.

Madison Gas and Electric spokesman Steve Kraus said power was restored at 11:10 a.m. in an area from the Hilldale Mall shopping center east to the UW-Madison campus. The problem was at the Walnut Street sub-station.

Police had been directing traffic at several intersections because of stoplights not functioning.

iDGi: UW-Oshkosh students to staff Yahoo! employee tech support (77 Square)

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When Yahoo! employees call for technical assistance this fall, the accent they hear may be “Cheesehead.” The University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh announced Wednesday that tech giant Yahoo! will establish a student-staffed technical support center in Oshkosh.

The Yahoo! CareCenter, which is about two years in the making, will provide technical support to some of the company’s 17,000 employees.

Students staffing the Yahoo! CareCenter will be able to earn $10,000 or more per year working part time, UW-Oshkosh said in a news release. Twenty students will be recruited initially, with 20 more added as needed.

Fight in bar leads to fatal stabbing

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Capital Times

Madison police have a suspect in custody after a fatal stabbing Wednesday night in downtown Madison.

A 22-year-old Madison man was stabbed outside the Plaza Tavern, 319 N. Henry St., at about 11:40 p.m. following an in-bar dispute between two groups of men.

(According to police the victim was not a UW-Madison student)

Bulk of schedule will be seen on TV

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Fans won’t have a problem seeing the University of Wisconsin men’s basketball team play this season.

Almost every Badgers game will be broadcast on one of the ESPN networks, CBS or the Big Ten Network. A significant amount of their games will be shown on CBS, ESPN or ESPN2, the Big Tenâ??s most-watched partners.

UW student elected chair of College Democrats of America women’s caucus

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WKOW-TV 27

MADISON (WKOW) — From Wisconsin Democrats:

Last week at the College Democrats of America (CDA) National Convention in Denver, Colorado, Wisconsin student Analiese Eicher was elected National Chair of the CDA Women’s Caucus….Eicher is a junior at the University of Wisconsin-Madison majoring in political science. She has been active in the College Democrats of Wisconsin as the Women’s Issues Director for the past two years and was previously the CDA Women’s Caucus Campus Outreach Director.

Kikkoman chairman coming to Madison

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Capital Times

A host of local politicians, UW officials and business development insiders will welcome the chairman of Kikkoman Corp. to Madison next week.

Gov. Jim Doyle, UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin, Mayor Dave Cieslewicz and University Research Park Director Mark Bugher will host Kikkoman chairman Yuzaburo Mogi on Tuesday to mark the establishment of Kikkoman USA’s new research and development laboratory in the MGE Innovation Center at University Research Park.

….The Kikkoman Foundation is also granting $100,000 for scholarships at the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.

Baby smell can lower testosterone level, UW study finds

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Capital Times

How do you knock down the testosterone in men? Have a baby.

Researchers at UW-Madison have discovered that the scent of a newborn marmoset, a type of monkey, can alter the testosterone level in papa marmoset, making for a calmer, more relaxed dad, which can help in the parenting of the baby marmosets.

The discovery was announced Wednesday by the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center and is published in the Sept. 2 issue of the journal Biology Letters.

Wisconsin spends millions to bring new business here. Does it work?

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Capital Times

….To better monitor state subsidies to corporations, a UW-Madison think tank has called for a searchable database to track whether that money actually benefits the Wisconsin economy. Patterned after a system recently implemented in Illinois, the database would include how much companies pay in state taxes, how much business they do in the state and how much financial help they get.

In 2003, Illinois passed a Corporate Accountability Act, considered one of the most comprehensive corporate disclosure laws in the country. As part of that act, companies receiving state economic development money must also report on their progress in job creation, retention and wage promises.

“This level of transparency is key for policy makers and the public to better evaluate the tax system and see if it is truly working in the economic interests of the state,” said Kate Gordon, lead author of the report for the Center on Wisconsin Strategy.

Douglas B. Johnson: State fails to make right ‘green’ moves

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Capital Times

Like Jon Foley, I do environmental work. And just as he is leaving the University of Wisconsin-Madison for a better opportunity at the University of Minnesota, I too left Wisconsin at the end of July.

In 1996 I received my doctorate from the UW’s Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. I own an 8-year-old environmental management consulting firm.

….Rep. Steve Nass might be driving some academics to leave with his disrespect for UW-Madison, but others in the state are proving remarkably effective at driving some of the rest of us away too — or at least not being very shrewd about how to keep us around.

College student has beaten the odds of her disability

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Capital Times

Brittany Saylor is a typical college student: She likes pizza, meeting new people and spending time on the computer navigating Facebook.

Though she’s quick to dismiss any differences, what sets the Wisconsin Rapids 19-year-old apart from many young adults who began classes Tuesday at UW-Whitewater is that she gets from place to place by wheelchair and uses a ventilator at night to help her breathe.

Title IX watchdogs keeping tabs on university academic departments

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Capital Times

Critics of Title IX in Madison know the 1972 law that prohibits sex discrimination at any school that receives federal funding as the one that helped doom the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s baseball team.

Yet the next major Title IX debate on college campuses, and potentially the UW, likely will have nothing to do with sports.

Over the past couple years, government agencies such as the Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation and NASA have started undertaking Title IX compliance reviews in university science and engineering programs at a handful of schools across the nation. In fact, auditors from the Department of Energy visited UW-Madison April 1-2 to review its graduate physics program, and a final report is due out by the end of the year.

What’s new and different this election

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Media Life Magazine

At this point four years ago, John Kerry had already been Swift Boated and MoveOn was branding President Bush a Vietnam War dodger, two of the bigger stories to emerge from the 2004 campaign cycle. But to this point in the 2008 campaign, the so-called 527s, tax-exempt groups that throw their weight behind certain candidates or issues during a campaign, have been relatively quiet. Instead, itâ??s been the campaigns themselves doing most of the advertising, according to Ken Goldstein, director of the Wisconsin Advertising Project, which has been tracking this electionâ??s ads closely.

Madison-based TrafficCast hires new CEO

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The company was founded by Li and Bin Ran, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor and director of the university’s Traffic Lab. It has patented software and predictive models that collect data from about 350 sources, such as helicopter data, probes embedded in highway pavement and cell phone towers. The result is route-specific, real-time traffic information and travel time forecasts.

A grounded jump start

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

If you weren’t sure whether to believe the persistent talk coming from the University of Wisconsin locker room during the off-season, talk of re-establishing UW’s reputation as a power running team no matter the quality of competition, the opener against Akron should have removed any doubts

Posted in Uncategorized

Tough economy worsens struggles for workers, job seekers

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

For the first time since the 1980s, Wisconsin has suffered three years in a row of declining real median wages, according to a report released Sunday by the Center on Wisconsin Strategy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Adjusting for inflation, the median wage rose 57 cents between 1979 and 2007.

HIV’s fight club

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Though it rarely makes front-page news anymore, AIDS continues to be a scourge. While there are treatments for the disease, and researchers are continually working to develop new ones, some individuals can control the disease by themselves.AIDS

Known as elite controllers, these patients are the subject of intense investigation.

Teams of researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are trying to understand how this works by studying the elite control process in rhesus monkeys.

Greed rules in Big Ten Network/Charter pact

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Capital Times

The Charter Communications/Big Ten Network agreement is bittersweet for many sports fans.

We’ll be the first to admit that it’s good news that Charter’s cable subscribers in southern Wisconsin will finally be able to see Badger football and basketball games that are exclusively carried on the Big Ten Conference-controlled network.

….There is a downside, however. Once again, big-time college sports and the television-connected outfits that enter into deals with them wind up putting the squeeze on the little guy.

Some of the kingpins in today’s athletic culture find it hard to believe that there may actually be people out there who can’t afford expanded basic service, much less the digital package that is increasingly being pushed. But, of course, there are and they’re big fans — as big as the high rollers who have taken hold of supposedly amateur sports today.

Badgers frozen out in bid for NCAA hockey regionals (Capital Times)

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Capital Times

The University of Wisconsin came up short in its bid to host NCAA men’s hockey regionals in 2010 and 2011.

That’s due largely to a trend toward hosting such events on NHL-size rinks at off-campus facilities in neutral cities, but in Badger hockey circles could also be interpreted as another reaction to Wisconsin’s success in the West regional in Madison last spring.

UW researcher makes hearing loss breakthrough

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Capital Times

A team of scientists has figured out how to transfer special genes to regenerate damaged cells in the inner ear, a technique that researchers say could one day lead to the restoration of hearing for both children born deaf and the elderly who are hard-of-hearing.

UW otolaryngologist Samuel Gubbels, working with a team of scientists at Oregon Health and Science University and Stanford University, grew specialized cells crucial for hearing by transferring a gene responsible for the formation of those cells into the inner ear of mouse embryos.

Get the red out … and support UW students

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Capital Times

With the college football season set to kick off, the University of Wisconsin Alumni Association is promoting sales of The Red Shirt — a one-of-a-kind, collectible T-shirt.

Proceeds will contribute to the more than $550,000 awarded to UW-Madison students each year through WAA’s matching dollar scholarship program.

Metro plans service, route changes

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Capital Times

The upcoming Labor Day holiday and start of the school year brings some service and route changes to the Metro bus system.

For Badger football fans heading to Camp Randall Stadium Saturday, Metro won’t be operating shuttle buses, with Kobussen Buses taking over.

….On Tuesday, Sept. 2, Route 80 buses, one of the main routes serving the UW campus, will detour to Walnut St. and Marsh Rd. because of ongoing construction.

Attorney General urges fire safety for students living both on and off campus

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WKOW-TV 27

MADISON (WKOW) — From Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen’s office:

The Wisconsin Attorney General’s Office and the Wisconsin State Fire Marshal, along with the National Association of State Fire Marshals and the Center for Campus Safety, recognize the month of September as Campus Safety Month. I and the State Fire Marshall’s Office would like to encourage students to keep safety in the forefront as they return to campus. Each year, lives are lost in campus-related fires.

BTN to go live on Charter Thursday afternoon

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Capital Times

Charter Communications said the Big Ten Network would be up and running for its subscribers by late Thursday afternoon, meaning the University of Wisconsin’s football opener Saturday will be available for Charter subscribers.

Charter spokesperson Bob Pinter said BTN will be found on Channel 73 for Expanded Basic subscribers, and on channel 795 for HD subscribers. BTN will telecast the UW-Akron game at 11 a.m. Saturday at Camp Randall and the Badgers’ second game against Marshall on Sept. 6 at 11 a.m.

Stormwater projects aim to fix Arboretum runoff woes

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Capital Times

Almost half a billion gallons of urban runoff swamps the UW-Madison Arboretum every year, endangering the restored prairies, savannas and wetlands and gradually overwhelming the stormwater detention ponds that protect the valuable property from erosion.

Five of the six stormwater detention ponds within the 1,260-acre research, conservation, educational and recreational facility have failed, and a concrete gutter that carried stormwater collapsed. As a result, soil has eroded, wetlands have been degraded, and a delta of sediment is settling into Lake Wingra, said David Liebl, the head of a committee that has planned stormwater control improvements at the Arboretum.

Five major projects are planned to help solve the problem over a five-year period, at a cost of $750,000 to $1 million each.

7 ways to have mad fun in the Mad City (77 Square)

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Figuring out what to do with yourself in Madison isn’t a matter of finding stuff to do. It’s a matter of winnowing the many choices down to one. Here, we offer seven offbeat options for things to do in town that are unmistakably Madison:

(The Memorial Union and Cinematheque in Vilas Hall are included on the list)

7 havens for Madison fine arts (77 Square)

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We are blessed with a great arts scene in Madison, which many of us take for granted. An oft-repeated sentiment is that with all the plays, concerts and gallery openings to take in, a person can get overwhelmed quickly.

But a few places stand out as being consistent locations to experience locally and nationally made art, and offer a good introduction to the fine arts scene here.

(Among the seven are the Chazen Museum, Wisconsin Union Theater, Vilas and Lathrop halls)

For fans, Big Ten Network deal doesn’t heal all wounds

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Capital Times

The long feud between Charter Communications and Big Ten Network finally came to a close today (Wednesday), ending an episode that in Wisconsin challenges the recent case of Brett Favre vs. The Green Bay Packers in terms of duration and emotion.

Throughout this tedious negotiation process, the feelings of most fans have fallen by the wayside while the media giants tussled in the ring.

So what do people think of the agreement, which will give the network a spot on the expanded basic lineup of the Madison area’s largest cable company, perhaps as soon as Saturday’s University of Wisconsin football season opener against Akron?

Update: Charter still working to air UW game

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Capital Times

There was no word yet Thursday morning whether Charter Communications would be able to complete equipment work in time to air Saturday’s Big Ten Network telecast of the University of Wisconsin’s football opener.

Charter spokesman John Miller said in an e-mail that an announcement would be sent out “as soon as engineers give us the word,” if they are able to complete the work.

Fatal Midvale crash victim remembered for her humor, positivity

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Capital Times

Friends of Lindsey Plank describe the 23-year-old chemistry student’s personal side, calling her fun-loving, goofy, perky, wild, energetic and uniquely charismatic.

“She was ready and raring to go all the time. I could never imagine her being in a bad mood. She was incredibly energetic and wild. She had a zest for life that I haven’t seen with anybody else,” said Ashley Gritton, 23, who has known Plank since elementary school and reunited with her a month ago at their five-year high school reunion.

Plank, a Stoughton native, and her boyfriend, Richard H. Putze, 22, from Milwaukee, were killed along with Daniel Myers, 22, when the car the three were traveling in hit a tree just after 1:45 a.m. Wednesday at 215 S. Midvale Blvd., just north of Mineral Point Road.

1998 Rose Bowl team to be honored

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

They were teammates, proud members of what one college football analyst labeled the “worst team ever to play in the Rose Bowl.”

For a short time this weekend, the members of the University of Wisconsinâ??s 1998 Big Ten Conference championship team will reunite in Madison to celebrate a special anniversary.

Charter adds BTN to lineup

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Charter Communications, with extensive cable operations in Wisconsin, has reached a deal with the Big Ten Network to carry Big Ten Conference sports programming.

As was the case with this weekâ??s agreement with Time Warner Cable, the deal covers several years, though neither company said for how long.

In a joint statement, the Big Ten Network and Charter said they were working together in an attempt to ensure that the majority of the systems that Charter operates â??can launch the network on its expanded basic level of service in time for Saturdayâ??s Big Ten college openers.â?

‘Makeover’ sidesteps stem cells

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

After more than a decade of trying to harvest the promise of embryonic stem cells, scientists have hit on a fascinating new approach that sidesteps them entirely. By adding genes to targeted cells in the body, they have been able change the basic makeup of those cells, turning them into potential disease-curing cells.

Ripon College gives freshmen free bikes for no-car pledges

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Wauwatosa West High School graduate Cameron Collier wasnâ??t sure whether to bring a car with him for his freshman year at Ripon College, but a brochure from the school sealed the deal with an offer he couldnâ??t refuse.

To save parking spots and go green, the 1,000-student college offered incoming freshmen a brand-new Trek 820 mountain bike, a Trek Vapor helmet and a Master Lock U-Lock – all to keep – if they pledged to leave their cars at home. Collier signed up.

Prominently mentions UW-Madison’s efforts to help students get around in an environmentally responsible way.

Charter-BTN deal less exciting for sports bar owners

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Capital Times

Amidst all the joy for sports fans with the announcement of a Charter-Big Ten Network deal, one group of people wasn’t exactly doing cartwheels on Wednesday: bar owners.

“I was sorry for the people who didn’t have it, but sometimes it’s good when you get thrown your bone, too,” said Scott Peterson, a manager at Babe’s Grill and Bar on the west side.

Midvale crash victims identified

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Capital Times

Just days before the opening of a new semester, the University of Wisconsin-Madison community was stunned today by the deaths of two incoming seniors and a recent graduate in an early morning crash Wednesday on South Midvale Boulevard, just south of Hillcrest Drive between Mineral Point Road and Regent Street.

UW-Madison Responds to Student Deaths

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NBC-15

MADISON – The University of Wisconsin-Madison campus community is mourning the deaths of three of its students in a Midvale Boulevard car accident early Wednesday.

“We are deeply saddened by the loss of three members of our campus community,” says Dean of Students Lori Berquam. “The timing of this tragedy, just as we’re about to start a new semester, hits us all particularly hard.”

“ODOS offers our deepest and sincerest sympathies to all those who knew, attended class or worked with Lindsey Plank, Richard Putze and Daniel Myers,” Berquam says. “In particular, our thoughts go out to their parents and families, during this time of grief.”

….”The UW chemistry community is devastated by this loss,” says Professor Robert Hamers, chair of the Department of Chemistry. “In addition to being chemistry majors, Lindsey and Richard volunteered their time and energy to assist with lecture demonstrations. Our heartfelt condolences go out to all the family and friends of all three students.”

Midvale Boulevard Crash Kills 3

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WISC-TV 3

MADISON, Wis. — A third person has died after being injured in a single-car crash early Wednesday morning on Midvale Boulevard.

The Dane Counted coroner has identified the third victim as Daniel Myers, 22, of Madison. Myers was pronounced dead at UW Hospital late Wednesday morning.

The other victims were identified as Lindsey T. Plank, 23, of Madison, and Richard H. Putze, 22, of Madison, according to the Dane County coroner. Putze was pronounced dead at the scene while Plank was pronounced dead at UW Hospital.

The occupants of the car were all University of Wisconsin students.

UW-Madison to select scientists for the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery through a competition

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Wisconsin State Journal

Let the bio-nano-info-tech contest begin.

UW-Madison on Wednesday launched a competition to select scientists for the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery, the public part of a $150 million public-private research building going up on the 1300 block of University Avenue.

Campus leaders have picked three research themes for the institute: biotechnology, nanotechnology and information technology.

The crisis and cure for Wisconsin politics

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Capital Times

John Wiley is leaving his post as chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a bang. A political bang.

In an article penned for Madison magazine, Wiley takes on the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce corporate lobbying machine in language that rocked the state’s political scene.

It wasn’t that Wiley said anything new. There has for a number of years now been a dawning consciousness among thinking Wisconsinites that WMC is leading a race to the bottom that would have this state define being competitive as being “among those states with the lowest taxes, lowest wages, and least regulation in the nation.”

Road work means some traffic backups for Badger game

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Capital Times

Football season is about to start at Camp Randall Stadium, so it must be time to roll out the road construction barrels.

This season, however, there shouldn’t be as many headaches for football fans trying to get to the first game of the season this Saturday between the University of Wisconsin and Akron, as one arterial street heading into campus is now open and construction on another main conduit to the stadium should be finished weeks ahead of schedule.

UW School of Veterinary Medicine celebrates 25 years

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WKOW-TV 27

Twenty-five years after it was established in 1983, the School of Veterinary Medicine is still the youngest school on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus. And it is the second-youngest veterinary medical school in the nation.

But don’t let its youth fool you. Wisconsin’s veterinary medical school has accomplished a lot in a short amount of time.

Economic development all about IT, UW prof says

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Capital Times

When it comes to economic development in Wisconsin, biotechnology has been grabbing all the headlines. That’s understandable in one sense because the state largely missed out on the silicon revolution of the 1980s and has been a Midwest leader in the life sciences.

Yet when it comes to actual job creation and income generation, computers still rule, says a top University of Wisconsin-Madison professor.

“Epic Systems hires more people every month than all the biotech companies in Wisconsin combined,” said Guri Sohi, past chairman of the UW-Madison computer science department.

In recruiting, how young is too young?

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Capital Times

To a degree, recruiting in college athletics is like dominos. Once one school stretches the boundaries, others are sure to fall in line to avoid being left behind.

In college hockey, the boundary that’s being redefined is the age that is too young to be recruited. It took a new form last week when Jordan Schmaltz — a 14-year-old defenseman who’s about to start his freshman year at Verona Area High School — verbally committed to the University of Wisconsin, accepting the team’s offer of a full scholarship.

It got people talking because it’s rare in hockey for a player who hasn’t even entered ninth grade to be already at the endpoint of the recruiting process instead of at the beginning.

Mike Lucas: For Vincent, Madison ‘is where it all started’

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Capital Times

“The future belongs to those who believe in the power of their dreams.”

— Eleanor Roosevelt

Reflecting on the path that his life has taken, and the aforementioned quotation, Troy Vincent remembered going one-on-one with Barry Alvarez shortly after Alvarez took over a floundering University of Wisconsin football program.

….Vincent, the supremely confident athlete, was named to five Pro Bowls. But that doesn’t come close to matching the accomplishments of Vincent, the supremely confident businessman and philanthropist, who will be inducted Friday evening into the UW Athletic Hall of Fame. “It’s a tremendous honor, and it goes right to top of my highlight list,” Vincent said, “because Madison is where it all started.”

Lucas: I’m no bust, says Dayne, who awaits another NFL shot

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Capital Times

Ron Dayne enjoys a celebration as much as the next tailback. But the 1999 Heisman winner hadn’t planned to be here this weekend for the reunion of the 1998 and 1999 University of Wisconsin football teams.

Nothing personal. Dayne still stays in touch with some of his former teammates, like Donnel Thompson and Cecil Martin.

But instead of attending a Friday night reception at Heritage Hall — honoring the ’98 and ’99 Big Ten champions and Rose Bowl winners — he was hoping to be in an NFL training camp.

Alder wants to force talk on public urination, sleeping in parks

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Capital Times

Madison police would no longer be allowed to fine the homeless for public urination and sleeping in parks under ordinance changes to be introduced soon by Ald. Brenda Konkel.

With limited shelter space and no new city programs for the homeless population coming down the pipe in 2009, Konkel said the ordinance changes she will introduce at a City Council meeting in September are intended to spark a discussion about how the city treats the homeless.

UW prof awarded grant to advance Social Security reform

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Capital Times

A University of Wisconsin-Madison professor has been awarded a $30,000 grant by the Rockefeller Foundation Innovation Award to Strengthen Social Security for Vulnerable Groups.

Pamela Herd, assistant professor of public affairs and sociology at the La Follette School of Public Affairs, will use her grant to develop a proposal to improve Social Security for older women who have raised children.

“Many women end up poor in old age, in part, due to the time and energy they devoted to raising children as opposed to participating in paid labor,” Herd said. “Most other counties reward women for this work. The U.S. does not do so.”

UW custodians hope new chancellor helps in dispute

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Capital Times

Some custodians who work on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus are upset with recent changes in the start time of their shift, and are hoping incoming Chancellor Carolyn “Biddy” Martin can do something about the situation.

Last week, second-shift custodians on the UW-Madison campus started reporting to work at 6 p.m. For the previous 30 years or so, the second-shift start time had been 5 p.m. The work day now ends at 2:30 a.m. for those workers, where it previously was over at 1:30 a.m.

Posted in Uncategorized

A well-rounded University Square — almost

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Capital Times

Greg Rice is scurrying about like the owner of a brand-new home, checking all the details and looking for any signs of shoddy workmanship.

“I wonder what happened here?” asked Rice, noting a small chip in the corner of a concrete planter on the massive, fourth-floor rain garden that captures stormwater from the new University Square. Upstairs on the top floor of the Lucky Apartments portion of the project, Rice is curious about an 18-inch-ring stain on the hallway carpet.

But you can excuse Rice, 53, for being a little nervous. He’s overseeing the final phase of the largest mixed-use project ever built in downtown Madison just as some 40,000 students start pouring onto the UW campus and the U.S. economy teeters on the brink of recession.