Author: jplucas

MADISON, Wis. — A student vote approved up to $150 million in construction and renovations for University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Union South and Memorial Union.

UW-Madison students voted to take Union South down and construct a new building in its place, even though that could mean increasing student fees nearly $100 a year for the next 30 years.

The actual student cost will depend on how much a major fundraising campaign brings in, WISC-TV reported.

When out of town visitors arrive in Madison for Saturday’s freakfest on State Street, they’ll have to fight with football fans for places to stay. Hotel space is nearly booked solid around town, and the University of Wisconsin is locking out visitors from campus dorms.

At Ogg Hall, there’s a sign telling students that visitors will not be allowed in beginning at 9:00 p.m. Thursday.

MADISON, Wis. — With the new city-organized “Freakfest On State Street” only days away, many Langdon Street residents said that they’re bracing for the prospect that Madison’s annual Halloween tradition might move onto their street.

To quell those concerns, University of Wisconsin and fraternity and sorority leaders said that they already have a plan in place to keep Madison’s fraternity row quiet and trouble-free this weekend.

Rumors have swirled for weeks that rogue Halloween partiers will try to move the sometimes infamous festivities to Langdon Street instead of State Street, where the city’s “Freakfest” is scheduled for Saturday, WISC-TV reported.

MADISON, Wis. — University of Wisconsin-Madison officials said that new election problems are keeping the UW student government from releasing the results of last week’s election.

The Student Election Committee counted votes by hand all day on Friday after confusion with the Scantron ballots caused several students to fill them out incorrectly, WISC-TV reported.

The City of Madison hopes this year’s advanced ticket sales and gated entry will ease some of those problems.

Some business owners aren’t buying the plan.

Dan Waisman knows the aftermath of Halloween riots firsthand.

The city of Madison is less than a week away from enacting a Halloween plan about a year in the making. The past four such celebrations have ended with everything from violence to police using pepper spray. This year, however, police are hoping to avoid all that by shutting down the event early.

Last year an estimated 100,000 partygoers donned costumes and took to the street. This Saturday will be different in many ways. It will be a ticketed event, costing $5 to enter, and will be blocked off by snow fence. Like last year a public address system will announce the party is over. This time that will come at 1:30 a.m. daylight time, an hour and a half before bar time.

Get ready to fall back. Daylight Saving Time ends this weekend. The annual time change coincides with the Halloween celebration on State Street this year.

Next year, Daylight Saving Time will begin three weeks earlier, and it will end later, by one week. However, it still will affect the State Street celebration in 2009.

Fraternity and sorority members are used to pledging, but this Halloween they’re making a different kind of pledge.

Last Halloween, the State Street celebration spilled over to Langdon Street, home of the university’s Greek community.

“We don’t want to see any of our chapters asked to leave campus,” says Rhiannon Kelleher.

A group of Madison residents will be text messaging state street partiers on Halloween. Ã? The group, called CRASH Madison, says they’re picking up where the city has left off, giving up-to-the minute information on dangerous situations.Ã?  They say they were motivated to step in once the city announced that snow fencing would line State Street.

The University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee placed its Student Association on suspension Friday after the student government’s leaders refused to release some of the association’s financial records for review by university auditors.

The Freshman 15, a term coined to describe the extra pounds that many college students pack on in their first year away from home, has lost some weight. New research out Sunday shows that the newcomers on campus only gain a little more than half that amount. Call it the Freshman 8.

Call ââ?¬Å?pre-gamingââ?¬Â by any of its other names and it still translates the same for substance abuse specialists seeking strategies to control the ubiquitous ââ?¬Å?pre-party,ââ?¬Â generally defined as a small group of students drinking together in a dorm room or other private space prior to an actual party or social event.

LA CROSSE, Wis., Oct. 22 (AP) � This month, searchers combing the Mississippi River found the body of the eighth college-age man in nine years to disappear from one of the taverns here and turn up dead in a river.