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Category: Community

Another big student housing project is coming to Downtown after Madison City Council vote

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Wisconsin State Journal

The 1,600-bed complex, which includes a small amount of lower-income rent prices, would see four buildings erected on the block bounded by Johnson, Gorham and Broom streets. Given the moniker “Johnson & Broom,” the latest development from Chicago-based Core Spaces features another agreement between the company, the city and UW-Madison to give some future student tenants lower rents than they’d get in other market-rate apartments.

Editorial | Madison condemns neo-Nazi lies, racism and antisemitism

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The Capital Times

University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin said: “The presence of this hateful group in Madison is utterly repugnant. I am horrified to see these symbols here in Madison. Hatred and antisemitism are completely counter to the university’s values, and the safety and well-being of our community must be our highest priorities.”

UW-Madison students work to improve impaired Koshkonong Creek

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The Capital Times

Labracke has been part of the project as a graduate student studying water resources management at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Nelson Institute. The project, led by UniverCity Year, is aimed at creating a watershed plan to improve the impaired waterway and reduce the creek’s flooding.

Wisconsin organizations urge lawmakers to embrace local approach to reducing childhood obesity

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Wisconsin Public Radio

In 2018, the UW-Madison’s Division of Extension received a $2.5 million five-year grant from the CDC’s High Obesity program to address obesity in Menominee County. The funding led to the Kemāmaceqtaq: We’re All Moving initiative, which worked with county and tribal government and community groups.

Gauthier, who helped lead the initiative, said the last five years of work have focused on changing policies and making environmental improvements to support healthy choices. The initiative has helped local government buildings, schools and community groups adopt new nutrition policies, supported a local farmers market program and led a walking audit of the county to identify how to improve infrastructure for walking and biking.

Amber Canto is director of the Health and Wellbeing Institute with the UW-Madison’s Division of Extension and project director for the High Obesity Program grant funding. She said they’ve received another five-year award to continue their work in Menominee County and begin work in Ashland County, which now also has an obesity rate of more than 40 percent.

Canto said they’ve tracked increases in healthy food options and recreationally-accessible miles, but the bigger impacts are harder to quantify this early on.

“That data has shown, from a theory perspective, that if these opportunities are present that the behavior and therefore the health outcomes will shift over time,” she said at Monday’s hearing.

Pell grants give inmates another shot at college

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Wisconsin State Journal

“There was a general feeling nationally that incarceration needed to be about punishment and deterrence, and that was going to be ultimately the key to reducing incarcerated populations in the country,” said Peter Moreno, director of UW-Madison’s Odyssey Beyond Bars and the Prison Education Initiative. “In the past 20, 30 years, people were coming to prison and many, many of them were returning to prison after they had left because they weren’t prepared for success when they got out.”

As our politics get worse, it’s time to reevaluate how we talk to each other

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Wisconsin Examiner

Not a moment too soon, the University of Wisconsin-Madison has chosen a paradigm-shifting book on truth, persuasion and social change for its 2023-2024 Go Big Read common reading program.

“How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion” by David McRaney (Penguin Random House 2022) tackles the psychology that drives our bitterly divided, tribal politics, and sheds light on the path to a more civil, democratic and constructive future.

New partnership will offer prenatal check-ins, pregnancy care in Milwaukee

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Wisconsin Public Radio

A Milwaukee nonprofit and Froedtert Health are launching a new initiative to improve health outcomes for pregnant people and infants by offering prenatal care in a community setting.

Funded by a grant from the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Penfield Children’s Center will be offering group pregnancy care sessions. Participants with similar due dates will meet regularly at the nonprofit’s location for pregnancy-related classes and to get an individual prenatal check-up through a new maternal mobile clinic operated by Froedtert. They’ll also be able to access postpartum care at the mobile clinic and work with a social care navigator at Penfield to access additional support.

How to make the most of your first science festival

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Discover

If you’re a science educator, professional development sessions and lectures on timely topics are often included in science festivals to enrich your curriculum. Take the Badger Talks series from University of Wisconsin-Madison for example, where professors will speak on topics like sustainability, psychedelics research and weather monitoring.

Madison schools see surprise enrollment increase

Posted on
The Capital Times

Soldner said for the actual number of students enrolled, there is an increase of 17 in 3K special programming, 58 fewer students in 4K, 14 more in kindergarten and 48 more in grades 1-12. He said staff will work with the district’s data and research team and outside consultants at the UW Applied Population Lab, which does population projections, to better understand how this affects the overall trend.

University of Wisconsin is celebrating 175th birthday with new ice cream. It needs your help picking flavor

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

In a fashion only fitting for the Dairy State, Wisconsin’s flagship university is celebrating its 175th birthday with a new ice cream flavor.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison created four new flavor ideas and is asking the public to vote for its favorite by Friday. The winner will be available at campus Babcock Dairy stores in early 2024.

Wisconsin to get even cheesier this weekend

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

The festival will include 25 cheese companies in the state and involvement from local chefs, authors, brewers, distillers, sommeliers and chocolate makers. One event teaches how to create a cheese board, another focuses on cooking while others offer up instruction on how to pair cheese with wine, chocolate, beer or bourbon. One event is a mini course in cheese science at the Center for Dairy Research at UW-Madison and includes a luncheon with certified Master Cheesemakers.

Metro Transit knows some buses are crowded. Help is coming

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Wisconsin State Journal

He said the system needs about 170 drivers each day when buses are running and UW-Madison and Madison schools are in session. Currently it has 288 on staff and as of last week had 21 vacancies. There also were 16 drivers in training — three of whom are expected to be on the road on Oct. 1, another three on Oct. 15 and another 10 on Nov. 12.

New Madison Justice Team aims to help transition from jail, prison

Posted on
The Capital Times

Since then, the all-volunteer organization has grown to include more than 80 people with representatives from more than 30 local organizations, from the Black Men Coalition of Dane County, to the Christ Presbyterian Church, to the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Odyssey Project, which provides low-income and formerly incarcerated adults access to accredited English courses.

Madison Plan Commission gives OK to raze 3 Capitol Square buildings for new history museum

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Wisconsin State Journal

Prior to voting on items for the museum, the commission unanimously passed other items that would create more housing and make a big change to the UW-Madison campus.

Under a demolition permit passed by the commission, an auto repair shop at 1233 Regent St. would be razed to build a $13 million, five-story, lower-cost housing project proposed by the Wisconsin Housing Preservation Corp. The redevelopment would have 50 units and 1,500 square feet of commercial space.

Lunch at Culver’s fitting place to find common ground in polarizing political climate

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The promotion of civil discourse is one of the most urgent actions the La Follette School can take going forward.

Co-authored by Susan Webb Yackee is a professor of public affairs and director of the La Follette School of Public Affairs at UW-Madison. Curt S. Culver is the non-executive chairman of MGIC Investment Corp. and its principal subsidiary, Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Corporation (MGIC), the nation’s leading private mortgage insurer. He is a founding member of the La Follette School’s Board of Visitors.

Everybody poops. Wisconsin is a national leader in using it to monitor public health.

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The CDC established the National Wastewater Surveillance System with Wisconsin and five others as founding members. Wisconsin demonstrated the value of having an academic, public health and state lab all working together on the effort, said Martin Shafer, a senior scientist at UW-Madison and the Wisconsin State Lab of Hygiene.

“It was an amazing couple of years where close to 70 or 80 different jurisdictions (were getting started),” said Shafer, adding, “Everybody kind of did something a little bit different. So that spurred a lot of innovation.”

With online listings hit or miss, Madison college students expected to throw away 1 million pounds of furniture

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Wisconsin State Journal

Downtown Madison can expect to see the worst of off-campus student moving over the weekend and into early next week. With virtually every off-campus student housing lease turning over between Aug. 14 and 15, streets near campus quickly become congested as students and their families park all along the streets for moving days, the curbsides become temporary landfills, and the city of Madison Streets Division attempts to mitigate it all starting with 4 a.m. shifts.

Amid housing crisis, Madison City Council member proposes broad housing task force

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Wisconsin State Journal

Ald. Amani Latimer Burris, 12th District, introduced a resolution at Tuesday’s council meeting to create a task force including members of multiple city committees, four council members and a representative from UW-Madison’s Division of University Housing.

“The affordable housing crisis is something we’ve got to attack,” Latimer Burris said. “We have a lot of committees. We spend a lot of time studying stuff. In the meantime, prices are getting out of hand. What’s the answer? I don’t know.”

Hold-outs no more? Madison police body camera test run to face final City Council vote

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Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison Professor Keith Findley, who co-chaired the Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee, said despite the pilot program’s differences, it largely reflects the committee’s recommendations.

“It’s taken so long to get to this point we can’t keep dragging our feet on this,” Findley told the Civilian Police Oversight Board on Monday. “I think Madison has fallen behind on the times.”

The annual downtown Madison move-out is quickly approaching. Here’s what you need to know.

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WISC-TV 3

The University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Office of Sustainability recommends downtown residents pack smart, using things like suitcases or reusable containers to store and move belongings rather than buying new cardboard boxes. Clothing and other fabric items can serve as packing material for fragile items, and kitchen items should be packed last to avoid creating waste from additional takeout meals.

Federal grant to fund training aimed at deterring sexual assault in Downtown Madison

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Wisconsin State Journal

The initiative is headed by an advisory council consisting of officials from Public Health Madison and Dane County, members of UW-Madison Student Services, nonprofit leaders, business owners and city officials. It combines Safer Bars training with increased surveillance, better lighting in the city-owned Buckeye parking lot and other safety measures.

In a fast-evolving city, Madison considers changes to map that guides growth

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

“Smart Growth believes there are many areas in and near Downtown and near the UW-Madison campus where it would be appropriate to encourage greater housing density and taller buildings than was contemplated in the Comprehensive Plan and earlier neighborhood plans,” executive director Bill Connors said. “Those earlier plans were adopted before it was fully apparent that Madison has a persistent housing shortage, which is causing rents and house prices to skyrocket.”

Madison’s mental health crisis team can’t keep up with its own success

Posted on
The Capital Times

University Health Services in fall 2020 started its own mental health response team called the co-responder program. The University Police Department contacts Health Services for calls related to mental health, and the team will send two counselors to join UW officers at the scene.

Sarah Nolan, director of UW Mental Health Services, said that program has made a big difference on campus but is challenged by limited hours of service: from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Lake Monona redesign, Madison apartment tower face open forums

Posted on
The Capital Times

Core Spaces said the Johnson & Broom project will include affordable student housing in the same style as another project Core is building on State Street called oLiv Madison.

The oLiv project will have 386 units with over 1,000 beds, and 10% of the beds will be set aside for discounted rates for students receiving financial aid, through an agreement between Core Spaces and the University of Wisconsin.

St. Mary’s Hospital launches program to give food to new moms who need it

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

UW Health started screening ER and hospitalized patients for food insecurity in 2017, and screens children at clinic visits, spokesperson Emily Greendonner said. Patients needing food get food packages at discharge.

One in 12 Wisconsin families can’t afford the food they need, according to data before the COVID-19 pandemic, said the Wisconsin Food Security Project at UW-Madison. Food insecurity can contribute to chronic disease and poor mental health, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Madison tweaking Metro Transit system to address concerns, challenges

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

The main complaints about UW Hospital service are being addressed with fixes planned for August, Rusch said. “Some of the concerns people have are because they are still learning how the new system works, and it’s a bit different from what they’re accustomed to,” said Dar Ward, commuter solutions manager for UW-Madison Transportation Services. “It appears Metro Transit’s proposed service adjustments are directed at addressing the complaints.”

‘No choice:’ Madison council flips to yes on ‘luxury’ student housing

Posted on
The Capital Times

Chicago-based developer Core Spaces proposed the construction of a 12-story, 232-unit market-rate apartment building dubbed “Johnson and Bassett” at 221 N. Bassett St., 430-444 W. Dayton St. and 437-445 W. Johnson St., but the council voted 13-6 in June to reject zoning changes that would allow the project to be built. Several council members said they opposed the apartment development because it lacked affordable housing units.

Cap Times’ Evjue Foundation announces over $900,000 in grants

Posted on
The Capital Times

Among today’s major recipients is the UW’s longtime Odyssey Project, which received $35,400 for the college classes it offers in south Madison to adults who never had a chance to attend college and $50,000 to Access Community Health’s efforts to bring dental care to people without insurance coverage.

Madison project helps Black women build financial literacy, wealth

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

“As research extensively documents, racial disparities in wealth accumulation are systemic, of which historic public policies and private practices sustain,” said Melody Harvey, UW-Madison assistant professor of consumer science in the School of Human Ecology.

Black communities are likely to be what Harvey called “banking deserts,” meaning there are few, if any, mainstream financial institutions. They are also more likely to have concentrations of high-cost alternative financial services such as payday and auto title lenders, Harvey explained, asking “Where does one begin when even the most basic of financial services may not be readily available and accessible?”