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Category: State news

WIAA Board Votes To Move State Tournaments To Green Bay

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WISC-TV 3

MADISON, Wis. — The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association has voted to move the state boys and girls basketball tournaments from Madison to Green Bay. But the tournaments could remain in Madison if the University of Wisconsin-Madison makes the Kohl Center available for tournament dates. The WIAA has been considering moving the tournament from Madison as early as 2013 because of scheduling conflicts at the Kohl Center for the March boys and girls championships. The Wisconsin Badgers hockey team will begin playing home games during that time when Big Ten conference play begins. The WIAA?s agreement with the Kohl Center expires in 2013.

WIAA approves 5-year agreement to move state basketball

Posted on
WKOW-TV 27

STEVENS POINT (WKOW) — The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association Board of Control supported an Executive Staff recommendation to enter into a five-year agreement with PMI? and the Resch Center in Green Bay, as soon as 2013 and extending through 2017, if the University of Wisconsin is unable to accommodate the State Boys and Girls Basketball Tournaments in accordance with the terms of the existing agreement.

Seely on Science: Learning the ancient language of sturgeon

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Wisconsin State Journal

Researchers with the state Department of Natural Resources and the UW-Madison Sea Grant Institute have confirmed in recent studies that the enormous sturgeon in the Fox and Wolf River basins communicate in deep and rumbling sounds that are so low they usually can?t be heard by the human ear….The subsonic sounds made by the fish, which can reach weights of more than 200 pounds, are being studied by the DNR’s Ron Bruch and Sea Grant’s Chris Bocast.

Private donation provides boost to faltering Wisconsin Covenant program

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Wisconsin State Journal

About 800 Wisconsin students will receive more money for college through the Wisconsin Covenant program thanks to a funding boost from a private source. The announcement pours some new life to the Covenant program, which is no longer accepting new enrollees. The Wisconsin Covenant, one of former Gov. Jim Doyle?s signature programs, promises high school students they will get a spot at a Wisconsin college or university and some financial help if they earn at least a ?B? average in high school and stay out of trouble.

Cuts to UW disproportionate, unfair

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Badger Herald

Today, the Joint Committee on Finance will hold a hearing regarding the disproportionate budget lapse to the University of Wisconsin System. It is proposed that the UW System take a $65.6 million cut, 38 percent of the total lapse. This, after the System received a $250 million cut in the current biennial budget, bringing UW funding down to 7 percent of the total state budget.

On Campus: Investigation into former UW-Madison athletic official could cost $100,000

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Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison estimated it could cost up to $100,000 to investigate a former senior athletic official accused of sexual assault, according to a work contract for the review. The university appointed former Dane County Circuit Court Judge Patrick Fiedler, now an attorney with Axley Brynelson, LLP, to lead the inquiry into John Chadima, formerly a senior associate athletic director. The contract, approved Jan. 19, states that Fiedler will charge at a rate of $300 per hour plus out-of-pocket costs.

Interim Chancellor David Ward has now tasked Fiedler to lead a second investigation into two more allegations against Chadima. Gov. Scott Walker authorized the Department of Administration to approve the hire, a spokesman for Walker said.

Guard mission: Butter, not guns for Afghanistan

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Wisconsin State Journal

A newly formed unit of the Wisconsin National Guard soon will deliver Dairy State know-how to war-torn Afghanistan. Team members received a 40-hour crash course from UW-Madison instructors in topics ranging from beekeeping to fish farming to water management to the ins and outs of growing corn, pomegranates and poultry.

?They are not going to be experts by any means, but at least they won?t be clueless,? said Karen Nielsen, director of the Babcock Institute for International Dairy Research. The institute does a lot of international education, but this curriculum was unique, Nielsen said. ?We haven?t had to train at this level before because most of those we?ve worked with have electricity and machinery, but the people in Afghanistan don?t,? Nielsen said. The institute plans to bring in Amish farmers to help train the next group, Nielsen said.

Gov. Walker signed Chadima probe contract; $100,000 estimate

Posted on
WKOW-TV 27

MADISON — A contract between the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Madison law firm and signed by Governor Scott Walker estimates as much as $100,000 in legal fees to investigate potential wrongdoing by former top UW administrator John Chadima. Governor Walker signed the contract with the law firm – Axley Brynelson, LLP – January 19, after a UW official requested Walker?s involvement.

Don’t bounce tourneys from Madison

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Wisconsin State Journal

As the clock ticks down toward a decision from the WIAA on where it will host its premier post-season events ? the state boys and girls basketball tournaments ? we keep coming back to this thought: Don?t blow it as the buzzer sounds. Keep the tournaments in Madison. It?s just that simple. The WIAA would do itself no favors, and possibly put its far-and-away leading revenue stream at risk, by moving the tradition-laden events to a new venue in Green Bay. A major scheduling conflict at the Kohl Center has been resolved, thanks to efforts by UW Athletic Department officials and others.

A year later, in praise of the TAA

Posted on
Capital Times

When Gov. Scott Walker attacked collective bargaining rights a year ago, many unions and union members were in shock. The oldest graduate student union in the world (now an American Federation of Teachers affiliate) “got it” immediately. Within hours of the governor?s announcement, the TAA declared: “What we do in the next five days will determine whether we keep our union, and our professional lives as educators, researchers, and public servants.”TAA members were front and center at the first rallies on campus, and the led the first great march into the state Capitol on Feb. 14.

Madison sweetens deal to keep WIAA tournaments as Green Bay makes push

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Wisconsin State Journal

Madison continues to sweeten its bid to keep the state high school basketball tournaments, making Kohl Center more available, offering cash to the WIAA and ensuring better deals for parking, lodging and restaurants. Madison didn?t initially recognize the danger of losing the tournaments but is now doing all possible to keep them, Mayor Paul Soglin said. The plans are a collaboration between the university, the city and the hospitality industry. They would include a contribution to the WIAA from the Greater Madison Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Loopy roundabouts actually work

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Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison transportation safety expert David Noyce traces the roundabout?s bad rap back to Chevy Chase in the 1985 comedy “European Vacation.” Chase?s character, Clark Griswold, drives his family in an English rental car into the inner lane of a roundabout near London?s Lambeth Bridge. “They got stuck in the circle and couldn?t get out,” Noyce recalled Thursday. “So people had a negative view.” And a lot of motorists in Wisconsin still do.

Property Trax: Local advocates warn struggling homeowners not to assume $25 billion settlement with banks will help them

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Wisconsin State Journal

Dane County advocates for struggling homeowners this week generally welcomed the national $25 billion settlement with five of the nation?s biggest mortgage lenders over foreclosure abuses like robo-signing….UW-Madison Professor Morris Davis, academic director of the university’s Graaskamp Center for Real Estate, said he didn’t believe the settlement would help most people who are “deeply underwater” on their mortgages avoid foreclosure.

“But (the aid) could encourage some families that are only marginally underwater to postpone the foreclosure process as long as possible,” he said.

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Unions want repeal pledge from Dem candidates

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Wisconsin State Journal

State union leaders are asking Democratic candidates for governor to pledge they will veto the next state budget if it doesn?t restore collective bargaining rights for public workers. The limitation of those rights is largely what motivated the petition drive to recall Republican Gov. Scott Walker.

Legislative Task Force on UW Restructuring talks tuition, campus advisory boards

Posted on
Daily Cardinal

Amid discussions of who should set tuition in Wisconsin and how the UW System should be structured, UW-Madison Chancellor David Ward told members of a state task force Wednesday there is no ?one size fits all? model for flexibilities needed across campuses system-wide. Ward said individual institutions would benefit from having ?university councils? to facilitate communication between the campus community, the Board of Regents and the state.

Editorial: Allow two UW campuses to start governing boards

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Eau Claire Leader-Telegram

The furor that erupted a year ago over who should control the state?s flagship UW-Madison campus has given way to sober realism about how best to fund and manage the state?s universities. That discussion resumes this week in Madison, and this time, with any luck, a reasonable solution will emerge that gives the state?s two largest campuses more freedom to run their affairs as state funding dwindles.

Legislative Affairs talks Mifflin, Responsible Action Policy

Posted on
Daily Cardinal

Associated Students of Madison Chair Allie Gardner told the student government?s Legislative Affairs Committee Monday that members of the state?s committee dedicated to studying the restructuring of the UW System have been unresponsive to students? requests to speak at its upcoming meeting, where the task force will discuss tuition. Gardner is asking students to attend the Task Force on UW Restructuring?s meeting Wednesday.

Second allegation against John Chadima reports “inappropriate misconduct”

Posted on
Daily Cardinal

….Initially, authorities and colleagues including Athletic Director Barry Alvarez said they thought the initial incident was isolated, but Rep. Steve Nass, R-Town of La Grange, said in a release Monday that he is not surprised to learn about the additional accusations. Now, Nass is urging the university to launch a ?thorough administrative review? of the Athletic Department.

?There is growing concern that Chadima?s conduct may have been directly or indirectly enabled by the current structure and management environment,? Nass said.

Experts say species still could thrive with wolf, crane hunts

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Wisconsin State Journal

Some state wildlife experts and even hunting proponents say Republicans may have over-reached last week in putting forth back-to-back proposals to hunt formerly endangered gray wolves and sandhill cranes, and there could be a backlash from non-hunters.

“It?s just lousy timing,” said Scott Craven, a recently retired UW-Madison wildlife ecologist. With the wolf just removed last month from the endangered species list, the non-hunting public is probably perplexed by what seems like a rush to hunt a species on which so much time and money was spent to restore and protect.

Give UW the freedom to manage its own affairs

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The furor that erupted a year ago over who should control the state?s flagship University of Wisconsin campus has given way to sober realism about how best to fund and manage the state?s universities. That discussion resumes this week in Madison, and this time, with any luck, a reasonable solution will emerge that gives the state?s two largest campuses more freedom to run their own affairs as state funding dwindles.

The shame of last year?s implosion of a plan advanced secretly by former UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin was not that the plan was scotched. It deserved to be scotched. The shame was that cuts to the university system were put in place without giving the campuses the degree of flexibility they needed to manage those cuts.

Madison sweetens offer to keep WIAA tournaments

Posted on
Madison.com

Madison is stepping up efforts to keep the state boys and girls basketball tournaments and their $9 million in estimated tourism spending. The WIAA is considering moving the tournament as early as 2013 because of the Kohl Center is unavailable to the WIAA for its preferred dates in 2013 and perhaps 2014 due to conflicts with WCHA and NCAA hockey events. The WIAA?s agreement with the Kohl Center expires in 2013. “We want to do what it takes to make this successful,” said Deb Archer, president of the Greater Madison Convention and Visitors Bureau. About 96,500 people attended the boys tournament and 55,000 the girls tournament last year.

Wolf hunting bill goes too far, scientists tell lawmakers

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Wisconsin State Journal

Some of the state?s top wolf scientists cautioned Wednesday that an Assembly bill establishing a wolf hunting season goes too far and does not offer enough protections against killing too many of the state?s 800 to 1,000 wolves and returning the animal to the federal endangered species list….Tim Van Deelen, a UW-Madison wildlife ecologist who helped author the wolf management plan, said the population goal of 350 was set 20 years ago and dramatically underestimated the capacity of the Wisconsin landscape to support wolves. Also, he said, there is little research on the impact of hunting on a recovering wolf population.

Book memorializes state?s historic protests

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Wisconsin State Journal

Whatever your party affiliation or ideological leanings, the historic nature of last year?s protests and this year?s gubernatorial recall is undeniable. Local writer Dennis Weidemann has taken on the project of documenting the movement to create what he describes as a sort of “yearbook” for participants who want to remember the time when they stood shoulder to shoulder with strangers in the snow, united for a common cause. Weidemann is no political firebrand; he goes to great pains to stress that his interest in the protest movement is not a partisan one. He did not even attend the protests at first, but was encouraged by his wife’s stories of the people she met there.

“It was just the normal folks,” Weidemann says. “Immediately, that’s what hit me. Not just the numbers of people. The diversity. People from all walks of life.” Where news reports portrayed a sea of faces, Weidemann saw individuals. His interviews capture a broad spectrum of participants, from the most obvious stakeholders ? public employees like teachers and librarians ? to people not customarily associated with public demonstrations, like farmers and pilots.

City faces stiff competition in bid to keep high school basketball tournaments in Madison

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Wisconsin State Journal

With the WIAA weeks from a decision, Madison is stepping up efforts to keep the state boys and girls basketball tournaments ? and the estimated $9 million in spending they generate ? here.UW-Madison is pursing options to make the Kohl Center available on the WIAA?s preferred dates and hoteliers are preparing a proposal to make the event more affordable to visitors, officials said.

Hearing at Capitol to address wolf hunting season

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Wisconsin State Journal

The discussion of a hunting season will begin in earnest Wednesday morning with a legislative hearing on a Republican plan to allow public hunting and trapping of wolves in Wisconsin. Among those who will testify Wednesday (this) morning is Tim Van Deelen, a UW-Madison wildlife ecologist who has studied wolf populations. Van Deelen said Tuesday that, while he believes the state?s packs can probably sustain some level of public hunting, the impact of killing any percentage of a recovering wolf population has been little studied.

Giving ethanol a good name: Advocates tout increase in production, jobs for state

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Wisconsin State Journal

….”That?s the new frontier,” said Gary Radloff, director of Midwest Energy Policy Analysis for the Wisconsin Bioenergy Initiative at UW-Madison. What?s exciting for ethanol plants is that much of the progress is taking place under their roofs. “So the ability to take advantage of that pre-existing infrastructure is good business and good environmental consideration. We don?t need to reinvent the wheel,” said John Greeler, director of education and outreach at the UW?s Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center.

Wisconsin farmers now allowed to shoot problem wolves

Posted on
Daily Cardinal

The new DNR wolf regulations have led to speculation about the creation of a public wolf-hunting season. Despite opposition from some groups, UW-Madison Associate Professor of Environmental Studies Adrian Treves said he believes legislation will be passed in 2012. According to his research, most Wisconsin residents endorse a wolf hunt. Treves warned that while the state needs to have some authority over the wolf population, “the successful conservation of wolves depends on people tolerating them, accepting them, and that tolerance has been declining,” Treves said.

For Biddy Martin, a New Test of Leadership

Posted on
Chronicle of Higher Education

There are more than 1,000 miles between this idyllic college town and Madison, Wis., but that distance must seem even greater in Carolyn A. (Biddy) Martin?s rearview mirror.

The nearly yearlong roar of protesters in Madison, where Ms. Martin had a relatively short and rocky tenure as head of the state?s flagship campus, has been replaced with the calm that whispers through Amherst College like one of Emily Dickinson?s tamer verses.

Additional doctors revealed in sick notes

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Wisconsin State Journal

Additional sick notes from last year?s Capitol protests released Thursday by the Madison School District reveal two more doctors who provided excuses the district deemed “fraudulent.” That brings to 15 the number of doctors who signed such notes but have not faced sanctions from the state Medical Examining Board. A board committee plans to decide next month whether to investigate additional doctors.

Campus Connection: Falk steers clear of controversy during talk at UW-Madison

Posted on
Capital Times

Former Dane County executive Kathleen Falk — who is among the Democrats seeking to unseat Gov. Scott Walker in a recall election later this year — spoke for nearly an hour Tuesday afternoon on the UW-Madison campus. The event, titled “A Career of Politics, Service and Leadership: The View from the Executive?s Chair,” was held at Ingraham Hall and attended by about three dozen people, mostly students. Although Falk was energetic, entertaining and informative, the event was devoid of bombastic sound bites.

Biz Beat: Proposal would let new UW staff opt out of state retirement system

Posted on
Capital Times

New hires at the University of Wisconsin could opt out of the state retirement system under a proposal being floated in the Assembly, though it?s not clear that they would want to. The measure would allow the UW System to let covered employees select a defined-contribution plan ? like a 401(k) ? rather than participating in the state pension system.

Obey, Gebhardt to be featured at worker-management seminar

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Wisconsin State Journal

Two former members of Congress will lead the list of speakers at a presentation on Thursday honoring one of the UW-Madison?s most influential economists. Building Management and Worker Partnerships for a More Prosperous America is the theme of the event to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of John R. Commons. Known as the “spiritual father” of Social Security, Commons, born in 1862, worked closely with Wisconsin governor and U.S. senator Robert M. La Follette to draft the Wisconsin civil service law in 1905 and the public utilities law in 1907.

First details of proposed school accountability system revealed

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Wisconsin State Journal

The state could more aggressively intervene in the lowest-performing publicly funded schools under a proposed accountability system unveiled Monday. The system would rate schools on a scale of 0 to 100 based on student performance and growth on state tests, closing achievement gaps and preparing students for college and careers. Ratings also would be tied to dropout rates and third-grade literacy levels.

“This is light years ahead of where the state is now,” said Doug Harris, a UW-Madison education and public affairs professor who advised the state’s accountability reform task force.