Category: UW-Madison Related

One of the inescapable conclusions from the impressive recent community public safety conversations in neighborhoods around Madison is that home ownership matters. Certainly, renters are important members of our community and we need rental properties and engaged owners and tenants.

But, it is homeowners who feel a sense of investment and commitment to a neighborhood and it is simply good policy to encourage homeownership as much as possible. Affordability is key.A recent University of Wisconsin study found residents of the Park Street corridor for example valued their neighborhoods and want to stay there. But more than half of respondents are paying more than a third of their incomes for housing and that’s tough to sustain. The survey itself was significant because it used a community-based model that suggests a high level of credibility.

Jesse Miller – the 19-year-old who escaped from Dane County Jail last month and triggered Tuesday’s lock down of UW Hospital and a campus search by claiming he had a gun and wanted police to shoot him – repeatedly sought help for suicidal thoughts during a week last summer when he threatened to jump from the top of the Veterans Hospital parking garage, court records show.

Dear Editor: The governor and state Senate have proposed a state budget that includes the University of Wisconsin System Growth Agenda, which improves access to the UW System, increases the number of baccalaureate degrees and graduating rates, and strengthens campus communities and local businesses. For example, it would facilitate much-needed and long-delayed capital projects that include student unions, residence halls and academic buildings.

As a parent of a college student, your article on student privacy (“Families Grapple With Student Privacy,” Personal Journal, Sept. 20) rang true. I was absolutely floored by the statement from the University of Wisconsin administrator that the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act “is about judgment.” I have found the exact opposite to be true.

When confronted by parents and others, school officials abandon judgment and hide behind the privacy act. They use it as an excuse to do nothing about legitimate concerns. I hate to admit it, but my wife had to pose as my daughter over the telephone to clear up a relatively simple issue. What a mess.

State lawmakers on the Assembly Committee on Colleges and Universities are on the right track in asking the University of Wisconsin to drop the practice of “preferred” lender list of financial institutions offering loans to college students.

Lists of preferred lenders have come under fire recently when investigations found that at least some were offering colleges gifts or financial inducements, presumably in exchange for getting on the “preferred” list.

Madison Police Department spokesman Joel DeSpain said a suspect is being questioned in connection with the armed robbery earlier today of the Italian grocery store Fraboni’s, 822 Regent St.

The man is not yet under arrest, DeSpain said, but added that he is not aware that police are searching for anyone else.

DeSpain said the man was found by police in the University of Wisconsin administration building at 21 N. Park St. after it had been cleared because a UW employee in the building saw someone suspicious. UW employees and students in two nearby dormitories were alerted about the robbery at 12:15.

The downtown Madison business climate is thriving and ready for growth, according to a year-long Downtown Madison Market Analysis study published Thursday.

University of Wisconsin faculty and staff asked lawmakers to endorse a plan that would allow them to form unions. AFT-Wisconsin delivered a letter to budget negotiators that includes the names of more than 2,000 employees at UW campuses who support the plan. Under the proposal, employees on each campus could decide whether to form a union. All other state employees have that right. Supporters want the plan included in the final version of the state budget

MADISON, Wis. — The University of Wisconsin said that it will continue to provide students with a list of preferred private lenders even though some colleges and universities have decided to scrap the practice.

The lists came under scrutiny this year after an investigation by the New York attorney general turned up quid-pro-quo relationships between schools or college financial aid officials and lenders.

UW-Madison is in danger of massive cuts and reductions if the state Assembly version of the budget is passed, according to a letter sent by Chancellor John Wiley to legislative leaders currently debating the stalled issue.

….The fact that university staff and faculty are singled out is one of the reasons they rank among the lowest paid among their peers in the Big Ten and behind the technical college staffs in the state.

Perennial UW haters Rep. Steve Nass of Whitewater and Sen. Glenn Grothman of West Bend like to claim that this would mandate unions on our campuses — one of their many misleading statements about the university.

Let’s make it clear: This budget language doesn’t unionize UW faculty and staff. It merely gives them the right to make that choice. Some campuses may indeed vote to join a union, others not. There’s no justification, however, to keep them as second-class employees of the state and deny them the right to make that choice for themselves.

UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley warned Tuesday that proposed budget cuts would devastate the Madison campus, as lawmakers and Gov. Jim Doyle’s aides continued to negotiate a new state budget.

Wiley said the budget proposed by the Assembly would force layoffs of staff members, thousands of classes to be canceled in the spring semester and enrollment caps in some major fields of study.

The result would be fewer students graduating on time and diminished student services, he wrote in a memo distributed to legislators.

UW-Madison and Madison police continue to search for a suicidal man who claimed to have a weapon and said he wanted officers to shoot him.

Police, however, said it was not clear whether the man was ever in the hospital area. UW-Madison Police said they believe the man is a threat to himself but not to UW-Madison students or staff. UW Police Sgt. Jason Whitney said Wednesday that officials did not believe Miller was armed or on campus.

MADISON â?? Legislative leaders called to Gov. Jim Doyleâ??s residence to reach a deal on the 12-week late state budget worked in private all day Monday and were expected to resume on Tuesday.

Those of us who went to college with David Obey no doubt find it hard to believe that the Wausau Democrat is now the longest-serving member of the U.S. Congress in Wisconsin’s history.

He was so young in the 1960s and he is so powerful today. What happened?

When an ambitious master plan to upgrade UW Athletic Department facilities was outlined Friday, it triggered a series of questions for which there were few answers.

MADISON, Wis. â?? Gov. Jim Doyle and legislative leaders plan to meet privately starting Monday to work out a budget deal that all involved said could be done by the end of the week.Announcement of the meeting to be held at the governorâ??s residence came Friday after Democrats made a major concession designed to kick-start negotiations over the budget that is three months late.

MADISON, Wis. — A University of Wisconsin-Madison alumnus is facing a charge of violating a restraining order.

Police said Albert Wellstein was arrested Wednesday when he showed up at the Red Gym on the UW-Madison campus.

He was banned from campus this spring. Authorities accused him of sending a threatening poem to a female acquaintance and making a death threat to a campus police detective.

From Raymond Road to West Badger Road to West Mifflin Street, Madison Police are investigating six separate cases where people say they’ve been attacked and mugged across the city.

Madison’s thug factor seems to be rising as fall approaches, with a slew of purse and bag snatchings this week â?? typically by pairs of young men targeting women walking alone in the city’s Downtown and South Side, police said.

A man officially banned from stepping foot on the University of Wisconsin campus was arrested Wednesday evening after entering the Red Gym.

Wisconsin continues to lead the nation in binge drinking and the percentage of adult drinkers.

Raising a glass to toast those rankings is an inappropriate response.

University of Wisconsin students wonâ??t be seeing any new bars downtown in the near future, as the Madison City Council passed an ordinance Tuesday night that will prohibit new liquor licenses from being granted in the downtown area.

Landlords with problematic properties will be held accountable for improvements â?? or face penalties â?? in an ordinance passed by the Madison City Council early Wednesday in an 18-2 vote.
The chronic nuisance abatement ordinance will identify addresses where police are often needed and hold landlords responsible for an improvement plan. The city could penalize landlords who fail to submit a plan or do not make an effort to end the nuisance.

Following months of debate and public hearings, the Madison City Council plans to vote tonight on a proposal to ban most new liquor licenses in the downtown area.

Madison, Wis. – As he works to turn a research prototype into a breakthrough network security product, Paul Barford envisions quite a large potential market for his technology – basically, any organization with a computer network.

Barford, an assistant computer science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is developing that product as the founder of Nemean Networks, LLC.

MADISON, Wis. — The reward for information in the search for who killed the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater student who disappeared from downtown Madison earlier this summer has increased to $12,000.

As the Kelly Nolan case has begun to slip from headlines and TV screens, her family appealed to the public for help once again on Monday afternoon. At Library Mall on the UW-Madison campus, Madison police and the Nolan family announced that the reward for information leading to solving Nolan’s killing was increased to $12,000.

Kelly Nolan’s two sisters joined police Monday to make a plea for additional tips in the nearly three-month-old murder case of the UW-Whitewater student.

Police have not yet identified a suspect, but they’re confident whoever is responsible has ties to the community.

“We wish to locate anyone who was in the State Street area Friday night, June 22nd, into the early morning hours of June 23rd, who may have seen Kelly alone or with any other persons, male or female. We believe there are other persons in the community who know what happened to Kelly who have not yet contacted the police,” April Nolan says.

MADISON â?? The sisters of a slain Wisconsin college student asked the public Monday to come forward with information that could help in the search for her killer.

Kelly Nolan, 22, disappeared early June 23 after a night of bar hopping with friends in downtown Madison. Her decomposing body was found more than two weeks later in a ditch about 10 miles south of the city.

….Whether it’s clearing a path to get an ambulance through a tightly packed crowd outside a Badger game or getting quickly to a fight brewing at bar time on State Street, mounted police have some advantages in some venues that officers on foot or bicycles just can’t match.

Sgt. Kari Sasso of the University of Wisconsin police department often works with her horse, Vegas, a quarter horse-thoroughbred cross, at Badger football games, and the pair patrols on campus, as well.

Dear Editor: Thank you for Dave Zweifel’s excellent Sept. 10 column on the Charter Street power plant. That this travesty even happened, let alone that it’s allowed to continue, and worse yet that the University of Wisconsin and the state are trying to defend it, is nearly beyond belief.

I think that the people responsible should be summarily dismissed for this unbelievable disregard for human welfare. Or perhaps we can give them an option: Drink that bottle of water.

Don Ferber, Madison

Metro bus riders on the UW-Madison campus won’t be able to use the bus stop southbound on Charter St. at its intersection with Johnson St., because of safety concerns when the route 80 bus has to cross over from the right lane to make a left turn eastbound onto Johnson St.

….Passengers are asked to use the stops on Johnson St. at Mills St. one block east of the affected intersection, or on Charter St. between Linden Dr. and University Ave. a block and a half north, to get on or off the bus.

Five hybrid electric buses will hit the streets in the next couple of weeks, WISC-TV reported. Two will run on the University of Wisconsin-Madison Campus routes that get about 90 rides an hour and three others will run in the rest of the city. All have a new hybrid battery perched on the roof.

The ride on a handful of Madison Metro buses is about to get quieter and cleaner. The agency unveiled of five hybrid buses on Tuesday at the UW Arboretum.

The UW helped purchase two of the buses, which will run on campus-specific routes. The seat configuration in those buses are also different. A wider aisle should help accommodate large backpacks. The other three buses will rotate on other routes in Metro’s service area.

Madison Police worked overtime this past Labor Day weekend to ensure the streets of downtown Madison were safe for everyone.
157 arrests were made total.

Madison Police enforced a plan called Downtown Safety Initiative Special Operations over four nights this past weekend, Thursday through Sunday.

The University of Wisconsin announced last week nearly $140,000 in new research grants have been awarded to the Division of International Studies.

LA CROSSE, Wis. – There is no serial killer, investigators insist, no boogeyman lurking in college-area bars, waiting to drown good-looking young men.

Mayor Dave Cieslewicz thought he would be in the thick of the action Saturday night.

He rode from 10 p.m. until 3 a.m. Saturday night and Sunday morning with Sgt. Dave McCaw in an unmarked police car as part of the Madison Police Department’s Downtown Safety Initiative.

MADISON, Wis. — There are many fun-loving terms for Wisconsin residents â?? Wisconsinites, Cheeseheads, Packer-Backers.

But one term is turning into big business for some recent UW grads.

The term is â??Sconnie.â?

FOR A grumpy old Badger, Art Luetke sure is having a lot of fun.

The well-known Madison real estate broker phoned this week from Hawaii, where he was engaged in grueling advance work for the Maui Channel Swim, a famous open-water relay race that starts Saturday.

Civic and business leaders paying for a study on higher education needs in Waukesha County share a common goal: resolving a debate that has continued for nearly three years.

More than a dozen individuals, companies and educational institutions are funding the $50,000 study, which could determine the future of the University of Wisconsin-Waukesha.

As students returned to UW-Madison for the fall semester, police and university officials have words of caution.

With Kelly Nolan’s killer still at large, they are warning students not to drink in excess, to stay with their friends and have a plan for getting home.

A member of the legislature’s budget committee suggests Governor Doyle change travel plans, in order to concentrate on the state budget. At the Capitol, the conference committee is still mired in trying to reconcile the vastly different budgets passed by the Assembly and Senate. Senate Minority Leader, Juneau Republican Scott Fitzgerald, said Governor Jim Doyle needs to be more involved.

Bret Bielema remembers what he was thinking on the plane trip back to school after the football game during his junior year in college when his Iowa team beat Michigan, solidifying the Hawkeyes ‘ trip to the Rose Bowl.
“My sister hadn ‘t seen me play, so on the plane on the way home I was thinking that the Rose Bowl will be her chance to see me play, ” he says.

The Charter Street power plant on the UW-Madison campus is not likely a major source of contaminants in Monona Bay, according to a study released this week.

Dane County issued slow, no-wake orders for the entire surface of the four Yahara lakes today, as historic high water levels continue to endanger shoreline properties.

….The order will make it difficult for hundreds of boaters to recreate on Lakes Mendota, Monona, Waubesa and Kegonsa during the upcoming Labor Day weekend.

When students return to classes at the University of Wisconsin-Madison next week, many will no doubt be talking about upcoming classes and professors, and the national ranking of the UW football team.

Sadly, few will likely notice the loss of the Department of Wildlife Ecology.

What was the country’s first Department of Wildlife Management, founded by Aldo Leopold — who is considered nationally to be the “father” of modern-day wildlife management — has lost its independent department status.

UW-Madison senior Gestina Sewell always knew that as a history major, she’d be doing a lot of reading.

Translation: She knew her book bills would be huge.

She’s hardly alone. Students at UW-Madison last year paid an average of $890 for textbooks and supplies.

Green Bay – An investigation continues into the death of a 21-year-old University of Wisconsin-Green Bay student whose body was found last month in a car at the bottom of the Fox River.

“We are still hard at it,” Green Bay police Commander Tom Molitor, who heads his agency’s detective bureau, said of the death of Mahalia Xiong. “We’ve had two detectives on this thing since (her) body was found.”

The fall season is fast approaching and that means the football season is about to begin.

We were reminded of that the other day when the University of Wisconsin sent a gentle reminder to our advertising staff that the university has an Office of Trademark Licensing and advertisers are not to be using any words or logos that have been trademarked when they publish ads in our newspaper.

In 2004, a 27 News investigation showed how much money the City of Madison could save if Madison Metro wrapped busses with ads. This spring, Metro began selling full-wrap bus ads.

Metro Spokeswoman Julie Maryott-Walsh says the city expects to earn $273,000 this year from the ads.

Developers looking to convert the historic Woman’s Building into an upscale three-level venue are feeling the wrath of the city’s new “get tough” attitude toward downtown nightlife.

Patrons of the Samba Brazilian Grill at 240 W. Gilman St. will be able to dine outdoors, but they won’t be able enjoy a glass of wine with their meal — at least initially.

LA CROSSE, Wis. â?? The FBI has concluded there is no evidence that a serial killer is responsible for the drowning deaths of eight young men in La Crosse-area rivers over nine years.

The FBI and the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime reviewed the cases, said Police Chief Ed Kondracki. The center was asked to determine any common factors and whether more investigative work was warranted.

If a language class about an obscure African dialect spoken by a dwindling number of people worldwide attracts only a handful of students at UW-Madison, should the university continue to offer it?

That type of question comes up more often these days, as universities try to juggle the notion of encouraging wide-ranging intellectual curiosity with the practical needs of running a university on a limited budget.

Golfers use their clubs to swat a ball off of a man’s nose. Alice in Dairyland gets a ride on a Harley. An all-girl band performs for cows at the UW, to persuade them to churn out more milk.

This is life in Madison, but not as you know it today.

….”Historic Photos of Madison” (Turner Publishing Co., $39.95) by Donald J. Johnson personalizes our past in a way that will make you chuckle and wonder. He is a senior editor at the UW and heads library communications. Most book images come from the Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

From weird gourds to heirloom tomatoes and dazzling blooms, this garden has it all.

And the gardeners on hand will be happy to answer your questions. Some guests don ‘t know the difference between an annual and a perennial; others tell the resident experts what they ‘re doing wrong.

Hundreds of people are expected to attend today ‘s annual open house at UW-Madison ‘s West Madison Agricultural Research Station, where thriving flower and vegetable and fruit gardens showcase plants both traditional and experimental.

Campus safety initiatives may have to be put on hold at some schools in the University of Wisconsin System in the face of possible budget reductions, some campus leaders say.

The Commission on University Security – convened by UW System President Kevin Reilly after the shootings at Virginia Tech – last month released its recommendations for ensuring school safety. It noted that only two campuses, UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee, have “full-service law enforcement agencies,” and recommended that all four-year campuses in the system have armed university police 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Story quotes Dale Burke, assistant police chief at UW-Madison.

When two University of Wisconsin-Whitewater business professors head to India, they will face a daunting task of helping silk-sari weavers find a way out of poverty that has driven some of them to commit suicide.

We’re still a couple of weeks away from pushing the panic button. Because we want to believe State Senate Majority Leader Judy Robson and Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch are reasonable people who care about all the people of this state, we’ve been willing to wait while they get the necessary political posturing out their systems and then do the jobs they’ve been entrusted with.

A consensus emerged within hours of Mayor Dave Cieslewicz’s Monday afternoon decision to abandoned his streetcar proposal that his action will help bring a Regional Transportation Authority, and thus commuter rail, into existence.