Top Stories, July 10th

Lake Days Wraps Up Today

7/10/11 - Beaver Dam Lake Days wraps up today at Tahoe Park. The event features live music, food, and a carnival midway. There was big turnout for last night’s fireworks and pretty good weather. Sunday’s activities begin with an Ecumenical Polka Worship Service. Music will be provided by Don Peachey and Brian and the Mississippi Valley Dutchmen.. Also today, the Women’s Affiliate Day In the Park Arts and Crafts Fair is being held in Swan Park. The event, now in its 40th year, features around 200 booths of hand-crafted items. Shuttle service today stops at both Lake Days and the Craft Fair in addition to the lower Tower Parking Lot, off Mill Street, the Family Center and the M&I Bank parking lot and leaves every half hour.

Watertown Schools Get $7K For Fresh Fruits, Vegetables

7/10/11 - Students at 166 Wisconsin schools will get fresh fruit and vegetables, not a minute too soon. Approximately 57,000 students in Wisconsin’s poorest schools will be eating the healthful snacks at least three times a week. The Badger State will get just under $3 million in grants as part of the $150 million allocated nationwide, from the federal Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program. In our area, the Watertown Unified School District will receive $7100 while the Fond du Lac School District is slated to get $54,000. Schools Superintendent Tony Evers says the DPI hopes to expand the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program in years to come as long as funding is still available. Wisconsin joined the program in 2006 with just 25 participating schools.

Questions Remain Following Fatal Explosion in Sun Prairie

7/10/11 - It was just over a year ago that a house exploded in Sun Prairie, killing a teacher and injuring two others. City police and the state Justice Department are still investigating a possible cause – and they’re not saying much else. 26-year-old Andrew Manley died in the blast. Steven Slack was paralyzed from the waist down. And Lindsey Stephany was also hurt. The two survivors and Manley’s relatives have filed a lawsuit against a company that installed a furnace in the home. Their attorney, Dan Rottier, said part of the furnace piping was found to be separated after the blast. The installer, Service Specialists of Dane County, has denied wrong-doing. And the two sides appear to be headed toward a trial that’s expected in February. Manley rented a bedroom from Slack and Stephany. The site has been cleared, and the owners say they expect to sell the lot.

Foreclosure Assistance Available Through July 22

7/10/11 - Wisconsin homeowners who face foreclosure have until July 22nd to apply for federal help. The Emergency Homeowners’ Loan Program ends in two weeks. It provides interest-free loans of up to 50-thousand-dollars to those facing foreclosure due to unemployment or under-employment, medical conditions, or other hardships. The U-S Department of Housing and Urban Development allocated 51-and-a-half million dollars to Wisconsin. Officials expect the average loan in the state to be around 35-thousand dollars.

Cullen Not Confident in Auto Worker Recovery Office

7/10/11 - A veteran state lawmaker from Janesville says he’s doing what he can to help his home town recover from the loss of General Motors. But Senate Democrat Tim Cullen says he’s not getting his hopes up over a new Obama administration official who will try to help towns with former auto plants. On August eighth, former Youngstown Ohio Mayor Jay Williams will take over the federal Office of Recovery for Auto Communities-and-Workers. It uses federal programs to help people retrain and find new jobs, and help communities attract new employers. Williams said he’ll use his experience in Youngstown to help areas like Janesville – which had Wisconsin’s highest unemployment rate in May at nine-point-four percent. Williams said his city had to figure out ways to create partnerships that were overlooked in the past, cut through red tape, and coordinate various resources. Cullen has worked with local leaders to revitalize Rock County after G-M left in 2008. There’s been a little headway, as the area’s jobless rate dropped almost two percentage points over the last year. But Cullen says today’s working class wages are less than when G-M was in town. And he’s curious to see how Williams can help draw new companies to the region. Cullen says Janesville is not likely to attract a mega-plant with up to three-thousand jobs. He says new firms with 100-to-200 jobs will ultimately be the way to rebuild Rock County’s economy.

Dodge County FSA Nominations Still Being Accepted

7/10/11 - Nominations are still being accepted for the Dodge County Farm Service Agency County Committee election. The FSA administers federal agricultural production, farm loan, conservation and emergency programs annually in Wisconsin through a network of 58 local offices. Locally elected committee’s of farmer’s and/ or landowners that serve staggered, three-year terms oversee each office. This fall, the townships of Beaver Dam, Burnett, Calamus, Chester, Fox Lake, Oak Grove, Trenton and Westford will be holding their election for a FSA County committee member representative. Dodge County FSA Director Susan Blachowiak says farmers can nominate themselves or another producer to run for a seat on the county committee. Blachowiak says the locally elected committees help make national farm programs fit the needs of local farmers by bringing local expertise and knowledge to the USDA’s daily programs and services. Eligible voters may circulate or sign nomination petitions for as many candidates as they choose, including themselves. The deadline for submitting nominations to the local FSA office is August 1. Ballots will be mailed to eligible voters in November and must be in by December so newly-elected committee members and alternates can be seated by January 2.

Eastern Wolves Settling In Badger State

7/10/11 - Federal officials say a second species of wolves appears to be roaming in Wisconsin. And environmentalists are playing up that possibility, to try-and-stop the grey wolf from being taken off the endangered species’ list. Scientists from the U-S Fish-and-Wildlife Service say the Eastern wolf appears to have moved into Wisconsin, joining an estimated 700 grey wolves. But the D-N-R’s Rebecca Schroeder says the two species appear to act as one – and therefore, it should not be a factor in deciding whether to end federal protections for the animals. Schroeder says the Eastern wolf is only a pure species in southern Ontario, and its genetics mixed with Wisconsin’s grey wolves long ago. But Noah Greenwald of the Center for Biological Diversity says the genetics’ issue has not been settled – and therefore, it says the federal government should continue its protections for both types of wolves. Greenwald says his group is also concerned with how Wisconsin would manage its wolf population. The state has a management plan it used when the animals were de-listed twice before. It allows farmers to kill problem wolves which kill livestock-and-crops. It does not allow hunting, even though the possibility has been talked about. The Fish-and-Wildlife Service was asked earlier this year to remove grey wolves from the endangered list in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan. A final decision is expected by the end of the year.

Wisconsinites Gaining Weight

7/10/11 - Almost two-thirds of Wisconsin adults are overweight or obese. And as bad as that sounds, a new report says Wisconsin is about average compared to other states. The Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation said 64-percent of adults in the Badger State are either overweight or obese – the 24th-highest percentage among the 50 states. The report also said 27-percent of Wisconsin adults are obese – which means they have a body-mass-index of 30-or-more. Those with B-M-I’s above 25 are considered overweight. The report said no state decreased its obesity rate in the last year, and the problem got worse in 16 states. Jeff Levi of the Trust for America’s Health said the state with the lowest obesity rate today would have had the nation’s highest rate as recently as 1995. Levi says the nation can no longer afford to ignore the impact obesity has on Americans’ health, as well as the corresponding increase in health care spending. The U-S Centers for Disease Control says obesity increases the risk of 20 major diseases, including heart disease and type-two adult diabetes.

Mitchell Flights Hit Record Numbers

7/10/11 - Wisconsin’s largest airport has attracted record numbers of passengers for the 21st month in a row. Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele Mitchell International Airport handled five-point-seven percent more passengers in May than the same month the year before. For the first five months of this year, Mitchell’s passenger traffic is up three-point-two percent from the same time in 2010. Fares have dropped in Milwaukee over the past couple years – and observers say it’s because there’s no longer one dominant airline there. Competition has increased between AirTran, Southwest, and Frontier which acquired Milwaukee’s former Midwest Airlines. But after Southwest bought AirTran in May, some analysts expect competition to decline – and fares to go up again. But for now, Mitchell keeps gaining national stature. It was the nation’s 34th largest airport last year, up from 45th the previous year. And the Brookings Institute said Milwaukee rose to 28th among the nation’s airports in its numbers of non-stop flights.

Xcel Customers To Benefit From Settlement

7/10/11 - Electric customers in northwest Wisconsin will get part of a 100-million-dollar settlement in a utility’s dispute with the federal government over the storage of spent nuclear fuel. X-cel Energy had extra costs because the U-S Energy Department did not remove spent fuel from two nuclear plants by a 1998 deadline. The utility says the government will pay for storage costs at the Prairie Island and Monticello nuclear plants through 2008, and will continue those payments through 2013. The money will be refunded to X-cel Energy customers in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, and the Dakotas. The company will decide soon how to return the money, and ask state regulators for approvals. X-cel has about one-point-six million electric customers – and each will get about a 20-dollar benefit. Today’s settlement closes two cases, including a federal lawsuit that X-cel won in 2007. It was still being appealed.