Top Stories March 28th

Santorum in Beaver Dam

3/28/12 - More than 200 people were on hand at the Elk’s Lodge in Beaver Dam yesterday to hear Republican Presidential candidate Rick Santorum speak. The former from Pennsylvania spoke for about an hour hitting on all the main themes of his campaign, including the economy – gas prices – and family values. But he spent a lot of his speech taking shots at his main GOP foe, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, for what Santorum said was support of President Barack Obama’s health care reform bill. Santorum called on those in attendance to help him get his message out, and once again said he was the only true conservative with the ability to beat Obama. In the latest Marquette Law School poll, Santorum trails Romney 39-percent to 31-percent with less than a week before Wisconsin’s primary next Tuesday.

BDCDC Discusses Its Future

3/28/12 - The Beaver Dam Community Development Committee discussed its future role in city government last night and wound up tabling any decisions to dissolve. The bulk of the CDC’s responsibilities were lost when the city entered into a partnership with the Beaver Dam Area Development Corp 15 years ago and CDC Chair Robert Ballweg says the Development Corp has plenty of other city committees to run new business projects through. Ballweg says there is no official record of the intended function of the CDC, so he would like to establish a purpose or dissolve. Ballweg says one possible function of the CDC would be to award grant funding for downtown façade improvements. The CDC approved a plan last night to use the approximately $25,000 accumulated annually through the downtown TIF #6 for that purpose. It still requires council action. Another possible function of the CDC would be to for downtown blight elimination. TIF #3 near Rechek’s is due to end next year. With approval of the various taxing entities, the city could extend TIF #3 for another five years, collecting nearly $1.2 million in that time to clean-up blighted areas like the county-owned MetalFab property.

Juneau Candidates Spar on Community Comment

3/28/12 - The candidates for mayor in the city of Juneau appeared on WBEV’s Community Comment yesterday. Alderman and Finance Committee Chair Robert “Mac” Affeld was critical of Mayor Ron Bosak’s plan to restructure the city-owned Utility Commission. The plan replaces two of the five commissioners with alderpersons and trims their pay by 45%. Affeld says a lot of experience was lost as a result of the restructuring and any savings will be lost to the increase in consultants needed by the new commission. Bosak defended the change pointing to the $5000 in annual savings and said the new commission will not be using consulting firms any more frequently than in the past. You can hear our complete conversation with the candidates for mayor in Juneau and also Waupun on our website, click on Election Coverage tab on the right-hand side of the page.

Horicon Mayoral Candidates in Studio Today

3/28/12 - On Community Comment today will be hearing from some of the candidates running for mayor in the city of Horicon, where there are two candidates appearing on the ballot and three declared write-ins. On today’s program, we will be speaking with write-in candidates Thomas “Toby” Anfinson, Paul Moxham and Alderman Steve Neitzel. Tomorrow, we welcome ballot candidates Craig Reiger and Craig Muenchow. Community Comment airs weekdays on WBEV 1430AM beginning at 12:35pm.

Walker in Tight Race Against Potential Recall Opponents

3/28/12 - Governor Scott Walker is in a statistical dead heat with two of his potential recall challengers. That’s according to the newest Marquette Law School poll released yesterday. Seven-hundred-seven likely voters were surveyed from last Thursday through Sunday. And they gave the Republican Walker a 49-to-45 percent lead over Kathleen Falk, and a 47-45 edge over Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett. Both are within the poll’s four-percent margin of error – and both leads are slightly smaller than in the last Marquette poll in January. Walker has a stronger 49-42 advantage over Secretary of State Doug La Follette, and a 49-41 edge over Senator Kathleen Vinehout. Falk, La Follette, and Vinehout announced their bids some time ago. Barrett says he’ll wait until after Friday’s deadline for the state to certify the Walker recall petitions. The Marquette poll also showed that Barrett leads Falk 36-to-29 percent in a potential Democratic primary. Without Barrett in the primary, Falk has a wide 54-percent edge to 15 for La Follete and 12 for Vinehout. Falk asked Barrett last week to step aside and support her – just like she supported Barrett against Walker in 2010. The new Marquette poll also gave Walker a 50-percent approval rating – same as in January and up a bit from February. Forty-seven disapproved of Walker’s job performance.

Workers Rally in Waupun

3/28/12 - Corrections workers say no one is listening to them about escalating safety problems at state institutions brought on by restrictions in collective bargaining. Over 100 workers marched outside Waupun Correctional yesterday afternoon. Marty Biel, head of the American Federal of State, County and Municipal Employees says there used to be a consistent set of policies and procedures accepted by both labor and management but with the signing of Act 10, management developed new polices and procedures without employee input, leading to a harmful work environments. The legislation did not dissolve the unions but did limit their bargaining powers to negotiating only for wages at or below the rate of inflation. Biel says state officials won’t return phone calls from the union to talk about wages or workplace safety. Our phone calls to corrections officials were not immediately returned.

BDUSD Seeking Employee of the Year Nominations

3/28/12 - The Beaver Dam Unified School District is seeking nominations for their Teacher, Administrator and Support Staff of the Year Award program. Awards will presented for Elementary teacher, Middle School teacher, High School teacher, Administrator/ Coordinator, Special Services Teacher, Secretary, Teacher Assistant, Food Service Worker and Custodial/ Maintenance/ Computer Technician. Nominees will be judged primarily on the significance of their contributions to the well-being of the educational community. Representatives selected will be submitted to the statewide teacher and administrator of the year competition. Parents, students and community members who would like to nominate an employee can obtain a nomination form at any Beaver Dam public school office, the Educational Service Center or on the district’s website. The deadline for submitting a nomination form is Friday, April 13.

Federal Court Will Re-Draw Two Assembly Districts

3/28/12 - A federal court panel said Tuesday it would be willing to re-draw the boundaries of two state Assembly districts in Milwaukee. But first, the three judges have asked all parties in the recent re-districting lawsuit to try and reach an agreement on their own. And if they cannot agree, they can each submit their own maps by next Tuesday for the judges to consider. Last week, the court upheld the other 97 Assembly districts and 33 Senate districts throughout Wisconsin that were re-drawn by majority Republicans in secret last year. The judges said the two Milwaukee Assembly districts were the only ones to violate the requirement that the districts be of relatively equal population according to each 10-year Census – and that communities-of-interest be considered. The court said the two districts violated the federal Voting Rights Act, by making it less likely that large Hispanic populations would be able to elect at least one of their own members to Madison. State law requires the Legislature to complete the redistricting process. But the federal judges said they knew it would be virtually impossible for lawmakers to do that, given the current two-party split in the Senate.

Bus Driver Arrested on Suspicion of Drunk Driving

3/28/12 - A school bus driver for the West Bend district has been arrested on suspicion of drunk driving. Police stopped the bus with two dozen students onboard Monday as it arrived at West Bend East Side High School. Driver Terrance Habram was taken into custody. He was also allegedly in possession of narcotics. Police report two students on the bus had called their parents to tell them Habram was driving erratically. Those parents called police, who were quick to respond.

Mega Millions at $476M

3/28/12 - Wisconsinites will have a chance to win the biggest lottery jackpot in U-S history on Friday night. The Mega Millions jackpot is now 476-million-dollars, after nobody won the top prize of 363-million last night. Forty-seven players around the country won the quarter-million dollar second prize, but none were from Wisconsin. Friday’s jackpot surpasses the previous record lottery prize of 390-million-dollars in a Mega Millions’ drawing on March sixth of 2007. It was the largest in the world at the time, and it was split by two winners – truck driver Eddie Nabors of Georgia and building contractors Harold and Elaine Messner of New Jersey. Friday’s cash option is just over 341-million dollars for a single winner who takes the entire prize now instead of in yearly installments. No Wisconsin player has won the Mega Millions’ jackpot since the state lottery began offering the game in February of 2010.