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Bipartisan bill aims to protect youth victims of sex trafficking

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At the Capitol, bipartisan legislation to end the practice of charging youth under the age of 18 with prostitution had a public hearing on Thursday.

State Senator Alberta Darling (R-Rivers Hills) said it’s a recognition of the fact that those young people are victims of human trafficking.

“I think we have to make this really personal. Because what if this was your daughter, or your granddaughter . . or your niece or your nephew,” Darling told the Senate Committee on Judiciary and Public Safety. “All of us can look at people we care about and ask what if it were them.”

Advocates say human trafficking takes place in all 72 Wisconsin counties.

“It’s not just a real problem it’s a heartbreaking problem. And we need to do everything that we can to treat these young people as victims, and get them the help that they need,” said state Representative Joel Kitchens (R-Sturgeon Bay).

State Senator LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee) said the bill (SB 245) would bring Wisconsin into line with federal law, which treats children involved in commercial sex acts as sexually exploited children and victims of child abuse, not criminals. “This is bill does not legalize prostitution,” Johnson said.

UW System back to pre-pandemic levels of in-person instruction

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The University of Wisconsin System has returned to pre-pandemic levels of in-person instruction for the fall semester.

UW System President Tommy Thompson announced in a Tuesday press release that systemwide, 85 percent of undergraduate courses are being delivered in person. That exceeds the goal of 75 percent Thompson set in February, when more classes than usual were delivered remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Madison, La Crosse and Plattville campuses are all above 90 percent in-person classes, and all but the Superior campus are at or above 75 percent.

Restored Wisconsin State Capitol statues back on their pedestals

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Statues damaged during last summer’s unrest in Madison are back in place on the grounds of the state Capitol. Workers with the Wisconsin Department of Administration put the statues on their pedestals on Tuesday morning.

The two statues pulled down on the night of June 23, 2020 were of Forward, a female figure outside the Capitol at the top of State Street, and Colonel Hans Christian Heg, a Norwegian immigrant killed during the Civil War.

The action followed a day of demonstrations over the arrest of activist Devonere Johnson outside a Capitol Square restaurant.

The nearly year long restoration was done by a Michigan company. The bulk of the 80-thousand dollar project was paid for by federal grants, the remainder through insurance and donations to the State Historical Society.

Gableman says he’ll compel clerks to cooperate with investigation

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The former state Supreme Court justice overseeing a Republican review of the 2020 presidential election is telling local elections officials that they’d better cooperate

“As the officials directly responsible for administering elections, Wisconsin’s 1,922 county and municipal clerks have a duty to the people of our state to be forthcoming in this investigation,” attorney Michael Gableman said “It is my sincere hope that Wisconsin election officials will live up to that duty. But if they do not, we will use the power afforded to the office of special counsel to compel answers to these questions.”

Gableman released a six-minute YouTube video on Monday. “It’s critical to know that an obstruction of this office is an obstruction of each citizens right to know whether all ballots were appropriately counted, that our elections were managed with fairness, inclusivity and accountability.”

He also says the public can submit information regarding the election, although his Office of Special Counsel has no website or official email address.

Bill would allow parents to opt kids out of sexual orientation curriculum

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At the Capitol on Thursday, a hearing on legislation that would allow parents to remove their K-12 students from any program “related to sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or gender expression.”

State Representative Donna Rozar (R-Marshfield) is a co-sponsor of the bill (AB-562).

“When you have belief systems being subtly introduced to young, developing minds that are in direct opposition to what a belief system is in the home that is detrimental, parents need to know that that is happening,” Rozar told the Assembly Education Committee.

Rozar insisted the Republican measure is not intended to “erase or alienate” LGTBQ youth, but LGBTQ Legislative Caucus chair, Representative Lee Snodgrass said it will run the risk of doing that if it becomes law.

“When children and young people are informed, they’re able to be more tolerant, more inclusive and have a better understanding. And without that you run the risk of their being things that they don’t understand,” Snodgrass said. “And frankly you run the risk of them bullying them this group of already marginalized individuals that they don’t fully understand some of the things that they might be dealing with.”

Snodgrass noted that Governor Tony Evers would be unlikely to sign the bill if it reaches his desk.

Study: alcohol use declines, cannabis use increases among college students

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A new study shows college students reported record high marijuana use, and record low drinking in 2020.
According to the 2020 Monitoring the Future study by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, alcohol use among college students dipped from 62 percent in 2019 to 56 percent.

The percentages reporting being drunk in the past month and reporting binge-drinking also declined. Also according to the report, 44 percent of college students reported using marijuana in 2020, an increase from 38 percent in 2015.

Researchers are unsure whether the pandemic may have driven the record in cannabis consumption.

Eighteen states have legalized recreational marijuana, 37 states have legalized it for medical purposes. Wisconsin allows neither.

Four people from Minnesota found fatally shot in western Wisconsin cornfield

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Four people found dead in a western Wisconsin cornfield over the weekend were all from Minnesota. The Dunn County Sheriff’s Office has identified them as 26-year-old Matthew Pettus, 30-year-old Jasmine Sturm and 35-year-old Loyace Foreman III, all of St. Paul, and 30-year-old Nitosha Lee Flug-Presley of Stillwater.

Their bodies were found Sunday, after a 911 caller alerted deputies to an SUV off a rural road in the Town of Sheridan, about an hour east of the Twin Cities.

Preliminary results of autopsies by the Ramsey County medical examiner’s office shows each died from gunshot wounds.

No arrests have been reported. The sheriff’s office has scheduled a press conference for 4:00 PM Tuesday.

 

Evers seeks to intervene in redistricting case

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Governor Tony Evers has signaled he wants to be involved in a redistricting case. Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul on Monday asked a federal court to allow Evers to intervene in a lawsuit filed last month by Democrats, that asks a federal court to draw the state’s next set of electoral maps.

The governor’s motion contends state law recognizes a joint role for both the governor and the Legislature in the redistricting process, and that the governor should be allowed to provide input in the litigation.

The Democratic governor said he intends to submit maps drawn by a commission he created to both the Legislature and the federal court for its consideration.

Wisconsin state employees report nearly 70 percent vaccination rate

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Nearly 70 percent of state employees in Wisconsin have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Eighty-seven percent of state employees have reported their vaccination status, and close to 70 percent report getting at least one dose, according to a Monday press release from the state Department of Administration.

That’s above the 55.5 percent of Wisconsinites who’ve received at least one dose of a vaccine.

So far, the Evers administration has not mandated vaccination for more than 30,000 state workers. DOA Secretary Joel Brennan said that given the ongoing public health threat posed by the Delta variant, vaccination remains the best tool for beating back the latest surge.

UW Health: Unvaccinated Wisconsinites 32 times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19

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While “breakthrough” infections are occurring, unvaccinated people in Wisconsin are 32 times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 than those who are fully vaccinated, and 13 percent more likely to die than those who are fully vaccinated.

UW Health Dr. Joseph A. McBride says breakthrough cases are to be expected. “I really hope that people look at these breakthrough data not with cynicism and doubt, but with understanding this remains our best tool at lowering the rate of infection for the individual, and also the severity of infection for the individual.”

The discrepancy in COVID-19 cases among unvaccinated and vaccinated is confirmed in data from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services. At this point, 55.5 percent of Wisconsin residents have received at least one dose of a vaccine, and 52.2 percent have completed the vaccine series.

“The message that I hope the people of Wisconsin take, is that getting the vaccine is still the most effective way to limit someone’s risk of acquiring the infection, and significantly reduce the risk of having a severe manifestation of the infection, things like hospitalization and death,” McBride said.