Author: Correspondent

Preserve Our Parks, a local non-profit advocacy group, announced recently that it will launch a grassroots “Our Turn” petition drive to protest the loss of funding for Milwaukee County parks. The petition call on County officials direct more funding to repair and maintain the County’s 140 parks and parkways. “Our parks are in crisis,” said Jim Goulee, president of Preserve Our Parks. “We funded stadiums and arenas, and now it’s ‘our turn’ for parks funding. Our parks are a critical part of the quality of life in Milwaukee County. The parks and trails that make up our ‘emerald necklace’...

The key message of a new public education campaign launched, by the Wisconsin Alliance for Women’s Health (WAWH), and supported by the National Partnership for Women & Families, is that the biggest threat to Wisconsin women’s ability to access quality reproductive care comes from politicians in the state. The campaign highlights findings from a new, rigorous report by the nonpartisan National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, including that abortion is safe and that medically unnecessary regulations undermine access to quality abortion care. The new campaign contrasts these findings with the fact that politicians have made accessing abortion care...

A new study suggests that the main threat to our democracy may not be the hardening of political ideology, but rather the hardening of one particular political ideology: when intolerant white people fear democracy may benefit marginalized people, they abandon their commitment to democracy. – Noah Berlatsky A new research study confirms what most people have suspected for a long time, that bigoted white Americans are not committed to preserving democracy. The authors argue that these individuals are more inclined towards endorsing authoritarianism. In a working paper, White Outgroup Intolerance and Declining Support for American Democracy, Steven V. Miller...

Documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), featured in a new report released on May 22, show the pervasive abuse and neglect of unaccompanied immigrant children detained by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The report was produced in conjunction with the International Human Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School. “These documents provide a glimpse into a federal immigration enforcement system marked by brutality and lawlessness,” said Mitra Ebadolahi, ACLU Border Litigation Project staff attorney. “All human beings deserve to be treated with dignity and respect regardless of their immigration status — and children, in...

According to a new analysis by the nonpartisan, independent Wisconsin Policy Forum longstanding structural budget problems have intensified for the Milwaukee Public Schools. WPF’s annual MPS budget review adds that while last-minute budget adjustments may stave off painful cuts to schools in 2019, the fiscal pressures driving those cuts still must be addressed. As initially proposed, the district’s 2019 budget would have made major cuts to instruction by eliminating 147 positions, including 80 teachers, to fill a projected $30 million “hole” next year. But new changes offered by the district’s interim superintendent this week appear to restore sufficient funding...

Midwest Environmental Advocates (MEA) filed a legal action on May 25, under the Great Lakes Compact, to challenge the April 25 approval by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) of the City of Racine’s request to divert 7 million gallons per day (MGD) of Great Lakes water outside the Great Lakes Basin. The Great Lakes Compact’s 2008 enactment was a historic accomplishment at both the regional and national level and celebrated as a means to safeguard the world class freshwater resources of our magnificent Great Lakes. “This legal challenge is essential, as Wisconsin’s approval of the Lake Michigan...