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Joyce Mallory: Jewish Refugee Scholars at Black Colleges

The Jewish Museum Milwaukee screened the film “From Swastika to Jim Crow” on February 1 to a full house, as part of a community engagement series supporting its new exhibit “Allied in the Fight: Jews, Blacks and the Struggle for Civil Rights.” Based on a book by the late author Gabrielle Simon Edgecomb, From Swastika to Jim Crow tells the little-known story of Jewish refugee scholars who escaped Nazi persecution by fleeing to America, and when faced with anti-Semitic sentiment at mainstream American universities, were hired for positions at historically black colleges and universities (HCBUs) in the then-segregated South....

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The $4.5B tax-payer subsidy to Foxconn includes $1.6B in payouts unrelated to job creation

An updated calculation of the public assistance provided to Foxconn shows that the costs have risen as high as $4.5 billion when multiple forms of assistance from state government, local governments, and utilities are included. This comprehensive accounting of public costs allows us to more accurately identify how much each new job created by Foxconn will cost to taxpayers. With an eventual employment target of 13,000 jobs at Foxconn, the cost per job would be $344,000 ($4.5 billion cost divided by 13,000 jobs). Breakdown of the estimated $4.5 billion in state, local, and utility assistance to Foxconn, as estimated...

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Black Cat Alley to host winter “Fire on Ice-Painting” event

Artists Todd Mrozinski and Renee Bebeau will paint images of fiery flames on a four-foot-wide slab of ice as a live performance in Black Cat Alley on February 3. Evoking Mrozinski’s recent body of work—oil paintings that feature built-up surfaces of paint that resemble fires and burning logs, the duo will bring a fun project idea to life with this unique winter art happening. The idea began with master ice carver Max Zuleta, owner of Wisconsin-based ice sculpting business Art Below Zero. Zuleta, when asked to install one of his world-famous ice sculptures at Black Cat Alley, said, “What...

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Vendors at Milwaukee Public Market set sales records in 2017

The Historic Third Ward destination recently announced that the Milwaukee Public Market had a record breaking year in 2017. Total vendor sales increased about 5%, rising from $15,815,436 in 2016 to $16,533,851 in 2017. Customer visits saw an increase of nearly 6%, up from 1,548,581 in 2016 to 1,634,534 in 2017, maintaining its position as one of the top southeastern Wisconsin attractions. In 2016, the public market was third in number of attendees, trailing only Potawatomi Casino and the Milwaukee Brewers. “These numbers reflect the hard work and outstanding offerings by our locally-owned vendors, as well as our tremendously...

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Low-paid Wisconsin workers left behind as border states increase wages

Low-paid workers across the country got a raise this month, as 18 states and 20 cities and counties increased their minimum wages, many of them of rates to $12 to $15 an hour. Once the increases are fully phased in, 15 million workers will see long overdue raises. In contrast, Wisconsin’s minimum wage remains at $7.25, the same as the federal minimum wage. It was last raised in 2009 and has lost about 15% of its purchasing power since then. State lawmakers have barred local governments in Wisconsin from setting their own minimum wages that are higher than the...

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Timeline: A brief history of Trump’s Racism

Photo by Gage Skidmore and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 For Milwaukee, a city with the dubious title of being the most segregated community in the nation, what the leader of America says about racial issues has a direct local impact. Critics of Trump point to numerous examples of his racist behavior. Defenders of him share talking points that his meaning was taken out of context. However, as David Leonhardt points out in his New York Times opinion: No one except Trump can know what Trump’s private thoughts or motivations are. But the public record and his behavior are...

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