It’s All Part Of The “Plan” (Hour 1)

Good morning and welcome, welcome to Matt Maier on air.

Jane Matt Maier, Greg Bach, Calvin Butenoff coming to you live from our home here at Radio Park in Racine.

You can always join us, call or text the number is the same.

855-752-4842.

You can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter.

Busy Monday coming up for you today.

Civic Media News director, Shaly Pittman joins us now on Mondays to break down some news over the weekend.

We got into this a little bit last Monday.

We attempted.

We attempted.

Yes, we were having some technical problems last week.

But THC in Wisconsin, you see it everywhere.

Yeah.

It's the worst kept

secret in the state.

Yeah.

It's at gas stations.

It's pretty much every place.

But yet there seems to be very little consensus on regulating it.

It seems like something they just literally feels like something that lawmakers in Madison are just turning their heads to.

So they don't have to make the big decision.

So they don't have to deal with it.

Yeah.

So Shaly's going to join us to talk about.

THC and regulations or not in Wisconsin.

In our number two, Joe Pedrangelo is a research director for the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

And they did look at apprenticeships in Wisconsin.

Love apprenticeships.

Me too, which are doing very, very well.

And if this is something maybe you thought about.

for your kids or your grandkids or yourself.

Or

yourself.

Absolutely.

Stick around for that.

Joe is going to join us in hour number two from the Wisconsin Policy Forum and we're going to talk about Wisconsin's great internship programs.

So that's pretty cool.

Yes.

Something I wish I had considered more when I was in high school.

Yeah.

And that's another thing I wanted to, you know, we can talk about as well is the education on education of these things because

Yeah, it goes back to, I feel like a history that we tell kids, for your college, that's how you do it in life.

And that the- It's not the path for everybody.

It's not the path for everybody, and we'll discuss it more, but yeah, it's-

especially in today's day and age, there's some real opportunities out there for a lot of people, not just young people, but for a lot of people.

Definitely.

Also, in hour number two, after the 1030 news, as we always do, we lighten it up with a segment called Audio Sorbet.

Oh, man.

And this developed into quite the discussion as we were trying to land on what we wanted to kick around today.

Food edition.

Food takes.

Food take.

Audio sorbet, food take.

Cracker edition.

I feel like food takes now is like its own category.

There's audio sorbet, food take, subsection, this, paragraph,

this, you know,

but yeah.

Favorite crackers.

There's a lot of takes on crackers and

smart Alex out there favorite eating crackers.

Don't be weird.

All right.

Yeah, keep it.

Yes.

And now we'll wrap up the show as we always do with this shouldn't be a thing today.

It's the this blows edition.

So stay tuned for that.

That's all coming up in our number two.

One of the start off with this, though, especially because FEMA was finally on the ground here in southeastern Wisconsin.

in the last couple of days after the flooding we had, it's what, two weeks ago now?

Three weeks ago now?

And this is an article on the Wisconsin Examiner from Jennifer Shoot.

Will states take on more FEMA duties?

Congress and Trump counsel debate the agency's fate.

Of course, Donald Trump famously said that he wants to see FEMA eliminated.

And that if governors are worth their salt,

They'll find a way to come up with the money.

If they can't come up with the money for disasters, then they're not very good governors.

The one thing, okay, so I don't want to give any credit to Donald Trump on anything because I don't think he deserves credit or anything other than whatever, but at least his resolve is true and.

consistent on this one because he is denying FEMA protection or FEMA money to everyone.

Pretty much.

It

doesn't matter if your state voted for him or not.

He's not he's not saying sorry California but hey Texas have California's money too.

I mean state Arkansas, Texas, North Carolina, Wisconsin.

We're not sure we're gonna get FEMA money.

No.

And he is just withholding it from everyone.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency could look significantly different by the time next year's hurricane season rolls around.

Members of both political parties have long criticized FEMA, a bipartisan measure moving along in Congress, combined with the president's disdain for FEMA, may give some momentum for some big changes coming to FEMA.

This is what the president said at one point, quote, we want to wean off of FEMA and we want to bring it down to the state level.

He said this in June.

We're moving it back to the state so the governors can handle it.

That's why they're governors.

Now, if they can't handle it, they shouldn't be governor, unquote.

Okay.

Well, all right.

So, all right.

Are they going to take the FEMA money that FEMA has and then distribute amongst the 50 states and territories?

I don't think that's been mentioned.

Because, and as you know, folks listening and watching, I'm not very smart, but I will say this.

If there will be no FEMA money to give out, let's just say if they're not gonna take the FEMA money that's allocated and disperse it amongst the 50 states on whether it's a, you get this much, you get on whether it's by size of state, need or whatever, then the governors,

all of them, regardless of party, will then have to raise that money to have something in the coffers to cover emergency management.

Therefore, they will have to do something that some of those governors say they will never do, which is raise taxes or raise fees or both or both.

Or maybe take, let's say Wisconsin, we say we take $500 million of their surplus and just put it away for emergency management or on top of what we already have.

But to just say, governors, if you can't magically make money appear, then maybe you shouldn't be governor.

Well, I don't understand this.

Like, you want to get rid of FEMA?

Okay, fine.

But there has to be a plan.

Yes, because this administration is so good on forward planning.

Phil Bryant, the former Republican governor of Mississippi, says states should be prepared to begin spending more on natural disasters.

We're going to have to turn on our own resources.

States are going to have to develop an emergency response fund, take some of their rainy day funds or funds they may want to use for other events.

and instead put it into disaster recovery.

Virginia Governor Glenn Junkins says the committee has to clearly explain what costs state and local governments are gonna be responsible for, and what, if anything, is gonna be covered by the federal government.

Junkins essentially said, we're changing tires on this car while we're driving 100 miles an hour.

Because again, we still, Western North Carolina is still waiting.

And there was a whole lot of blame on the Biden administration.

Oh, there was.

If we forget.

And conspiracy theories, too, abound about it.

About it.

And Western North Carolina is still waiting for FEMA money.

Texas.

Arkansas.

Arkansas.

Texas, just that, just having the 4th of July.

Yeah.

And this, you know, this was just released on the Washington Post, too.

Nobody has.

Oh, yeah.

Brianna Sacks.

with the byline, and I'm just going to read you the first part of it.

It says more than 180 federal emergency management agency employees sent a letter on Monday today to members of Congress and other officials arguing that the agency's direction and current leadership experience harms the agency's mission and could result in a disaster on the level of Hurricane Katrina.

And when George W. Bush was president and Hurricane Katrina happened in 2006.

You're doing a great job, Brownie.

That is when FEMA was a functioning agency.

There was none of this, what's happening right now.

They had their budget, they had their people, they had the ability to do it.

George W. Bush's reaction, the gentleman, Mr. Brown in charge of FEMA, they did a horrible job.

There is no argument on that.

But with what's happening now with FEMA, if there is a natural disaster of any sort,

that is on the level of Hurricane Katrina or possibly worse as climate change brings in and we're getting more hurricanes, floods and things of that nature.

What is going to happen?

These states then, what's gonna, what will probably happen?

Let's just say Florida.

Florida then has to knock on the door of Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana saying we need your help.

We need money and resources because we've run out of emergency funds.

Like this is not a plan.

This is not how you help Americans.

And by the way, this is our tax dollars.

These are our tax dollars at work.

Guess where that money's gonna go then it's gonna go to the pockets of billionaires because of this budget They just passed when there's no money for FEMA and there's just all this leftover funding guess where that money's going next Not into your pocket not in the mind It's going in the pockets of the buddies that pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to have dinner with a president

Houston controller Chris Hollins says that Houston is typically put away between 25 and 30 million dollars for natural disasters with the expectation for

FEMA will help with additional costs.

He says if we're all gonna be on our own, it's gonna put our individual finances in a state of turmoil.

We're either gonna have to tax our citizens and residents at extremely high rates to have enough money to be prepared, or we will intentionally roll the dice and run the risk of not being prepared when these moments come.

And what about small communities?

They're

gonna be dependent on they're gonna be dependent on surrounding areas.

They're gonna be dependent on Madison It's going to be an absolute disaster and that's not a pun intended.

I'm not trying to be funny this is the This is beyond stupidity.

This is this is this is cruelty masked in

Fiscal conservatism and we're trying to do something, you know, we we just we want to make we want to bring it back down to the states Okay, if you're gonna give it to the states, that's fine Then you liquid then you then you eliminate FEMA today Then you take all of that money and you budget federal government budget over these next budgets and say here is the emergency funding from the government

And here it is, from the partnership between

federal and state.

Make it

work.

Yeah.

Make it work.

Fine.

You don't want FEMA to be a thing, then at the very least, you have a responsibility as the people who take our tax dollars.

You're not going to lower our taxes if FEMA goes away, or if the Department of Education goes away, or all these other three-letter agencies are going away.

You're not lowering our taxes at all, because we don't have to pay for it anymore.

So if you're going to take our money, then you distribute it back to the states like you want to do, and then at least we have some kind of partnership between the federal

government and us.

855-752-4842.

If you'd like to join us, Gene from Oak Lear is on the line.

Good morning, Gene.

You got about 90 seconds.

Thanks for joining

us.

Covering this is so down important.

Everybody needs to look at this seriously.

It's an attack on America.

Instead of Trump coming and helping out Americans, he's too busy going after people making his own little army, spending millions on his little police force.

People need to wake up because you can't fix what he is wrecking overnight.

So anyway, thanks guys.

Keep up the great work.

Bye.

Bye, Gene.

Thanks a lot.

Really appreciate it.

Yeah, we have no money, you guys, but we got money for guilting.

We do?

We have money to bling out the White House.

Plenty of money for that.

I love

gold trim.

It's all good.

Yeah, coming up.

So you say your multi-million dollar energy project is almost done?

Let's kill it.

All the details coming up.

You are listening to Matt Nair on air.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

We'll be right back.

Good morning.

Welcome.

Welcome to Matt Nair on air.

Jane Matt Nair, Greg Box.

Sweet Calbee coming to you live from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.

You can always join us.

Call her text at 855-752-4842.

Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube and what used to be Twitter.

We do have baseball action later on.

today.

The Brewers hosting the Diamondbacks, our broadcast starts at 6.05.

You cannot listen on the stream.

You do have to listen on Terrestrial Radio.

But you can catch the game if you're around Richland Center, W-R-C-E, W-I-S-S in Oshkosh, here in Racine and Kenosha, W-R-J-N, in Park Falls, W-C-Q-M, and in Hayward on WBZH.

Brewer is hosting the Diamondbacks.

Our broadcast will start tonight at 6.05.

Wanted to share this just a little bit.

The Trump administration on Friday ordered that all construction stop on revolution wind.

This is a four billion dollar wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island.

It's almost finished.

It's like 80% complete.

On Friday, the Trump administration ordered all construction stop.

It's 80% built.

The 65 turbine project got all necessary permits.

About 70% of the turbines had been installed.

Developers say it was on track to produce enough electricity for more than 350,000 homes in Rhode Island and Connecticut by next spring.

But Donald Trump famously hates wind power.

Hates it.

Hates it, thinks it causes cancer.

Uh, thinks it's ugly.

Thinks it kills birds.

It ruins the sight line from his golf course in Scotland.

That's what he doesn't like.

Folks, is this good business?

Is this how you do business?

I don't know.

I'm a business owner, but I'm not in the business of golf courses around in the country or wind turbines.

or putting my name on buildings or failed stake and or water companies.

But this doesn't seem like how you run a business.

It seems like bad planning.

It seems like awful planning.

To let it get 70 to 80 percent completed.

This is a multi multi million dollar project.

Four billion dollars.

Almost done.

Yeah.

Almost done.

And because commander in chief doesn't like wind.

They killed it.

And here's the other thing, too, in that article.

They talk about the fact that they are not counting out legal action from the company suing the federal government, because they did everything legally.

They have

all the permits.

Everything was approved.

It's not like they were doing things behind closed

doors.

Hey, you know what you want to hate wind go ahead.

I don't understand why you do but then again, don't make me don't make it make sense to me.

I don't care Economically let's just look at the economics four billion dollars already invested invested in the community in jobs In the people who are gonna who will have jobs?

Overseeing those machines repair things of that nature.

I mean this is this is not how you invest this is not

How you make an economy strong you do not take so whether so you you hate wind turbines in Is the government going to pay to take them out of the water or off the land?

Oh, I don't think so because now they're just going to be non-working machines that don't have maybe don't even have Don't even have wings on them.

So they're just gonna be staying at big stations.

It's it's This is so So irresponsible

at the same time

great

from the Guardian

A coal-fired plant in Michigan was all set to close.

Trump forced it to keep running at a million dollars a day.

A town in Michigan had big plans for this facility site, then the Trump administration ordered it to stay open.

The J.H.

Campbell power plant

Since 1962 sits near the dunes at the edge of Lake Michigan was eight days away from a long planned closure when the Trump Department of Energy issued an emergency order that had stayed open for 90 days.

It is costing us a million dollars a day.

Fiscally responsible, they do their, Sidman they're so, they just, the planning.

The long, the forecasting, there's just nobody like them.

Mark from Prairie DuSac is on the line.

Good morning, Mark.

Thanks for joining us.

This kind of has echoes of Scotty Wanker, because let's remember what happened to us when we shut down the railroad project here in Wisconsin.

How much do we end up paying for the rail cars that had already been produced?

And so those, you know, got shipped to points elsewhere and that the opportunity to cost loss there and that

if they've got this place at this thing it is just so so trump would rather see a big old smokestacks belt you know cold cold smoke then then actually a wind tower i mean i used to park my car downtown um using before i thought i'd buy close to the madison power plant there and periodically my car would be kind of coated with black coal certainly sure and it is just um i think you know dallas trump and his fellows that think this way should

going to a nice garage and seal up all the doors and to start one car up and, uh, okay.

All right, Mark, we're,

we're

following you on that one, Mark.

Yeah, I

understand.

Thank you very

much for calling Mark.

Appreciate

it.

Uh, and, and I'm sorry, I just want to throw this

in

there.

He got a whole, Trump got a whole ton of money from the oil and gas industry.

Yes.

So he owes them.

And we saw a clip of one of his, one of his guys on Fox news business this weekend saying energy dominance.

They want energy dominance, so they want coal, and they want more gas, they want more pipelines, more natural gas.

Well, we've talked to Mr. Global about this, and the rhetoric is beautiful, but the reality is there.

They're shutting down, they're shutting down certain.

We got rigs shutting down.

We got rigs shutting down.

Natural gas, you can't force it to make more.

It's not, we're already dominating.

Coming up, Wisconsin Republicans call it judicial tyranny.

Civic Media News Director Shelley Pittman joins us after the news to explain.

Keep it here.

We are the Civic Media Radio Network.

We'll be right back.

Good morning.

Welcome.

Welcome to Matt Nair on air.

Jane Matt Nair, Greg Bach, Calvinator on the board coming to you live from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.

You can always join us.

The number is the same call or text at 855-752-4842.

You can leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream.

Good morning, live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter coming up later on today.

in the two o'clock hour with Todd Alba, 235, joined Todd for a conversation with Wisconsin watch reporter, Tom Kircher, about a legal scheme involving three different counties.

I heard his promo for the show when I was coming in this morning.

It sounds tantalizing.

That sounds like it has.

Intrigue.

It does.

So join Todd this afternoon from 2 to 4, coming up again around 2.35.

He's going to be talking about that multi-county intrigue.

Ooh.

Dun, dun, dun!

Exactly.

She joins us every Monday at this time to give us a little breakdown of what is happening in Wisconsin.

She's Civic News, Civic Media's news director, Shaly Pittmas here.

Good morning, Shaly.

How you doing?

Good morning.

It's nice to be here to hear you and you can hear me

When

things

are working, it's it's a good day my

goodness

just a good Monday.

Yeah, we're all happy Let's okay.

There's there's a lot to cover here.

Shall we?

So first of all, I think when people hear JFC it stands for the Joint Finance Committee when we're talking about Wisconsin, but there is another part of this called

J. C. Rahr.

J. C. Rahr.

J. C. Rahr.

I'm not sure what people actually call, but yeah, there are a lot of legislative committees at the state capitol, and the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules

is

one of them.

I fell

asleep while you said that.

Oh, that sounds like an exciting committee to be on.

I know, I know.

I promise you, this is exciting though, and it's been a moment of intrigue in the last couple, in the last week or so, and I'll do credit to Wispolitics and JR Ross for really sussing this out.

He's fabulous.

I'm relying mostly on their reporting, so, and they did a great job.

So, the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules, let's call it JCRAR from now on.

Its job is to review administrative rules from state agencies.

We talk a lot about the normal legislative process.

Lawmakers propose a bill and there are hearings and then it gets passed or it doesn't and then it goes to the governor.

This is outside of that.

This is coming from state agencies themselves that want to change rules for the state.

So the DNR is a great example of setback rules or CAFO rules or

wolf hunt rules, right?

And that's been an area of controversy in the state for a few years.

They had a whole

bunch of public comments about the gray wolves in Wisconsin.

I mean, thousands

and thousands.

Thousands of public comments.

And that is still pending, shifting the way that Wisconsin manages its gray wolf population.

This is one of the rules affected by this back and forth.

So let's jump back to 2018 though.

Do you remember that lame duck period where Governor Evers wasn't quite yet governor, but there were rules passed in the state legislature kind of stripping away authority of the executive branch?

Well, one of the laws that was passed allowed Jay Krar to block a rule indefinitely.

So this is played out in

in practice by

this committee being able to kind of slip a rule into its pocket and never be able to take action on her if they don't want to, right?

Well, Governor Evers recently was successful in a lawsuit to the now liberal Supreme Court.

Evers v. Markline II is a lawsuit that was filed in 2023, right?

And it accuses the legislature of an inconstitutional veto.

of taking some of these rules and never taking action on them or not, or taking a long time to take action on them.

Right.

Sitting on them,

essentially.

Yeah, exactly.

And so this was overturned by the liberal majority of the state supreme court.

You mentioned this in the promo.

State legislator, Steve Nosk, who is co-chair of the Committee on Administrative Rules, called this ruling judicial tyranny of the liberal Supreme Court.

He said, the liberal judicial junta on the state Supreme Court has in essence given evers the powers of a king.

So he issued that when the...

when the law suit uh or sorry when the state supreme court issued their decision.

So now governor evers is trying to get some of these pending rules through and enacted.

One is the gray wolf management plan which as you referenced has been pending for two years at least.

At least.

It was approved.

by the Natural Resources Board, it's received thousands of public comments.

In the meantime, the gray wolf is now again a federally listed endangered species for a while.

It hadn't been, and there was a wolf hunt that was controversial because it killed- They went way above the state quota.

And that had conservationists concerned.

Absolutely.

If you're just joining us, Shelly Pittman is Civic Media's news director.

She joins us every Monday at this time to do a little deeper breakdown of what is going on in the news.

And we are talking about this agency in Wisconsin called JCRAR.

It's a subset of the Joint Finance Committee.

And just to remind folks who may not remember, on Scott Walker's way out the door, Scott Walker and the Republicans in Wisconsin

essentially tried to make the governor's office as toothless, as toothless as humanly possible by stripping away a lot of what would have been regular duties of the governor.

Yeah.

So again, would it had this been a Republican governor?

I'm assuming these things never would have happened.

Well, that's I mean, that's a fair that's a fair assumption, I think.

But yeah, it just

Yeah, I Sorry, there's a lot to be said on that point, but that's a lot of opinions

But again, just look at the fact that I mean again Governor Evers is coming to the end of his second term and they are still sitting on I believe over 100 of his appointments They've never even given them a hearing and they will not and they will never get a hearing.

Yeah

Yeah, but I Charlie that the language that senator mark line or not son senator Haas was a state senator Haas.

No, thank you very much.

My apologies.

Haas is the city of Madison's interim clerk.

You are.

You are such a nerd.

No, but that that that the use of language that I love it when any politician says junta.

I'm like really tell me what a junta really is and tyranny, but really it's just about restoring

allowing the governor to do his job, his or her job really.

So yeah, I don't know if it's so much a liberal court decision as it just is a basic decision from a court of people who know how to process common sense.

Dony on the live stream says, Evers versus Markline one was an absolute classic, but Evers versus Markline two is definitely living up to the hype.

So exciting.

It's like the Godfather two of state court cases.

I gotta

say, really just just.

So, where are we on this, Shaly?

Exactly.

Right.

Why am I talking about this obscure committee, right?

And bothering you with it?

Well, there's some news there, right?

And now we're at the news part.

Evers had been trying to push this through, push these rules through, and he's facing another kind of challenge in the implementation of that.

So the GOP-controlled Joint Committee on Legislative Organization, another committee, had a paper vote last Friday that directed the Legislative Reference Bureau.

to not publish a rule that hasn't gone through review.

So essentially finding another way to stop these rules from becoming implemented rules before getting

heard and considered by this committee.

They're throwing roadblocks in the way so nothing can move forward, essentially.

It's a political fight, right?

What tool can we use in state government?

It's back and forth, right?

I love that there was a paper ballot vote, right?

They had to drop off their ballots on Friday.

of the members of the Joint Committee on Legislative Organization in announcing this, Assembly Speaker Robin Voss and Senate President Mary Felskowski said, quote, we are following the law and maintaining the fundamental checks and balances of lawmaking.

So that's where we are.

It's Monday morning.

I don't know.

I know that this Joint Committee on Legislative Organization approved

this directive, I'm not sure where that leads.

You'd have to ask JR Ross or West politics.

But, you know, I often talk about politics in Wisconsin being the flow of power throughout the state.

or throughout the three branches of government, it's whatever tool you have at your disposal.

And so this is the latest in those tools and what folks have at their disposal.

I also want to mention, I looked through the Clearinghouse Rules just...

if there was anything else interesting.

And I don't actually know the status of this one.

It's a little tough to tell, but I did love that there is a rule from the Department of Public Instruction.

That's the elimination of the dance license.

We're talking about the wolf fund.

There's another rule that's regulating the elk hunt in elk population control.

So these are pretty obscure rules.

And yet, I would imagine folks have thoughts on them.

Oh, they're

very passionate opinions, certainly.

And especially about the wolf, the gray wolves.

But again...

When you said the dance, what was the dance again?

Eliminating the dance license, I can pull it up.

I only asked because, and I'm not kidding you when I said, when my parents got married in Waukesha in 1968, you know, last century, dancing in the city was legal.

Are you

kidding me?

I'm

not kidding.

It was footloose.

It was so footloose.

It was such a footloose thing happening.

Yeah, they couldn't, you know, there was no dancing allowed.

Oh, you know what?

Looking closer, this rule has been withdrawn.

I'm glad I pulled it up again.

This was just an aside.

You heard it here first, folks.

It was withdrawn in February.

So they list all of these clearinghouse rules the same.

So you have to kind of go through and look at each one.

The elk hunt, though, has not been withdrawn.

So wait, wait, wait, wait, I'm

sorry.

So there was actually a measure that was going to outlaw dancing.

Is that what that was?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Go ahead, Greg.

What she's talking about is I figured what you were talking about had to do something with like an old, you know how like in some towns, there are old rules

or

laws that they get really, you can't walk cross street with a squirrel on a Sunday.

Right.

I thought that you did that yesterday, evil person.

Go on, the dancing thing.

I thought it just had something to do with that.

So this one comes from the DPI, right?

So it used to be that to teach...

dancing in a school, you needed a license or a permit.

Well, there aren't institutions that really give permits for dance, teaching dance anymore.

So they wanted to roll that back.

This is quote, the dance license is not offered by any educator preparation program in Wisconsin.

So due to that inability, we want to eliminate dance as an area for licensure.

So this is kind of the granularity of these rules, right?

I just want to

hit somebody now.

I just

I want to dance.

I just want to say something really quick here.

And it's there is a there is someone in Wisconsin.

I can't remember his name.

Oh, no, it's it's it's I think it's Bill Barry and he wants to get rid of all all needs for licensure for

kids for concealed carry.

But yet if you want to teach dance in this state, you must be licensed.

That's what I'm hearing

right now.

He says just dance like no one's watching.

They can't regulate all of our dancing.

That's what we're going to do next.

And then we're going to talk a little bit.

It's everywhere.

THC, it's kind of the Wild West here in Wisconsin.

That's all on the way.

Stay close.

You're listening to Matt Nair on air on the vast statewide, countrywide listen to us around the world on this civic media radio network.

Good morning and welcome back to Matt Nair on Air.

Jane Matt Nair, Greg Bach.

Our resident young person Calvin on the board coming to you live from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.

You can join us.

Call or text.

The number is the same.

855-752-4842.

Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter.

Shia Civic Media's news director, Shali Pittman, joins us every Monday at 9.30 just to recap some of the news.

a lot of news, and it's easy to get lost and trying to keep up with everything that is happening.

I want to bring in Jack from Miramac just to dial this up.

Good morning, Jack.

What do you want to say?

Good morning.

Yeah, this is just more of the gerrymandered, and yes, they are still gerrymandered, thanks to the so-called lease change rule.

The redistricting was done with the more or less cooperation of our governor.

But these guys are more megatite Republicans.

They're just trying to keep their my way or the highway approach to what they consider governing.

Besides, you know, trying to steal as much of the governor's power and lame duck sessions after walk or lost,

They attempted even worse gerrymandering than they originally had.

Fortunately for us, it was to the point where it was actually unconstitutional, breaking a very simple rule of the Constitution.

They have vetoed every single one of the governor's budgets, just throw them out and said, here's our budget.

take it or leave it, basically forcing Governor Evers to make some difficult decisions in terms of budgeting.

And this is just more of the, oh yeah, I forgot.

They also haven't even bothered to approve, what is it, somewhere over a hundred of Governor Evers' nominees.

These guys are absolutely outrageous.

They're just

You know, they figure, well, we're in the majority of the legislature, doesn't matter whether they only got 48% of the vote, but we're in the majority of the legislature so we can force our rules on anyone.

No, you can't, guys.

You know what, though, Jack?

Jack, I've said this for a long time.

It's Robin Voss's money and he knows what he wants to do with it.

I think that's the way he looks at it.

He knows he knows best.

Hopefully he's spending his own money on these these crazy lawsuits because it would be outrageous if our government is paying our lawyers to make the lawsuit and they're paying The the legislature is the lawyers to fight against

it.

Yeah Yeah, appreciate it Jack.

Thank you very much.

Yeah.

Well, essentially we've done that Wisconsin taxpayers have shelled out millions

In in various lawsuits.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean it's that had been filed by Robin was and Republicans.

Yeah, anyway, Shali Pittman is here We do one in the time that we have left Shali It's the Wild West of THC in Wisconsin.

That's what we wanted to get around to here.

You see it everywhere

Yeah, so this was the one I was really jazzed to talk about last week and it came in my hands because I was covering news in WLCX and La Crosse.

And as part of that, I noticed that the city of La Crosse and their common council meeting became the latest municipality in Wisconsin to set the limit

on purchase of products that contain cannabinoids, right?

They did so now to almost a week and a half ago in a 12 to 1 vote.

Now, why is this happening or what would it do?

The legislation bans the use, possession and sale of THC containing products to people under 21.

businesses have to check ID and it prohibits sales from within 500 feet from places that serve youth.

The reason I wanted to bring this to you and why am I talking about news in La Crosse is that this is actually happening all across Wisconsin.

So in watching that Common Council meeting, the city attorney testified that

Wisconsin is indeed the Wild Wild West in terms of this, in terms of cannabis regulation.

And she said, it would be great if the state could create a licensing and regulation scheme, but they haven't and were not preempted from regulating it.

And so in watching that, she referenced several dozen municipalities recently passing legislation that did essentially the same thing.

So I decided to Google them and I wanted to share with you my list of some of these municipalities that have

taken their own initiative, absent state direction, on enacting basic rules prohibiting youth from purchasing kind of Delta 9 THC.

So let's start with La Crosse, August 2025, Wisconsin Rapids in July, Milwaukee sort of in July, mostly just to ban the sale of these products to people under 21.

It doesn't have some of the other requirements.

But on Alaska in May, Greenwood in April, the city of Thorpe in April, Colby in January,

the city of Loyal in January.

That one had, within 2,000 feet of a place that serves youth, the town of Rome in September, the village of Harrison in Kelly McCounty in September, the city of Hudson last August, and then Wood County seems to be the first municipality, the local government to ban the sale of these products.

So that's an incomprehensive list.

That's just creative Googling that I was able to find.

But this also seems to have come about through a state ad hoc committee on psychoactive derivatives that kind of provided last fall model legislation on how to do this that used that legislation from Wood County three years ago.

So yeah, I just, I thought this was interesting.

This is hard to pack into a two minute newscast and thought you might want to

know.

Absolutely.

Shelly Pittman is Civic Media's news director does a fantastic job.

and joins us every Monday at 9.30.

Thank you so much, Shelly.

We will see you in a week.

Sounds good.

Bye.

We have news coming up next.

And then when we return, college isn't for everybody.

Maybe an apprenticeship is the way for you to go.

We have all the details coming up.

Stay with us.

You are listening to Matt Nair on air on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Good morning and welcome, welcome to Matt and air on air, Jane, Matt and air, Greg Bach, Calvin, Newton off coming to you live from our home here at radio park in Racine.

You can always join us.

You can call you can text the number is the same at 855.

752-4842.

You can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter.

Delighted to be joined by the research director for the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

Joe Pietrangelo is here.

Good morning, Joe.

Thank you so much for joining us.

How you doing today?

Good morning.

I'm good.

Thanks for having me.

Absolutely.

So let's talk apprenticeships in Wisconsin.

Wisconsin Policy Forum did a deeper dive into this.

And it's something that we've been hearing a lot about, especially in the last couple of years.

College isn't the right path necessarily for everybody.

And there are a lot of businesses that are looking for bodies.

So this is kind of a marriage of the two, right?

Yeah, this is a topic that we're starting to work on and we're going to be working on for a while now.

But, you know, like you said, the context here is a lot of employers are struggling to find the workers they need across a number of different industries from manufacturing, construction to health care and other occupations.

And so

What we're seeing is there has been a steady growth in participation in registered apprenticeships, so that's positive that we're seeing more people go into those pathways.

Apprenticeships really give people an opportunity to learn on the job while doing complimentary work in the classroom.

Well, and one of the benefits I would think of this too, Joe, is that it gives you an opportunity to find out if you even like it.

because I think a lot of times kids go through college and you get your degree and you get out and you get into the field and after a year of being it's like I don't want to be a lawyer and I'm even like lawyering.

So you know what I mean?

This is more of a hands-on opportunity for people to find out if this is really what interests them.

Yeah, and actually what you're talking about...

also points to this other kind of even before an apprenticeship there are these programs that actually only exist in a few places in Wisconsin right now they're they're called pre-apprenticeship programs and they're in you know Milwaukee, Racine, Dane counties are kind of the places where you can find more of those opportunities but those are training programs that are not so the employer hasn't hired you yet.

When you're a registered apprenticeship

A registered apprentice, the employer has hired you and committed to supporting you through that as an entry-level worker.

But a pre-apprenticeship training program gives people an opportunity to just try things and get oriented and then get connected to employers if they are interested.

So that's a really good opportunity to figure out if you like something and what specifically you want to go into.

You mentioned Racine, my friend Ola has been running first choice pre-apprenticeship for a very long

time down

here.

And when we talk about this topic, it's near and dear to my heart because I'm a former apprentice.

I'm a trained barber.

I was an apprentice for two years and I went through the program.

And I think that when we talk to kids about where their path leads, we focused so much on four year college, four year college, four year college.

What we don't talk about, and this is just the fact, there are so many jobs out there that can be done through apprenticeships that are good paying, solid jobs.

You can't export these to other countries.

You can build your own businesses off of them.

And I think another important piece of the conversation, too, is it's not just for young people, either.

If you are in a place, and this is where I was at, I was like, I want to do something different with my life, my career, and I want to do an apprenticeship program in my 30s.

They're available for people.

They're there, and they get you the good training.

They're paid.

Most of them aren't paid.

I can't guarantee all of them.

But I think this is such a great path for a lot of individuals, but specifically when we talk to kids and just try to figure out

What do you like to

do?

What do

you want to be when, not what do you want to be when you grow up?

That's a, you know, well, you know, if you want to, but it's just opening their eyes up to all the options out there, especially in the world of like plumbing.

I mean, I remember the graduating

class, the

graduating class and the trades for elevator repair was huge because that's, there you go.

That's a.

pretty lucrative job.

If you can get it.

And

then,

so I think these are very, very important conversations to have, especially in the light of, you know, I just saw an article, Joe, about a company replacing almost this entire customer service staff with AI now.

And you can't do that with, you

can't do

that.

You can't do that with an auto repair person.

So I think what

this

is, what you're talking about, Joe, is, I mean, what is out there is great.

I love to see more apprenticeships out there for people to take hold of.

Yeah, and we're looking, so our next step, so this first piece we did was really looking at sort of what's the state of apprenticeships in Wisconsin right now, where are people doing them and what fields, where are these pre-apprenticeship training opportunities, but what we're going towards next is trying to understand where there might be opportunities to strengthen the apprenticeship system, like where are there places in Wisconsin where there are a lot of jobs.

especially jobs that are expected to open because we have a lot of baby boomers retiring, they're leaving these jobs and opening up opportunities.

And so we're, we're looking for, you know, where are those places where we could strengthen it and we could add more of this programming to, to kind of build the pipeline.

If you're just joining us on mat and air on air, Joe Peter Angelo is our guest.

He's a research director with the Wisconsin policy forum and recently did a look at Wisconsin print apprenticeships and who are they serving and who's getting involved.

And were there any surprises, Joe?

I am always curious about women.

and getting into the trades because I think it's something that has increased maybe in the last decade, but these are good paying jobs.

I mean, I did a couple of stories when I worked with a different radio station.

I talked to women who were carpenters and trades people and drove forklifts, which is my greatest dream.

But I mean, those opportunities, are there more women getting involved in these things?

You know, that's an ongoing challenge and we we did identify that in the in the report that women are really underrepresented as apprentices and only less than 8% of the apprentices in 2024 in Wisconsin were women And that hasn't really gone up.

It's it's it's been, you know It's gone up and down a little bit, but it's it

has never

been

Yeah, yeah, and and so that's an opportunity I think to really you know an ongoing challenge and an opportunity to really get more women involved in these occupations There is one interesting thing that you asked about surprises I guess this is not a surprise but something I learned through this research was that there have been new apprenticeship pathways that have been created recently in health care occupations mainly in Dane County, so these are

So they involve partnerships with the technical college there, but people are becoming medical assistants and pharmacy technicians.

And even now you can become a registered nurse through this program where you are working, getting paid on the job, but also taking classes at the technical college.

So that's an area where, you know,

given the demand for healthcare workers.

And there's kind of a pipeline, or you know, there's a ladder in healthcare from kind of entry level to more advanced.

But so there are these new opportunities that if we could make those available throughout the state, we could have more people taking apprenticeship pathways into healthcare.

And that's something, as you mentioned, Joe, with baby more, more, we're getting older as a population, just as a country.

And so the need for people in the healthcare industry is only going to grow.

What other areas other than healthcare have you seen in an increase in apprenticeships?

Well, so construction is still by and by, you know, the number one industry for registered apprenticeships, manufacturing is number two.

So a lot of different occupations within the manufacturing sector.

But then there's healthcare, there are services like Barbarian Cosmetology, there's work in utilities.

Those are kind of the main ones that we see right now.

Yeah.

And you brought up technical colleges too.

talk about this for hours.

I think the technical college, the, you know, the vocational colleges and vocational high schools that are still, that some that are still around, I think are an important piece of this puzzle because they really, as you, as we said earlier in the, in the discussion, it allows people to look around and see

What interests me?

And technical colleges are usually much more affordable than a four year or even a two year associate program.

And it gets you into that as with the apprenticeship, as you mentioned in Dane County, it gets you on the ground immediately, puts the equipment in your hands, gets you learning immediately.

And I think if you are looking at the apprenticeship world,

really reach out to your local technical college, whether it's Gateway in Racine or MATC, but they can really put you on a path and they can get you into that apprenticeship program.

I'm just, I love talking about this stuff.

I can talk about it all day long.

It's great stuff.

I think that we should be having more of these conversations with especially young people.

But, you know, I think one of the things that the pandemic really taught a lot of individuals was that, hey,

You want to make a change?

You can make a change.

It's out there.

It's available.

It takes some courage.

It takes support, but you can do it.

The tools are out there for now, as we know, but it's important to utilize them because people want you to be a part of those careers.

Joe Pietrangelo is our guest, a research director for the Wisconsin Policy Forum, and they recently looked into apprenticeships and pre-apprenticeship.

programs in the state.

And as you pointed out, Joe, unfortunately, women and women of color still remain underrepresented in this, even though I know not everybody is meant to have a desk job.

Not everybody is meant to work in an office.

There are a lot of women I know who really want to be outside.

Yeah, I mean, yeah.

And this is something that we've seen in Wisconsin over time and nationally.

This is

you know, there are efforts to bring more women into the these occupations, but it, you know, the improvement has been or

the

increase in their participation pretty slow.

Yeah.

Which is interesting too, though, because again, when I was doing this series of stories about women in the trades, all of them said there's there is a concern sometimes about women on the job sites and things like that.

And what these women found was, as long as I can do the job, nobody cares.

Yeah.

I you know as long as I'm competent and what I'm doing that's the that's the only issue

I have a dear friend who is a carpenter in Chicago and and except for where she works everyone else is like well but but and then insert question that's usually based in sexism here or the the weak will of others she she works and and and they don't care like can you do the thing good I need people who can do the thing she really faces it when she does side jobs like installing

wall TVs and then people look at her like,

are you sure you know how to do this?

Exactly.

So yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

And and there's nothing wrong with there's nothing wrong with the world.

I come from the I came from the world of cutting hair.

There's nothing wrong with that's what you want to do.

But they a lot of times they push women into the beauty trades and those like the typical things and those jobs are available for anyone who can do them.

Right.

Yeah, it's it's it's about demystifying those things and just saying, yeah, go do it.

And I think like you said too, this is it's just a different way to get into work where if some people learn better by doing then in a classroom and granted apprenticeships they do have a classroom component but you're also getting that hands-on experience and that's really for us some people it's just

a better way to learn.

Absolutely.

I might be able to math if I had been taught.

Or to continue our conversation with Joe Pietrangelo from the Wisconsin Research for Wisconsin Policy Forum.

You did it.

On the other side, words are hard.

You're listening to Matt Nair on air.

We'll be right back on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Good morning and welcome back to Matt and Air on Air.

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Joining us right now, he is a research director for the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

Joe Pietrangelo is our guest, and we were talking about apprenticeships in Wisconsin.

Do we know an idea of demographics, Joe, of how old and where these kids are coming from who are getting involved in these programs?

You know, yeah, you mentioned that not everybody is going directly into these programs and it's true a lot of people are going out trying something Whether it's they're trying to go they're trying in the college path or they're trying some other occupation and then kind of later discovering that they want to go into the trades and Coming back in so actually it's a lot of the people who are active apprentices are in their later 20s

you know that's that's fairly common to be not starting till mid to late 20s but you know they're awesome.

They're also encouraging people to go directly into them, even straight after high school.

We just do see a lot of people coming back after trying something else.

I think that's really encouraging, though.

I do, that folks at some point, again, you're 26, 27, it's like, I'm not happy doing this.

I don't see myself doing this for the rest of my life.

What about X?

What about Y?

I think that's

great.

was told as a kid you're going to college and that was all I knew because at the time you didn't really think about anything else it was for your college because I think that you know my parents and their the generation before there was so much happening in the world in the 20th century is they will you want your kid to do better than you and that was always equated to for your college right

well

of course get you the great job and of course do the thing and the thing and the thing and maybe my kid will become a doctor but what we really don't look at nowadays and and you want your kid you want

whomever in your life to be able to earn, to be able to take care of their lives and live a good life.

And a lot of these jobs that come through apprenticeships and the trades jobs pay really well.

They have good benefits.

They're union jobs, not all, but some.

And they just, as I said earlier, these are jobs that cannot be exported to another country.

You can be, I remember on like day two of my apprenticeship, they said,

A place can let you go, but they can never take away your training and ability.

And then you can take that to another place.

Absolutely.

I mean, it's like walking into a job site.

Oh, you've been doing it for five years?

All right, cool.

Pick up that thing and do that thing.

You're hired.

You know, that's it.

You are employable.

And you have value.

You always have value.

But in this situation, you have such real value for a

work

site.

And you had mentioned to Joe that the health care industry in particular is seeing more people get involved in apprenticeships.

know if people appreciate.

I went for a heart scan last year.

That's all this guy does.

The kid who did my heart scan and he's like 27.

And he said I specifically went in to just do this.

You know, it's he's he's not going on to become a doctor.

He's not he he loves this is his lane.

Yeah.

Yeah, there are quite a few different occupations and healthcare that

just in Dane County, like I said for now, but they've created apprenticeship programs for ophthalmology assistance, for respiratory therapists, pharmacy technicians, surgical technologists.

So there's a lot of different occupations that these opportunities are being created in.

And like I said, hopefully we can see that replicated in other parts of the state.

Where can people find out about this stuff, Joe?

If they're looking for a pre-apprenticeship programmer, is it just doing a Google

search?

One of the main providers of pre-apprenticeship training is called WRTP Big Step.

They're based in Milwaukee, Racine, and Madison.

They're really based in Milwaukee, but they provide training in those three places.

I would say that's one of the first places to look because they're one of the biggest providers.

And specifically if people are looking into construction trades or manufacturing.

So that's one place I would definitely start.

Well, can you repeat that name?

I'd like to get the web.

I'd like to get

the

website.

Yep.

It's called WRTP big step.

We'll put this in our show notes.

We'll get the links in our show notes so you can check that out.

We'll also have a link to your research on.

apprenticeships in Wisconsin.

Joe Peterangelo is a research director at the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

Thank you so very much for your time, Joe.

It's been really, really interesting.

I look forward to having you back for the next, we'll do a follow-up, the next one that you do.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Appreciate it.

Coming up next, we have news on the way, and then when we return, it's a segment of the show that we like to call Audio Sorbet, where we lighten things up, take a breath, get away from the news.

Today,

It's Audio Sorbet Food Take Cracker Edition.

Yes.

Hot takes.

We had a big argument about crackers before we went on the air this morning.

Well, there

wasn't an argument I won.

Who

knew?

But yes, people have very strong opinions about their favorite crackers.

That is coming up next.

All the important stuff happening right here.

Stay close.

You're listening to Matt Nair on air coming to you across the Civic Media Radio Network.

Good

morning and welcome back to Matt Nair on air.

Jane Matt Nair, Greg Bach.

Doctor, slide on the board.

Give me a D from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.

You can always join us, call or text at 855-752-4842.

Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter.

Just a reminder, if you would like to help support Civic Media, you can always go to our Civic Media store.

get some merch love merch we got merch go to civicmedia.us click on shop at the very top and we've got some different t-shirts and we've got a hat and some little charge keys so if you would like to help support civic media

Maybe buy a new t-shirt for fall

go to the civic media store.

Oh, there's some stuff fun stuff there John and Gordy have a t-shirt They're

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We

should have a t-shirt

there Maybe mad near on air.

It's merch.

Yes Merchant air on air someday was dumb that that will let you know but for right now you can

proudly wear a civic media t-shirt go to civicmedia.us Click on shop and check out our wares It is 10 30 just about 10 37.

This is the portion of the show that we call audio sorbet Where we Clean your ears with fun.

Thank you.

I'd like that on a t-shirt today audio sorbet food takes

Yeah, cracker edition.

Yes.

Before we went on the air this morning, we were talking, we always like to kick things around about what we want to do in this segment.

Somehow we started talking about crackers.

Well,

this is what I really love about audio sorbet is that you, you know, you can plan a show.

You can look at the news.

There's plenty of news to look at.

There's plenty of stuff you can discuss throughout the entirety of the show.

But I feel my personal thought is that audio sorbet has to happen in the moment.

And it usually happens about a half an hour or less before we go on air.

Just kind of a spontaneous thing.

Cause you can't force fun.

And it really comes out of a conversation where we're talking about the most mundane thing.

Absolutely.

And I said, it started with cheese.

That's right.

We were talking

about cheese.

I just was.

I, I love,

I'm just

going to be another,

this

is totally separate.

So don't give us your cheese takes yet.

We'll get to that.

Eventually we promise, but I was talking about the fact that we've been on a big monster cheese kick at the house.

It's just, and I feel it's the perfect cheese because it's not too hard, not too soft.

That's an

argument for another day.

You're fine.

I'm right.

Everyone else is wrong.

No, I don't think it's the best.

It's just our cheese of choice right now.

It's what, I mean, tomorrow it could be a fine breed, but I then went into the,

what I find to be a an annoyance

that oh yes the great crack the cracker switcheroo it's more

like the the cracker substitution and

I will say that, and I'll bet you a lot of people agree.

I love a Trisket.

I love a Trisket.

And a plain one too, just a salty Trisket.

Those lovely salty Trisket.

They can dip.

They're just built for speed.

I

like the, it's a heftier cracker.

Yes, it doesn't get broken apart by dips.

Exactly.

You

put a, you put a, you put a, even sometimes a scoop in there and you're like, oh, it's not just

waiting in the pool.

Disappointed, sure.

And I don't like it when I go to a party and I'm looking for Trisket's and someone says, oh, we just have wheat things.

Inside, I am upset.

I don't say it out loud because that just makes me sound like a

psychopath.

But it's a lesser cracker.

Oh, absolutely.

Both in size, in thickness, in value alone.

I feel like when you tell me, oh, I don't have a trisket, but we have wheat things, you might as well just be like, you're not my friend.

Why don't you just get out of my house right now?

That's how I feel.

Very strong feelings about triscuits.

And then tell me they're not there.

I'll pick some up.

Calvin want to weigh in on the great cracker to be

tell me how Maron Calvin you always do

I will So I will say wheat things are better than Tris kids.

Of course you do But neither are good.

Oh pass on both I will take either a Ritz cracker or a townhouse cracker the most basic Nice, they're crunchy.

They're also light and fluffy a little bit little buttery.

Yeah, perfect

What is your cracker of choice 8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2?

Is it your classic Ritz?

Mm-hmm.

Is it perhaps the regular Trisket?

Mm-hmm.

And don't even give me the- I don't even need- The garlic flavored- Yeah, I don't need that.

All the herb flavor, the fancy flavored crackers, no.

Oh, no, no, are you like, like, I don't need flavored Trisket's.

Just give me the good

or the fact- The regular, run-of-the-mill, Trisket, cracker, and salt.

And I'm not surprised at Kelvin.

Disagrees with me on like multiple levels.

He's designed to disagree with me.

It seems we never agree I thought we could come together on this

everyone has their own opinion townhouse 8 5 5 7 5 2 4 8 4 2 What is your favorite cracker?

We got your Trisket faction.

Mm-hmm.

I I haven't got I love Trisket's I'm a very pro Trisket,

but

Townhouse crackers There's something they're they're light and butter.

I like the whoo

to me a Ritz or especially a townhouse They're built for one thing and one thing only soups Crunch up a what townhouse and he puts cracker in soups Fritos and soups Get out of my country What are you talking Fritos and chili?

Yes, but like you have like a chicken a chicken noodle soup

crush up some townhouses and you just, you let it just

happen.

No,

you're throwing little freedoms.