A Pro-Pollution Transportation Secretary (Hour 3)

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You're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglow powered by Up North News.

Now, for my Lake Minnesota studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat Craiglow.

Good morning, it's 8.06.

It's nice to have you back here up north on this Wednesday morning, June 11th, 2025, Earl Ingram standing by as his meteorologist, Brittany Merlot.

Also ahead, we'll be talking to Melissa Baldoff.

We'll do our weekly climate check.

talk about transportation Sean Duffy trying to blow up believe it's fuel efficiency and emission standards and she'll also give her opinion on the new column by Dan Schaefer on whether Governor Tony Evers should run for a third term.

He makes the case in the column why he thinks the governor should not.

run for a third term and Melissa Baldoff I believe will not have a concurring opinion to that.

Along the way if you'd like to text the show you can do so use that Civic Media app or you can text 855-75CIVIC and send us a message.

On the app you can also use that voice note feature and record a little something and send it to us as well or you can put a comment on Facebook or YouTube.

I know earlier on we were talking about, you know, who, who has coffee and who doesn't have coffee and Parker Olson's in studio A2 right now, telling us that he only has, he only has water.

He only has a turkey and cheese sandwiches for lunch.

And I mentioned that I slurp coffee during the commercial breaks.

Tony asks on YouTube, what does Parker do while Pat slurps coffee?

Lap up water?

I don't think you lap up the water.

I'm pretty sure there's a water bottle involved

in this.

Yes, bottle.

Yeah, okay.

We're official here.

Okay, sounds good.

So we've got Parker standing by and meteorologist Brittany Merlo joining us to to tell us about a forecast that is starting dry.

But this is this is the last of the dry for a while here, Brittany.

It is unfortunately, but it's a beautiful day today.

I mean, don't forget the sunglasses, you can rock the shorts, the

tank

top, anything you want.

It is

going to be fantastic.

Honestly, especially far southeast, you could hit 90 degrees today.

That's not out of the question, but a lot of the state far south will be into those mid to upper eighties.

Far north, how about those 70s?

Still nice and comfortable.

Plenty of sunshine out there, but also far north, some areas of wildfire smoke still kind of mixing in.

So moderate levels there.

And then as we go through this afternoon, pretty much late afternoon, early evening, a few more chances of sprinkles and showers start to move in.

And then we've got.

heavier rain and thunder as we go through tonight and overnight for a majority of the state.

Now this is going to start to push into western areas around five or six o'clock tonight, spreading central around midnight and then moving south and staying south overnight and through tomorrow morning.

But all of that rain is going to be lifting up to the north as we go through tomorrow into our Friday and it's going to be heavy at times or we could see anywhere from one to two inches in places.

So flooding is not out of the question, especially if some of this rain gets heavy and soaking.

It will leave the area by Saturday.

We do have a dry weekend ahead and temperatures, of course, getting a little cooler as all the clouds and the rain is here, but we'll get back to those 70s and 80s by the weekend.

All right, uh, Robin Tigerton now has an eight o'clock update on the weather there, sunny and hazy and 63, uh, up six degrees in just the past hour before he heads to five mowing jobs in the Tigerton area, a doctor's appointment in Shawno and then more lawns to mow in Clintonville.

At least the weather is nice.

And he says he got hooked on coffee after appendix surgeries back in 1987.

I notice he said plural.

I too, I had plural appendix surgeries in 1986.

Did

not get

hooked on coffee, but I learned that your appendix is nothing to mess around with.

That thing with fickets and flame not addressed right away, the infection can be super bad.

I remember waking up from the first of the three surgeries and I remember just this ICU nurse in Rice Lake greeting me with

You know, you could have died.

Great.

Great.

Thanks.

Happy to be back, you know.

This clearly has an app in either one of you.

You don't have appendix stories to tell me about.

No, no, thankfully.

I do have a question for you, Brittany, and I'm going to ask Earl the same thing because we got Parker's take on it.

Where does Up North begin?

Oh, that is a tough one because, you know, I'm going to go.

Hard because I live in wasa so I want to say 29, but I'm gonna go with what I really believe 8

Highway 8 highway 8 see now that you won't go wrong with highway 8 with 29 there's some

places north or south that would make the case.

And I live on it, so I'll stick with it, but eight really is a solid answer.

You can't

go wrong with that.

All

right.

Thank you, Brittany, very much.

Appreciate it.

Don't forget you can get our

daily newsletter.

Head over to UpNorthNewsWI.com.

Multiple newsletters there now, a Sunday morning politics newsletter, a Saturday sports newsletter, and then of course our daily newsletter as well that Christina Laurie puts together.

All kinds of good stuff in there.

including this debate today on where is the Midwest, what states are included in the Midwest, what is not, and then also a story about progressive shopping brands.

Some folks, they see some companies and they go, well, they donate to conservative causes and I don't want to patronize them.

That's fine, that's your right, but.

maybe what would help is if you knew about the businesses and the brands that tend to support progressive causes and candidates.

And there's a website that does that.

And we've got a link to it in our newsletter.

Sign up for it over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.

Alright, I love Wednesdays because we get all kinds of great visits with civic media folks.

I talked to James Kelly who's covering stories in the Northwestern part of the state.

We had Melissa Kay on earlier from the Wisconsin Rapids area in Southeast Wisconsin.

We get to visit with Earl Ingram and talk about the stories that he's following and Earl as a Milwaukee fella.

I know you don't get to ask this question very much, but as somebody who lived in Milwaukee for a time, I'm always fascinated by this.

Asking people in Milwaukee.

if you hear the phrase up north, where does up north begin in your mind when you're talking about the state of Wisconsin?

That's a question that is clearly one that I don't have an answer to.

I have not spent a lot of time in northern Wisconsin or the majority of my life has been spent

in the city of Milwaukee.

I don't get up north.

I

love

the diplomatic way that you put it to say, Pat, there are 6,000 other things that I think about more often than what's up north.

It's just not something you debate the way they debate it up around here.

That's for sure.

But I thought it would be a fun thing to kick things off with because there's a lot to follow in the Milwaukee area here that we want to get to this morning.

Not the least of which, and we've talked about so many different ways that the Trump Republican House budget would

you know, do real damage to Wisconsin, to the economy, to families, to people, not the least of which is the closing of job core centers around the country.

You've got a U.S.

Department of Labor that funds over 100 of them around the country.

Their contract are operated where people from lower income families the ages of 16 to 24 can work to get their diploma and job training.

They could even in some cases live on site for free and the Trump big bloated boondoggle of a budget would

closed down and severely curtail the ability of these job corps centers to work.

And Earl, I imagine that is not going over well for the Milwaukee Job Corps Center as well.

It clearly is not.

There's over 120 people who are employed there.

First off, good morning.

Thank you.

There's over 120 people who are employed there.

They remember when it was first being built.

Then Mayor Tom Barrett was the guy who ushered it in.

It certainly has a major presence in the community where it's located.

Done some great things, but as you stated, over 60,000 young people are being supported by Job Corps.

It clearly offers them a respite and opportunity to maybe recalibrate.

Maybe things hadn't gone.

in the right direction, but the short-sightedness of these types of decisions that are being made.

These, in many instances, are young people who have run into a little trouble along the way.

Nothing serious, nothing major.

Maybe didn't do all the things that they should have done when they were in school.

And so instead of preparing those young people and making sure that those young people become productive citizens, which is what the Job Corps does, it

They are now looking to cut these programs which is going to force those young people who clearly some of them have had some Troubles early in life to the street and and the cost associated with locking them up Far our ways the cost that's going to be spent in keeping those job course in is open.

It's another one of those things that I think is just ten amount to

just criminal behavior on behalf of the president of the United States.

Oh, yeah.

And in so doing is is really kind of cherry picking or skewing the numbers of Job Corps history.

A story by Wisconsin Public Radio notes that there were 224 students at the Milwaukee Job Corps Center in 2023.

63 graduated.

And you can look at that either way.

You can say, well, 63 out of 224.

You know, what kind of a record is that?

Here's what it is.

It's 63 more who graduated who would not have graduated and are going to be in the workforce and taxpayers that otherwise wouldn't be.

And so you can either build on that success.

And yes, that is success.

You build on that success and you address

you know safety infractions and disciplinary problems or you do it uh you know Trump wants you to take a wrecking ball to it with you know undoing all the progress that you could have made and all the progress you could have built on.

Well I would say that if you're concerned about saving money uh why don't you start with the amount of money that's going to be wasted on the military parade.

I'm sure that money uh would would be better spent in doing what

They possibly can to make sure the young people get a fair shot in this society.

I'd also say.

But yes, somewhere along the way in 1964, the people who thought this was a laudable operation and it's been certainly going strong in all of these decades.

What does Trump know that they didn't know?

And I would also state that, you know,

they're ups and downs in everything and every aspect of life.

And so maybe in this instance, 60, 64 out of 220 at this point in time might be what the ledger says, but that clearly has not been the ledger on Job Corps and the impact that it's had, not just in the city of Milwaukee, but across this nation.

Without a doubt.

And again, that's something that you can choose to build upon or

tear down.

Right now, the president has made his choice, although thankfully, a judge has put a stop to that at least temporarily while the appeals work their way through the courts.

And so they have to remain open until a future ruling.

But we don't know how long that pause is going to last and the good work that can be done off the text line from Jim in Brookfield.

Always great to hear and see on YouTube Earl on on the show.

His

perspectives on Southeast Wisconsin issues is an important part of civic media.

So Jim and Brookfield, thank you much for that.

We're talking to Earl Ingram out of the Milwaukee area about some of the stories that he's following here for civic media.

Let me give you a quick sports update here at 819.

Where the Milwaukee Brewers so far have picked up one game with Atlanta after winning last night four to one Jackson Cheerio and Jake Bowers hit home runs Quinn Priester struck out seven across six strong innings in that four to one victory Trevor McGill pitched the ninth for his 13th save and 15 tries They will do it again this afternoon starting at 1235 the rubber game of that series Brewers versus Atlanta across several stations in the Civic Media radio network head to the Civic

Media website to learn more.

Thanks for joining us live from Lake Wissota, a great place to spend part of your mornings on the Civic Media Radio Network.

I'm Pat Rightwell.

You're listening to Civic Media.

Stay up to date on the latest news and information for your local community and Wisconsin by signing up for our free email newsletter.

Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.

Tomorrow on the program, we will have State Senate Democratic Leader Diane Hesselbein on.

We'll also have Sean O'Malley talking about your money and the markets.

We'll visit with Chad Holmes out of Wausau and Sharita Booker, Up North News social media manager.

who will also help us preview some big events around Wisconsin that you could head to and take part in coming up this weekend.

We're here with Earl Ingram this morning as we always are on Wednesday mornings talking about some of the big stories following in southeastern Wisconsin and specifically the Milwaukee area where

You have a Milwaukee Teachers Union there, the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association.

We spoke in the last hour to teachers union leaders in Green Bay and Eau Claire.

In Milwaukee, the story there right now is that there is a walkout after the new superintendent announced moving 40 teachers currently in specialist roles

back into full-time classroom positions.

And Earl, what is the teacher's union?

What are educators saying about the way the superintendent is trying to address the teacher shortage using this method?

Well, when you look at the fact that Milwaukee Public Schools is the largest school district in the state, has somewhere, depending on who you hear it from, 50 to 65,000 students in the school district.

And over the last year and a half, two years, they've had a difficult time trying to find teachers, certified teachers to fill those positions with all the different school systems that are alive today that the number of teachers, you know, aren't expanding.

And so Milwaukee Public Schools find itself in a position where they've had

unlicensed teachers in classrooms over the last several years.

New superintendent understands just how insane a thought that is.

And so the many educators or specialists have been working down at Central Office for a number of years.

And she realized that, hey, the number one thing is to make sure that there are teachers in the classroom.

what happens at Central Office should be secondary.

And so she's made the decision, a tough decision as it is, to bring those people back into the classrooms in order to address what is immediate, and that's making sure the children know how to read.

And because of this, the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association, that I have had my arguments with,

Who seemed to think that I'm anti-union?

I've always said to them, I'm a union man.

Spent 34 years in a union.

I support unions.

But if the argument is whether or not I'm going to support the union over children, then that's an easy answer for me.

So the teachers have to understand that their first priority is to teach.

They went into education.

and that's what they should be doing.

They should be in classrooms teaching children.

According to CBS 58, about two dozen teachers and staff walked out of Riverside School around 3.30 after the final bell.

Some of these specialists assist students with certain needs, impaired vision, reading coaches, and they maintain that the specialist jobs are important as well.

But the superintendent said that in some cases the specialist roles are a luxury compared to the hundreds of openings for everyday classroom instructors.

And so there's obviously a real debate taking place as far as what has to happen in the school district there.

Earl's, we get into summer as well.

We know that unfortunately, you know, crime spikes in a lot of areas in the summertime because the rest of us are hibernating for the winter.

Cities are no different and that would include, you know, gun crimes that are gonna be taking place and ramping up.

And again, I come back to the Job Corps center closings.

If you're closing off past opportunity,

You know, I'm not necessarily connecting the dots from A to B, but it sure doesn't help when you've got people who already feel desperate.

You know, I'm a guy who only had a gun 70 years old.

I've only had a gun in my hand one time.

And that was when I went through the FBI citizen training.

But, you know, I've never been around guns and I'm not opposed to people having guns.

But I think that there are far too many people who have guns.

in their hands and and don't know how to handle situations without feeling empowered by having a gun in their hands and so when you look at what's been transpiring the this uptick in in shootings in the city of Milwaukee if you live long enough it's nothing new you've seen it you're expected to happen but there's been kind of a lid on it for a while and so

People are rightfully alarmed when you know 18 people are shot in a three or four day period It says that it's more dangerous to live in some central cities in this nation than it is to be in the theater of war and You know the answers are complex But there's something that really needs to be addressed Donald Trump is the president now

And he should be looking at trying to figure out, you know, what's the best solution to this?

Well, unfortunately, that that solution for him is.

basically involves sending in the Marines into American cities.

And I know that there's been a lot of talk about him wanting to do that in other places, like New York and Seattle and places like that.

But he has mentioned Milwaukee in the past disparagingly.

And unfortunately, I feel like that's the kind of thing we're going to have to watch out for later on this summer as well.

Earl Ingram will continue to follow that for us.

Earl, thanks again for your time.

I always appreciate the visit.

Have a great day.

you as well.

All

right, thank you, Earl.

When we come back, we're going to have this week's climate check with Melissa Baldoff, and we will be talking about Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and, you know, what he wants to do about some of the Biden-era standards that would give us, you know,

cleaner, more fuel-efficient cars.

And as somebody who worked for Governor Tony Evers, we'll also ask her about the new column that came out from Dan Schaefer at the Recombobulation Area, saying that the Governor, Governor Tony Evers, has done a great job, but should not run for a third term.

He makes his case.

Melissa Baldoff tells us her thoughts on the column as well.

That's coming up next here on Our Morning's Powered by UpNorth News on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Oh, we are about 25 minutes away from Matt Nair on air with Jane Matt Nair, Greg Bach, all coming up during the 10 a.m.

hour.

They're going to talk to a principal about the radical improvement in his school's math scores over the past few years and how they did it.

And of course, they wrap up with their regular feature.

This shouldn't be a thing.

That's part of Matt Nair on air coming up next year across the Civic Media radio network.

Well, we've talked about this column from Dan Schaeffer for some time now and it's out.

He came out yesterday afternoon and he first talked about it filling in along with Angela Lange for Maggie Dawn and he Dan Schaeffer will again be appearing with Todd Alba later today at about 2.30 about his column.

So let's let's get to the column.

They were gonna welcome Melissa Baldoff in.

The headline is past the torch Tony Evers should not run for a third term as governor.

And he starts Tony Evers has been a very good governor for the state of Wisconsin.

You could even argue that he's been great given the perilous moment in American democracy that has surrounded his time in office.

He's been a central figure in Wisconsin's crawlback from the disastrous Scott Walker years and a bulwark against the heavily gerrymandered hard right Republican controlled legislature.

And he goes on and on and on to explain all of the things that have made Tony Evers a very good governor and then says

All things must pass.

Tony Evers should not seek a third term as governor.

It's time for him to do what so many Democrats have struggled so mightily to do and step aside when the time is right.

For the 73-year-old governor approaching a critical moment in his second term with 2026 and the midterms on the horizon, the time is right now.

And he gets into age considerations.

Obviously, a lot is said here about Joe Biden.

A lot is said about other Democratic leaders who have served well into their 70s or 80s, while other, you know, potential younger leaders have not been able to fill the void.

So

There is a lot to be said on either side of these ledgers.

I'm not going to be one that's saying this or that.

I'm here to simply facilitate the conversation.

I'm sure Dan will be back here.

But trust me, I put this thing up on my Facebook page and there was some spirited responses right away.

Here's one of those spirited responders right now, Melissa Baldoff, who has her climate check, but also as a former advisor to Governor Evers.

Melissa, good morning.

How are you doing?

Good morning.

I'm doing all right.

Yeah, I am glad you're glad we're going to get a couple minutes to talk about this here.

And, you know, I said this on your, commented on your Facebook post, and I'll say it again here.

I have known and worked with Dan for years, and I really appreciate what he's doing with Recomobulation Area.

I have the utmost respect for him, you know, personally and professionally.

But, you know,

even our friends get it wrong sometimes, and I think Dan's really got it wrong here.

Not only do I just disagree with the take, I think it is just a gift to Republicans who want to see a fight among Democrats.

They want to see disunity.

They want us to be divided and attacking one another.

And it's you know an attack that they they want to make as well.

So I think that this is you know giving him giving them a gift for one and I think that the broader concern You know setting aside what Republicans are gonna do because we know we have some ideas about what they're gonna do This is I think I you know kind of flies in the face of what we

Think you know what we can kind of expect from voters and what we're seeing already what we're hearing already that with all of the chaos happening in DC You know you see with you know Trump and his very public breakup with Elon Musk and all that's going on with that No expectation that things are gonna get calm and sane and easy and rational and effective anywhere

around the White House anytime soon.

People are really gonna be looking for calm, steady, trusted leadership at the state level.

And that's what they're gonna get with Tony Evers.

That's what they've always gotten from Governor Evers.

There is a reason that since he was elected, he has been the most popular and the most trusted elected official in the state of Wisconsin when you look at

market pulling, market up pulling.

So I think that is something that we really have to take into account here.

We're also, you know, I know that there were comparisons to other leaders.

And look, I am somebody who works very hard to ensure that the people representing us are less old, male, straight, and white.

And I

get

it.

And I understand where the conversation is coming from.

But I think on this particular one, I think it just misses the

mark.

It was always going to be talked about this weekend at the State Democratic Convention regardless.

I've obviously even more so now I think people were holding back.

And Dan has definitely found a way to be a conversation starter on this.

Again, the governor's made very clear he's going to decide after the budget's all done and then make his announcement.

I don't know that anything that's said or done this weekend is necessarily going to accelerate that timeline to you.

Yeah, I don't know about that.

I think that, like you said, the governor's been pretty clear.

At the same time, though, in my experience working for him and what I've seen from him,

publicly and privately he's a very honest dealer and if something were to change his timeline for some reason I think he'd be very transparent with people about that and you know what the reason for was for that but I think we have every reason to trust him when he says he's going to make a decision after the budget.

All right.

Well, we'll have a lot to talk about that seven days from now after the State Democratic Convention.

And we see what I think

I'll have a lot to say after the State Democratic Convention.

I think I think you will because there's also that that chairs race that's going on.

There's that guy under your roof who's running along with two other candidates.

It's going to be a.

Well, I also as a, of course, I have the personal interest there, but also as a, you know, former party staffer for a number of years.

You know, it's always fun and interesting to come back and watch how things change and how the process goes.

So it's a different perspective when you attend, not as a staff for the program.

Yes, you're much more of a kind of like a free agent, shall we say, and can be as candid as you want to be.

And we appreciate that here on this program very, very much.

Let's let's turn a little bit to climate issues here.

And, you know, whether we like it or not, we have to once again

point out some of the things that may not necessarily be good for the climate, including Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy saying that Biden-era rules were illegal in terms of fuel economy standards for gas-powered cars and trucks, and they are moving to reverse them.

paving the way for a new set of rules, which I haven't read that deep into it as to what the new rules will be.

But I if you told me Sean Duffy wanted to put a coal burner and every car with smokestacks, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.

A little bit of hyperbole, but clearly, very little concern about, you know, the quality of the air we breathe when it comes to, you know, the cars that we drive.

Yeah, absolutely.

I don't think you're

exaggerating all that much about Sean Duffy putting, you know, wanting to burn coal out of every vehicle.

So I don't know that that's all that much of an exaggeration.

Yeah, I think this is just, you know, another example of how everyone in Donald Trump's circle is for one, you know, completely

inept and largely unqualified for the jobs they are doing.

So that's one thing I'll point out.

But also just that they are so beholden to him and his wins and whatever he wants to do to reward his donors and people he thinks can benefit him.

personally, you know, that's always going to be the priority.

Never was best for the American people.

And, you know, I would think that, you know, with everything going on, that we would want to have a competent, incapable transportation secretary to be on top of, like, oh, I don't know, maybe the airline industry that they're ruining, that Sean Duffy, you know, would have some other things that he could be focused on.

other than, you know, trying to just completely erase our progress when it comes to electrifying vehicles and, you know, getting more, you know, reducing pollution.

So, you know, it seems like there are other things you should be working on.

It doesn't surprise me that this is coming, you know, as the Trump musk fight continues to escalate.

You know, it seems like it's, you know, just like trying to be another to get Elon Musk that they're getting out here like this.

So I think that it's going to continue to be a challenge for us all as we see just the insanity coming out of this administration.

Yeah, under the Biden administration, automakers would have been required to average.

And again, the keyword here is average about 50 miles a gallon by 2031 up from 39 miles a gallon for light duty vehicles today.

And again, that means you combine gas power at any EV and you look at the average.

And by going in that direction, we would have saved 70

Billion gallons of gasoline through 2050 that much less that would have been burned and put into the atmosphere and once again Duffy and Trump continue to Shall we say

lie about the EV mandate.

We always hear about this EV mandate.

There is no federal policy that requires auto companies to sell EVs.

There's no mandate for car buyers to purchase EVs.

But with these fuel economy standards in place, it certainly provides that incentive to make more of your vehicles EV cleaner burning, you know, and and something attractive for the American consumer.

And

Again, this was only going to be good for business, for car makers as well as for the climate.

But again, Trump and Duffy would rather take the side of big oil every time.

Absolutely.

And these rules, like you said, would save almost 70 billion gallons of gas, like you said, through 2050.

But it's important to note that

This is phased in really slowly.

This is not saying just overnight this has to get there.

This is something that the rules are increasing fuel economy 2% a year.

So I mean, this is something that is very achievable.

This is something that is not just like an overnight flip the switch.

This is something that

definitely would be very achievable and would be something that's going to help lower costs for people, make us healthier.

So it's just really disappointing to see.

Yeah, again, just no, no good reason for it.

But we could say that about a whole lot of things here.

And I sense that we probably will continue to do that.

Melissa Baldoff, thank you for the climate check.

Thank you for the insight on the Dan Schaefer column.

And we'll, we'll definitely have some post game analysis of the Democratic Convention next week.

So we'll talk to you then.

I look forward to talking to you next week.

All right.

Thanks, Melissa.

Again, coming up tomorrow on the program, we'll have State Senate Democratic Leader Diane Hessell-Bind about some of the proposals that Democrats have put forward in the legislature and an update on the state budget process and Republicans walking away from the negotiating table with Governor Evers.

Also, Sean O'Malley will have your money in the markets right before the opening bell on Wall Street.

And I'm Pat Krightlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

Thanks again for tuning in.

Remember, get what we do at Up North News,

sign up for our newsletters there.

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Network.

And remember, we've got daytime baseball today.

The Brewers and Braves game three of their series.

Wrapping up the series, coverage begins at 1235 on several Civic Media stations, head over to their website to learn more.

The Brewers then stay home.

The St.

Louis Cardinals come to town for their first visit of the year.

A big four game series that starts tomorrow evening at American Family Field.

Hey, for everything that we've talked about in terms of the Trump big bloated boondoggle budget bill,

and what it would do to Medicaid, which is known as Badger Care in Wisconsin.

If you need a little refresher, a little Medicaid 101, especially from a Wisconsin point of view, I've written a story about that for our website that you should go check out.

Head over to upnorthnewswi.com.

Look for the story.

Everything Wisconsin needs to know about Trump's cuts to Medicaid and badger care, where I lay it all out there for you to share with friends as well, who might want to know what exactly it is that Trump and the Republicans are looking to cut.

All right.

Well, as we often do on Wednesdays at this time, we check in with James Kelly at our Chippewa Falls Civic Media Bureau, where he covers the news all across Northwest Wisconsin.

James, how are you?

I'm good.

How you guys doing?

We're good here.

Apparently, you and Parker, in agreement on something, you were listening to Todd all the show yesterday.

Was it yesterday, the What's Worst segment?

Yeah, the Chicago Deep Dish Pizza.

Disclaimer, I am from New York, so I do have a little bit of a pizza bias here.

So

if it's What's Worst, Chicago Deep Dish Pizza or Detroit Style Pizza, where did you come down on this?

I will say Chicago is worse, and I hesitate to call it pizza.

I call it the...

tomato soup bread bowl.

That's really good.

The tomato soup bread bowl is how you refer to Chicago deep dish pizza.

Yeah, I'll tell you what, Parker, if you ever meet anybody from New York and you just want to get their goat, just say the words to them, New York style pizza.

Oh yeah.

There's no

New York, for them it's pizza.

It's just pizza.

Yeah, it's just like Mexican food is just food in Mexico.

Yep, those are the two things we take really seriously pizza and bagels.

That's it.

Fair enough, which I mean

And now, of course, all I'm thinking of is that scene where Michael Scott talks about

his

favorite pizza joint

in New York

City.

It's a Saboros.

It's just the best.

Yeah.

So stories that you've been covering for Civic Media at the newsroom there, Stepping Stones of Dunn County is a food pantry service, but they're ramping things downward.

Why is that?

Yeah, they are.

announced this week that they lost $150,000 in federal funding.

So they're going to be reducing their food pantry services from five days to four days, cutting off the Friday starting at the end of the month.

It also comes on top of some budget deficit issues they were already having since they opened up a 20 bed shelter called the Karen House.

The expenses for that shelter are very high and doubled their budget and they were already struggling.

So, you know, they're looking for other funding sources and they're looking for more donations

from the community, but this is people's food and shelter that we're talking about.

Oh, yeah, definitely.

Let's see, next door in Chippewa County, there's a sharps disposal program.

You can find these special boxes in all kinds of places.

And so Chippewa County clearly is seeing that there's a need for these to continue or even expand.

Yeah, they said they collected about 250 pounds of sharps during the month of May.

So it's free disposal.

You can drop off any sharps, needles, syringes anytime at the Chippewa County Health Department building, at least during normal business hours.

And on Monday, there's going to be a little pop-up collection event at the Chippewa Falls YMCA.

Just one of those little harm reduction things that have become so popular in this area of the state as we kind of recover from the opioid epidemic as those numbers start to come down a little.

Yeah.

And I know I'm hearing people going, well, that's just encouraging drug use is like, no, this is a safeguard that, you know, if there is going to be drug use, you don't want to be reaching into, you know, putting, putting something in a garbage can somewhere and, you know, getting a, you know, a needle prick or anything.

You want safe, safe disposal of these things.

It really became, it really was first set up and popular in the initial HIV crisis.

And there is an ongoing need.

And in this case, in Chippewa County, it will be

expanded.

Let's head down the road to Eau Claire, one of many places that will have a what's called a No Kings protest this weekend for the president's birthday and to mark his his big old expensive military parade as well.

Yeah, there are, it looks like a couple hundred happening across the country.

The one in Eau Claire will start at Owen Park and go to Haymarket Square to Phoenix Park and then back starting at noon on Saturday.

So I'm expecting to see a few people that I would normally see at these events, people who were at Mark Pocan's Town Hall last week, people who have attended maybe the Fighting All the Garky protests that happened a couple months ago.

I expect to see most of those people in...

not as many people being paid to agitate?

No.

And again, that's such a convenient thing to say to people that you disagree with, that they're paid agitators when these are folks who have taken the time to engage in some public service of their own to protest the things that they disagree with.

And frankly, the ranks have been growing, but I would just...

Tell people to take a look at how we started here with reduced food pantry service again because of federal budget cuts that are going to you know billionaire tax breaks and you can see why these protests continue to be

scheduled why they are growing and of course again you look at the the grotesque comparison to the cuts that are being made versus the cost of this military parade coming up on Saturday and you understand why we're going to continue to hear about these protests for the foreseeable future.

Final note from James here is that the bears are out and about and thankfully we're not talking the Chicago football kind but yeah here around Lake Wissota we do see the occasional bear strolling through.

Yeah, the DNR put out a press release earlier this month.

Just making sure everybody knows this is mating season for bears.

So mothers are starting to turn their cubs away and those cubs are now looking for other food sources as our male bearos that are just wandering around.

So there was a cub out in Chippewa Falls about a mile from the studio here.

And on Friday, the River Falls Police Department sent out a press release saying, hey, there's a bear walking around in the streets.

So be careful out there.

Goodness.

So yes, do.

First, first it was, you know, when they were kind of waking up from hibernation.

And now you've got this phase as well.

Every reason to be cautious, don't panic, but use your head.

Use some common sense.

James Kelly, Civic Media reporter in Jipple of Falls.

James, thank you so much.

We'll talk to you next week.

Thanks, guys.

All right.

Parker Olson, thank you so much down there in Madison.

A2, go get that turkey and cheese sandwich now.

You've

learned that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you.

Hey, tomorrow again, State Senate Democratic Leader Diane Hesselebein.

I'm Pat Critello, founding editor of Up North News, the Wisconsin Home for Courier Newsroom, a pro-democracy news network.

Follow us at UpNorthNewsWI.com.

I'm Pat Critello.

See you tomorrow morning here up north.

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