You're listening to Civic Media.
You can tune into any of our live shows on any radio station across the state with the Civic Media app.
Find us in your phone's app store and listen anytime,
anywhere.
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.
Welcome back.
It is 7 0 6.
Nice to have you here up north on this Wednesday morning.
It's June 11th, 2025.
And still to come, our homeroom segment this hour, we'll be talking to two local teacher union leaders, one out of Eau Claire, one out of Green Bay.
We'll talk about the state budget debate and what lawmakers could be doing to better support our public schools, transparency with the voucher school system and much more as we kind of ramp up the school year and get some people's thoughts heading into the summer break.
Then in our next hour, we will be talking to Earl Ingram.
We'll have Sean O'Malley with your Markets and Money, and we'll talk to Melissa Baldoff in our climate check.
She will also be talking in that segment as well, having formally worked for Governor Tony Evers.
about the new Dan Schaefer column at the recombobulation area that says that Governor Evers did a terrific job, but he should not run for a third term.
And we'll see what Melissa has to say about that.
Meteorologist Brittany Merlot is standing by as well, but first let's take care of that Scotty Summer Text-to-Win Contest.
You know the drill by now.
We've got a couple more days to play it.
Four times a day, you can get $100 cash or a pair of brewers tickets.
Every entry puts you in the drawing for one of the grand prizes.
A weekend stay in Door County or Wisconsin Dells, a little gas money to get you there as well.
A different keyword each time that you need to text us through the Civic Media app that you can download over at Apple, Google or elsewhere.
Go to one of the stations on the app and then use the text button at that particular radio station on the app to send us that hour's keyword.
For this hour today, for a pair of Brewer's tickets, good Brewer's tickets, club level seats, you're gonna love them.
For a pair of Brewer's tickets this hour, the key word is beer.
B-E-E-R.
Should have got that Brett Kavanaugh thing out.
I like beer.
So beer.
B-E-E-R.
You have until the end of the hour to text us this hour's keyword.
Your next chance is to play.
Come at 11 a.m., 2 p.m., 4 p.m.
Different keywords each time.
For this hour, the keyword is beer, B-E-E-R, for a pair of brewer's tickets using that Civic Media app.
Here's meteorologist Brittany Merleau now where we said that Tuesday was going to be the driest day and then, you know, the rain comes and then the rain's going to come some more and the rain's going to come some more, but it's not here yet.
And so that's been making for a very pleasant morning here all around Wisconsin, Brittany.
It sure has been.
I mean, it took forever for the clouds to clear out of the entire state yesterday.
I thought that was going to happen much earlier, but it took its sweet time.
though thankfully the sun is shining across a majority of Wisconsin right now.
There is some patchy thick fog far northeast in areas like Shawno, Eagle River as well.
Also a little crisp and cool this morning, far up north, 43 degrees this morning, 70 already into West Bend.
We are looking at temperatures far north, making it to the 70s.
and down south into the low to mid 80s.
Now we could see some 90 degree temperatures sneak into places far southeast in the state today.
So really cranking the heat up and the humidity stays on the comfortable side of things.
So a nice day, a lot of sunshine to start the day.
The clouds will be increasing as we move through this afternoon.
We do have multiple low pressure systems lined up and headed towards us.
And it's going to bring some showers and storms.
by around five or six o'clock tonight.
Far west is gonna see those move in burst.
It's gonna spread into the central areas of the state late tonight and then overnight it'll continue to stay in the southern half of the state into tomorrow morning before the rain starts to lift north and it's gonna become heavy at times, far north.
tomorrow throughout the day into our Friday and then it goes drops back south through the state into our Friday and Saturday.
So it is just going to be a wet mess as we go through the end of the week.
We do dry things out in the weekend.
I was really glad to get a little bit of time yesterday afternoon to get the lawnmowed because, you know, again, for anybody who didn't, and if they can't get to it this morning, you know what they're thinking and they're like, I'm going to have to bail this thing, you know, by the time by the time you find a break in the rain to get out there, I'm looking across the field here and I'm like, I haven't looked at the stats, but I'll bet second cutting of hay is underway for some folks, maybe already.
And
again, yeah, you have to watch the weather on that as well.
So we'll
keep a
keep an eye on the scratch.
sky and on your forecast.
Brittany, thank you so much.
We'll talk to you next hour.
Sounds good.
All right.
Coming up on the Civic Media Radio Network later this afternoon on the Maggie Dawn Show, she'll have on in the four o'clock hour state representative for Nuka Mayadev on the Democrats bill package that will protect Wisconsin from unlawful federal actions.
We've talked a bit about it on this program as well, saying that if Congress tries to, not Congress, if President Trump tries to claw back some federal funds that Congress had already approved previously.
Then maybe Wisconsin needs to you know not make some of its federal payments And so that'll be talked about Tanya Atkinson from Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin Will be on at 4 30 this afternoon and in the five o'clock hour Barat Ramamurti senior advisor for economic strategy at the American Enterprise Liberties Project and former deputy director at for president Biden's National Economic Council all about again the ways that there was a
a recovery that was going on.
You know, the best recovery on the planet post COVID.
But it wasn't perfect.
And so Donald Trump was able to exacerbate that and has now put the economy in a near tailspin.
So I'm sure that'll be one of the subjects coming up from Maggie Dawn a little bit later on her program.
Starting at four o'clock here across the Civic Media Radio Network.
Rob, where are my manners?
I let Brittany go before saying good morning from Tigerton.
Hazy sunshine, 57 degrees, five lawns to mow in the Tigerton area.
Yesterday, he had five in the Wittenberg area.
Then says he had lasagna for lunch at Briana's in the Wilderness Travel Center at exit 196.
That's at Highway 29 and 45 South near Wittenberg.
I've stopped there many, many times on the way to Manitowoc and Sherry's Parents Farm.
Said yesterday he had to wear a jacket mowing the lawn early on until the sun came out.
Has a doctor's appointment in Shawno this afternoon.
And he said, get that Super Tramps song.
It's raining again from 1982, a year of awesome songs.
So yeah, maybe tomorrow we'll have Super Tramps.
It's raining again to, you know, keep you company as well.
So thank you, Rob, for all of that.
Just wanted to check through the the text line here.
Oh, a lot of Scotty Summer text to win people.
A lot of people sending beer as the keyword here.
But here it is from Dave in New Berlin.
I heard your thought before the 630 break about, you know, what is the Midwest and what is up north?
And he said, consider this, Daytona Beach is up north relative to Miami.
With that thought in mind, Dave says, how far north do I need to go to be up north?
I thought up north was Wisconsin Rapids.
I don't know if we've ever put Parker on the spot for this.
Parker Olson in Madison Studio A2.
Parker, for you, where does Up North begin?
Okay.
Well, at least are you going to say Wisconsin Dells so that, you know, I can pile on or are you going to give me something closer to highway 10 or 29 or something
are
Where are you?
We are basically.
Buddy, many apples in Minnesota.
Yeah, thank you, Pat.
Thank you for that.
What's up north in Wisconsin?
At what point in Wisconsin are you up north?
my shot off.
Oh, there we go.
The gateway up north.
That's, you know, sucking up is always rewarded around here.
We do appreciate that.
So you're close.
You're very close.
Highway 29.
is up north.
And so there are folks in say Wisconsin rap or Wisconsin rap and see the point going, Hey, no, we're the gateway to up north.
No, it's highway 29.
You're way.
Yeah, I you know, I don't make the rules.
I only enforce them.
So there we go.
And Tony, of course, Ashland.
Yeah, well, highway two is not our definition of up north for these purposes, unless you live, you know, in an igloo, perhaps
that is the
north of north.
Yes, but yeah, Tony's like, oh, Claire is ours to the south of us.
Well, yes, point well taken, but.
It still is what it is as far as up north goes.
So we mentioned all this because it was in our newsletter today is your definition of the Midwest.
And whether you include certain states, you know, your Pennsylvania's and Montana's is Missouri, part of the Midwest, you know, Nebraska, yes, Kansas, yes, or, you know, at what point are we, are we running out of mid in terms of midwest?
Missouri, I guess,
a little bit there.
Not Arkansas.
not Arkansas.
What?
Okay.
Is that a thing
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Yes.
Uh, Scott in Shorewood, it says, uh, Sheboygan is the way to go on that.
So, and again, if you're in the Eastern part of the state, Sheboygan does make sense.
You know, you're, you're getting there.
But I mean, you still have Green Bay, you know, yet.
And when we're talking about up North, we're talking about really getting out of any potential for traffic signals.
And that was key to Chippewa Falls because for the longest time, Chippewa Falls was the last signal light that you'd hit on Highway 53 before it became a freeway.
And then you wouldn't hit a signal light again until you got off the freeway in Rice Lake or Hayward or whatever.
So you can measure it many different ways.
I happen to choose the signal light and chip will falls.
I did not know
that.
That's all.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
There's going to be a parade in economy walk, of course, like in a lot of other communities coming up for the fourth of July.
But in economy walk, according to a post I'm seeing on the dumpster fire once known as Twitter, in economy walk, they have said that their fourth of July is going to be politics free.
And
Needless to say, in this area of around economy walk, which is quite Republican, a lot of folks are not happy that their legislators, that their congressman, Scott Fitzgerald, that Senator Ron Johnson would not be permitted to march in the parade.
And I have to say that when I first started reading this, I was going to side with the folks who were critical of it, having been in many parades myself.
But then, and this is the twist, Economo Walk, the Economo Walk Rotary Club came up instead with a different event.
Their their tweet reads to underscore our spirit of inclusivity.
We warmly invite representatives from all political affiliations to gather for a special moment of unity featuring the renowned University of Wisconsin marching band.
The band will perform their beloved fifth quarter celebration at the Village Green following the parade, providing a symbolic moment of unity and welcoming participation from all members of our community.
So what they're saying to the politicians is
If you're marching in the parade, you're inviting people to boo or to disagree or whatever, but come to this moment of unity.
And I would understand if you said, no, no, no, that's not good enough.
You know, your representative should be in the parade.
But here's the thing.
Some politicians like to march in the parades.
They like to go down the route and shake hands.
There's others, frankly, who don't.
and would be very, we're going to be very happy about announcements like this because first you've got the unity event.
But just as important or more important to some of them, instead of being in the parade where people are jeering or whatever, you get to just work behind the scenes.
You can go up and down the sidewalk.
You can go around the, you know, the barbecue thing, the beer tent, especially shake hands and not have to, you know, sweat like crazy on a hot sunny day in the parade.
So for O'Connor Walk for the Rotary, the fact that they created this secondary event, which then allows the elected officials to just meet the crowd one-to-one instead of in a parade, I don't have a problem with that.
I know other people do and I understand and I'd love your thoughts on it as well.
Should all politicians just be welcome to march in parades and the crowd should just behave themselves?
Or do you like the twist that O'Connor Walk has put on this?
Would love to know your thoughts on that.
From the heart of America's Up North,
truly up north.
Live from Lake Wissota, thanks for making this the place to spend a part of your mornings.
I'm Pat Critello.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
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.
I was just going to start blurting out random names here as people text in the keyword for the Scotty Summer Text to Win contest, which is beer, B-E-E-R.
And so I was just going to grab whoever the last text was and say hi to Don and Waukesha.
But I can't because Kathy with a C came in just afterwards.
So Kathy, hi to you.
Thank you for using the Civic Media app and texting us the word beer in the Scotty Summer Text to Win contest.
we were talking during the break about parades and and economy walk and other communities and I was talking about my experiences as a state senator and as a candidate in these parades and I'd be just as happy working the beer tent and working behind the scenes and I shared with young Parker here my my proposal that you make more parades like street festivals uh and again I know there are a lot of people people who are fans of parades you're not going to like me saying this
but maybe you just instead, you know, tell all the groups, the floats and everything, here's where you're going to be on Main Street and you're going to stay right there and the people are going to parade.
Basically like a street festival.
That way if they want to stop and talk to you, they will.
If they don't, they move on to the next one.
You put your craft vendors in there, your food booths, you just make it one big street festival rather than a parade.
Yeah.
No, a lot of people.
And what did you compare it to college wise?
the party packers and STD family.
Yeah, exactly.
Yes.
Tony, parades are awful.
I said it.
Yes.
Tony, some people, some people do see it that way.
I know that we really over thought how to do parades and that's why we picked what I considered the best parade candy to toss which would be starbursts because they're individually wrapped and so you can just throw like a handful of them out to the kids and you know they won't get all dirty.
There's other things that I see people throwing them and I'm just like
No, I wouldn't throw that, that candy.
It's going to get, you know, dirty or what have you.
And then there was the politician one year who was throwing out packets of meat seasoning.
What?
I know.
I think he got, I think he got a deal from a local meat shop because it was.
I
don't care.
I know.
I know we were.
The thing is, we were a couple of floats behind.
I want to say this was in Colby, and this goes way back.
And I mean, it just gave us great fodder to talk to the crowd.
We're like, how do you like your meat seasoning?
Yeah.
It's part of the magic of doing the parades.
That's awesome.
Tony asking, you didn't throw candy cigarettes?
Now, that would have been funny because we were talking about the smoking ban at the time.
And whether to have a smoking ban or not, I can't believe just later somewhere who is against the smoking ban didn't pass out candy cigarettes.
That'd be really good.
That would have been so good.
Uh, let's see from, uh, Culver's, this is a story from Jalissa Burns in the Appleton post crescent saying that Culver's is about to debut a new chicken sandwich lineup.
revealing three recipes that underwent years of perfecting.
The Wisconsin based burger chain, she writes, will permanently feature new crispy chicken, spicy crispy chicken, and grilled chicken sandwiches, replacing all three of the current chicken sandwich recipes.
Here's where the story gets good.
We just looked at the landscape of all the different chicken sandwiches that are out there, and we just thought our quality could be better, said head of culinary,
Casey McDonald.
Yes, yes.
I'm scrolling the story and I'm like, wait, something doesn't seem, why am I seeing McDonald?
And I scroll back up and it's Casey McDonald, head of culinary for Culver's.
That feels
that.
It does, but here's the thing.
Now I'm thinking those sandwiches got to be really good because how much pressure are you under?
If your name is McDonald and you're doing the new chicken sandwiches for Culver's, because if they're awful, if they're awful, they're like, see, she's doing that on purpose.
She's a McDonald.
No.
Now I think so First Tony's got a three-part reaction on YouTube as the story is unfolding I'm intrigued and then a few seconds later your types now.
I'm sold followed by take my money culvers Yes, so this will start June 16th So that's five days from now where you'll be able to get the new chicken sandwich lineup as as Concocted by among other people culvers head of culinary Casey McDonald
wishing you all the best for that.
Another story I want to pass along from the Milwaukee Business Journal, and this gets back into the whole notion of what's happening in the news in terms of the trade war.
And no, we haven't forgotten the trade war still out there and that there is still so much uncertainty to put it mildly.
And that's the headline in the Milwaukee Business Journal from the CEO of Generac.
who says you simply can't make long-term decisions.
Generac CEO frustrated with tariff policy gyrations.
It says here, President Trump's policies have effectively frozen Generac Power Systems long-term planning for staffing equipment needs and facilities, according to CEO Aaron Jagfeld.
And I want to give proper attribution here.
This was from Rich Kirchin, senior reporter for the Milwaukee Business Journal.
It happened during a Tuesday roundtable on Waukesha County Business hosted by the Journal.
Jagdfeld expressed frustration at the ever-shifting tariff policies.
He says, we have to figure out where it's going in terms of just the tariff environment, he said.
I haven't checked my Truth Social Twitter feeds this morning.
Oh, that's an excellent point.
He says it's more than challenging to engage in any long-term planning until there is some level of stability.
He says Trump's goal of reassuring of manufacturing to the United States presents some opportunities, but doesn't make sense in many cases.
as plenty of economists have tried to tell them.
Generac has 2,000 employees at its Waukesha County locations, including the corporate headquarters, offices in Waukesha, and a plant in Eagle.
So again, just more of that uncertainty where even if you agree with the foundation of what President Trump wants to do with trade, it's the
scattershot way of doing it.
That just hasn't been good for business or the economy yet.
We've got today's homeroom segment coming up next with a couple of local education leaders here on these mornings powered by UpNorth News.
I'm Pat Crightlow.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
Here's your reminder that before the hour is up, use that Civic Media app and text us the keyword beer, B-E-E-R, that's this hour's keyword for a pair of brewer's tickets.
And you'll also be in the running for those grand prizes, a weekend getaway in Door County or in Wisconsin Dells.
Again, use the Civic Media app, go to any one of the radio stations on there, use the text feature and text us the keyword beer before the end of this hour.
And by the way, while you're on the app,
use that voice note feature as well.
Remember I mentioned our phone system is undergoing a little remodeling job right now, shall we say?
So in the meantime, you can text us, but you can also leave us a voice note and maybe we'll put that on the air as well with your take on, you know, the new Culver's Chicken sandwiches, for example, or anything that you heard so far in all the various news stories that we covered or what we're about to cover as we head into our homeroom segment for this week.
where we talk about public education, all of the opportunities, all of the great things about education in Wisconsin, and of course, all the threats to it as well.
And so joining us today, we've got Brent Bergstrom, he's president of the Green Bay Education Association, and Jeremy Treanor, president of the Eau Claire Association of Educators, both our WEAC affiliates, Brent and Jeremy.
Good morning.
Thank you for being here today.
Good morning.
Good morning.
It's so great to have you both here.
Jeremy, do I understand you're fairly new in the leadership role in Eau Claire?
Yeah, well, I started my presidency, I guess, about 10 days.
So I'm a seasoned veteran.
I'm a science teacher here in Eau Claire, and I've been teaching that I just finished my 26th year, which is why my hair is a little less than normal.
And I've been on the exec team for our union for quite a while.
I was also on the WEAC Board of Directors.
So I have a little experience going into this, but in terms of being the president and the leader of our union, fairly new.
Okay.
And Brent, also of your background as an educator and being active in the union.
Yeah, I'm a music teacher in the Green Bay Area Public Schools, and I have been serving for the Green Bay Education Association as the president for about three years.
I have experienced teaching in Eau Claire, Pestigo and Green Bay.
So I've been all over the place in different different size districts across the state.
Okay, so we're getting into the end of the school year, but we're also still in the thick of the state budget debate at the state capitol.
So we'll have some ground to cover in both of those areas.
But Brent, I wanted to start with you because we've spoken on the program a couple of times here about Green Bay's decision at the city level to put the impact of school vouchers on the actual property tax bills and that
some folks want to make sure that you and your union teammates get credit for that because this is all about
transparency is the way I want to put it.
You know, it's very tough to take on a threat if the threat's invisible.
And it sure seems like a lot of the ways that our tax dollars have been going to the voucher system have not been transparent.
And so you and your team have played a role in improving that, haven't you?
Yeah, I wish I wish we could take all the credit.
We were really a very, very small part of the work that was done.
And we've been talking about it for years.
And finally, the city council did pass a vote to show that up on our tax bills.
So we're really happy about it because the public deserves to know how much money is being funneled into private voucher schools.
And that was, I would imagine
That it was is still a surprise to folks when when people are told by you or others You know again, I think so many people think the the voucher program is still this little experimental thing and For just say the the taxpayers in Green Bay.
It most certainly is not right?
Correct.
Yeah We we lose about 13 million in the Greenberry public schools to private voucher schools.
So that's that's a big big
big ticket item there.
So the big part that usually surprises people is when we say that voucher schools are reimbursed for special education at 90% where public schools are only reimbursed at 30%.
It's clearly not equal.
No, and that actually, that was a story statewide, and I don't know if it was the Associated Press or Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, but somebody put out the story and then a lot of other outlets picked it up.
The kind of thing we have been saying for months, if it almost feels like years here, is that disparity in just that area, the special education reimbursement rate.
Jeremy, do you feel the same challenges there in terms of bringing transparency to the taxpayers so that they understand and they can't just say, oh, it's those teachers unions that are
responsible for our property tax bills.
It's a real messaging challenge for you guys, right?
Well, 100%.
And it's, you know, it's a challenge everywhere.
I think we're starting to get some momentum, just the fact that districts are forced to go to a referendum, you know, every two years.
And then there's a lot of education that, you know, is involved in those referendums just to get them to pass.
But the reality is we're asking our tax payers to fund two school systems, and the system's broken.
It doesn't work.
There's no evidence that voucher schools are doing any better than public schools.
It's the opposite, actually.
And I think that the public needs to understand how much money they're actually spending on those voucher programs.
So like in Eau Claire, where we just passed a referendum in November, and it was really a status quo referendum.
just to keep the doors open and we're going to be going back to referendum it looks like again soon we're already facing a deficit and you know that this voucher program is killing us.
And even if you take away the voucher part of the equation if you're just looking at why there are so many referendums
And again, I feel like the message is only starting to get out that we're talking about 16 consecutive years of underfunding schools compared to the rate of inflation.
So Jeremy, when you say it's about keeping the doors open, it's literally that referendums are not nearly as much for, you know, new buildings, new gyms, new remodels, new whatever, it's it's to keep the lights on the way things are right now.
Absolutely.
I mean,
especially smaller school districts are literally going bankrupt and then scary.
Luckily in Eau Claire, we have a very supportive community that has been very supportive of our past referendum votes.
So we've been able to at least keep the status quo when we've been able to do some remodeling, but that's not gonna last forever.
Some of our old referendum dollars are gonna be expiring and we're gonna be asking our public for even more.
You know, the funding formula at the state level has to change and our politicians, you know, need to get on the same page and fund our public schools.
We're going to have some serious issues.
That would be a lot easier if only we had a budget surplus, Brent.
Oh wait, do.
It's four billion dollars that's sitting there.
Brent, this is not an unsolvable problem in Madison.
No, it's not.
And I mentioned that reimbursement rate before, the budget only calls for 60% for public schools.
Again, big gap there between public schools and private schools.
And we've been told time and time again that the Republicans will not come past even 35%.
They might up it, but only to 35%.
So the discrepancy there between the 90 and the 60 or the 30, it's huge.
it's not acceptable.
And then we get to the next step which is the enrollment caps because right now there is a limit to how much the the state will
pay for and allow for vouchers for kids to, you know, move from public schools into private schools.
And yet those caps are set to be lifted.
We have spoken to Eau Claire State Representative Christian Phelps about his bill that would keep the voucher caps on there.
Jeremy, Representative Phelps is in your backyard there.
How important is it for those enrollment caps to stay and what happens if they actually are lifted?
I mean, it's vitally important that they stay.
I mean, if they're lifted, we're already experiencing a declining enrollment.
A lot of districts are partially because of the voucher program.
So when these kids leave the public school sector and go to the voucher schools, that reduces our enrollment at the public school, which also reduces the amount of funding that we get at the state.
So it's a huge snowball effect.
not only are we losing money due to the voucher programs but we're also losing students.
How is it in the Green Bay area Brent in terms of the
public perceptions that some politicians, you know, are feeding into like, Well, this, this kind of competition is good.
It doesn't.
First off, should there be this kind of competition?
Second, should it be there with public money?
And third, does somebody have their thumb on the scales of this competition?
But is that still the way it's kind of framed in conversations there, especially involving some politicians?
I would say yes, it always has been that way.
It's been that way since Act 10 with Scott Walker and trying to turn the public against public schools and turn it against teachers.
When it comes down to it though, our union and our district is there for the students, number one.
And we know that the funding is not set up for the success of our students.
It's set up to hurt public schools.
It's set up to cause a bigger divide between the wealthy and the middle class.
And we really just need to focus on getting our money back into our public schools and supporting our kids and our communities.
All right, let's step away from the politics here before we wrap up.
Brent, we're heading into the summer break here.
I mean, do you have any observations on how the year went as an educator, as a local labor leader, and how you expect things to go next year?
You know, this is one of the, I think I speak for most of our educators when I say this was one of the hardest years we've faced between the political climate, things that are carrying over into the classrooms from the political climate across the country.
And just educators constantly being piled on with all of the work to try to move our students forward and being blamed when that doesn't happen.
is a lot for our staff to handle.
Would you share in that assessment, Jeremy, as you look back at this year and what the education environment is like?
Yeah, I mean, there's no doubt our staff works incredibly hard.
Our teachers are dedicated to our students, all students, no matter, you know, what their zip code is, we're there for them.
And, you know, there's just been a ton of initiatives added to us, added to our plates.
I think we forget that COVID wasn't really that long ago and we're still still feeling the effects of that across the state.
There's achievement gaps.
A lot of social social emotional learning has been happening, you know, inside our classroom as well that's been adding to us.
Students are just different and technology is different.
AI is different.
And so there's been a lot of things added to teachers plates that were never there before.
And so
We're working really, really hard.
I'm proud of our teachers.
I'm proud of our students.
We're making improvements.
But we certainly need some support from our state level.
We need some funding.
We need equitable funding practices.
I have nothing against private schools.
But I just don't feel like we should be asked to pay for them as well.
We need to put our funding back into our public schools and take some relief off of our teachers.
Yeah.
And the work is getting done because of you and your colleagues.
And then, you know, on top of the work, all that work from every educator needs some leadership as well.
And thank you both for stepping up and doing that.
Jeremy Treanor, president of the Eau Claire area educators and Brent Bergstrom, Green Bay Education Association.
Gentlemen, thank you both for everything that you do and for taking a little time with us this morning.
Thank
you.
All right, appreciate it so much.
Still ahead today, we'll be talking to Civic Media's Earl Ingram about some of the stories that he's following in Southeast Wisconsin.
And we'll be talking to Melissa Baldoff, who normally has our climate check segment.
And we will, of course, still get into some climate check matters.
But as a former staffer for Governor Tony Evers, she's got a few things to say as well about pressure that seems to be coming for Governor Evers to not run for a third term ahead of this weekend's State Democratic Convention.
And that's all in the next hour.
of these mornings.
Powered by UpNorth News on the Civic Media Radio Network, I'm Pat
Reitlump.
All right, we've got Brewer's baseball this afternoon on stations across the Civic Media Radio Network.
Stop hitting your microphone, Mr. Alba.
The coverage begins at 12.35 on stations in Richland Center, Oshkosh, Racine, Kenosha, Park Falls, and Hayward.
From the text line, Lori and Hayward, can you please shout out the word one more time?
Yes, it is beer, B-E-E-R.
You've got all of about six minutes.
to send that to us through the Civic Media app.
Use that little text feature.
And also, after you've texted us the keyword beer for this hour, remember, you can do it again at 11 AM, 2 PM, 4 PM.
That would, of course, include 2 PM with the aforementioned Todd Alba, who joins us now from the balcony of his palatial estate in Madison.
You can, I mean, this guy's as suburban as it gets.
If you look very carefully,
on social media the
state capital
dome is peeking out his left ear or it's one of his ear buds could be and you got f-35 jets taking off clearly over you as well.
Where did where does that one go?
I mean, Madison's got a really nice airport.
I gotta say, Wisconsin itself has some really nice airports.
I love the Milwaukee Airport, but Madison, Moseley, Eau Claire, if you ever
have
reason to.
And Appleton, yes.
If you can plan a trip and take it there instead of having to go to Minneapolis or Chicago and go through all the parking hassles and the lines and everything else, if you've never done that, do it.
You might never go back.
TSA is the line is like five people long.
It's
wonderful.
My step-brother lives in Portland and during the certain times of the year, there's direct flights, believe it or not, from Appleton to Portland.
And it's like 300 bucks.
I mean, it's just round trip.
So, yeah, you're right.
There's some great deals to be had at our many airports all across Wisconsin.
I think that Delta flight probably going to, let's see, it's going to West, probably going to Detroit this morning, I bet, my guess is.
Do you know what, one of the things that...
probably nobody should have told me about are these apps on your phone where you can see what what plane is flying over your house at that moment.
because
really I did not
know this.
Oh yeah, flight radar is one of them and there's some others as well.
And it just becomes this game.
You see you see this flight and you always wonder like, I wonder where they're going to.
And sometimes it'll say like, you know, Chicago to Seattle or, you know, Minneapolis to New York.
And then you see these occasional ones that are like, I don't know, Sydney to London or something like that.
And it's like, Oh, the flight path takes you right there.
And again, it has no impact on your life whatsoever.
But it's one of those little conveniences that you now know.
what that plane is doing above you there, you know?
Because you think you look up you're where
they going.
Well, it turns out to Sydney.
Yeah, I just I always look at them and I think happy people because I always think of the people going on vacation.
You know, it's like, oh, where are the happy people off to Tony mentioned on YouTube.
Duluth is another easy airport to use.
Yes, very true.
From our last segment, Chris Handbook Boyle says thank you Jeremy and Brent for your leadership and caring for our educators.
Again, a great segment.
I'm always happy that Todd comes on after the homeroom segment.
Todd being as passionate about public education as anybody else that we can put
in the homeroom segment, and I just, I know the state budget debate is far from over, but Todd, I really do feel like we, and I mean a big we, everybody in education as well as broadcasting, are helping more people understand that this system is so out of whack and could be better.
It's just that there are certain interests, certain parties, certain politicians that are preventing what could be a fix to the system.
Yeah, we had state senator Keldor Royce Democrat from the Madison area on the show on Monday.
She's been coming on every Monday through the joint finance committee process better known as the budget process that happens every two years here in the state of Wisconsin.
And we talked about this story.
It was in the Milwaukee.
I apologize.
I forget who the Republican is who sponsored the bill right now in the legislature wants to give public or all educators a $300 tax credit.
because a lot of educators around the state, pardon me, spend a lot of spend more than that every year buying supplies and equipment for their classroom because the budget, the state legislature and subsequently the school districts are underfunding our classrooms, our public education.
At first glance, you'd think, well, that's great.
That's great.
We're giving educators a $300 tax credit when they put money into their own classroom.
But as Senator Royce pointed out,
wouldn't it just be nice if we took part of the four billion with a B plus state budget surplus and just actually properly funded our K-12 public schools so our educators wouldn't have to put in their own money to the classroom.
Oh it's like when I see these these benefit things and oh how great it is that somebody donated their sick days so that somebody else could get chemotherapy it's like
How about if we just have a system where, you know, you don't have to have a, you know, a bake sale for education or for healthcare or things like that.
So anyway, I feel like we're, we're turning a corner on that bit by bit.
Hey, you've got a, somebody on your show today who's getting a little bit of attention.
We're going to talk about this next hour.
That nice young man who serves as political editor and a founder of the reconbobulation area, Dan Schaefer, putting out a column that again, in a nutshell says, Governor Tony Evers has
been an amazing governor, a great governor, but he should not run for a third term and laying out the case.
I put that up on my Facebook.
I got a lot of spirited reactions right away.
I'm sure you're going to have that same kind of conversation with Dan Schaefer at 230 today.
I'm not sure what they're speaking of planes.
Maggie Gao and Britt Cuttaback from the governor's office may want to take a flight through Milwaukee County Airport and spend some time in the recombobulation area at the Milwaukee County Airport because that's where the name came from for Dan's...
Foundation there or the organization he started recombination area and I think he has a great take.
I've read it myself I think it's really really well written Dan's a great writer number one and and certainly he says about himself he leads leads left, but He's also a realist and I'm not a hundred percent sure where I'm at personally yet
I share a lot of Dan's frustrations with it, but I think it's really well written.
And I think that these are the kind of things, the kinds of conversations that Democrats should have had a couple of years ago about Joe Biden running it.
And Dan points out the piece that that was never had at the national level.
And we all know how that ended up.
And so I think it's a really good discussion to be had now.
I think there are some great Democrats that could run into primary.
who comes out of that?
And I think I'm going to be very interested in this.
We can see who the Democrats liked as chair executive impact.
All right.
Todd Alba's got Dan Shea for a two 30 today.
Have
a great show.
Quite low.
Him too.
All right.
I'll see you this afternoon.
Thank you, buddy.
We have got Earl Ingram and Mosa Baldov all ahead here on our mornings powered by up north news on the civic media radio network.
The national news cycle never stops.
but it can be hard to find news about your local community.
Civic Media is dedicated to providing quality local and state news coverage across Wisconsin.
With the Civic Media app, you can get notifications about local stories that matter to you and your community.
Find the free Civic Media app in your phone's app store and choose notifications from the menu to tell us what kind of news you want to hear about.