WFHR Friday News Roundup

Transcript

WFHR Friday News Roundup

WFHR News · Fri Apr 11, 2025

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.

This is your WFHR Daily News Roundup for locally grown radio 97.5 FM and 13.20 AM and WISC country 105.5 FM WIRI in Wisconsin Rapids.

For WFHR and WIRI News, I'm Alyssa K.

People in Nikusa won't be eating at Little Mexico or the West River Cafe anytime soon. Both restaurants were closed after owner Jenny Wiki was arrested and charged with fraud.

Court documents show Wiki was charged with 14 felony counts related to income tax, money laundering and food stamps, as well as a misdemeanor charge of resisting or obstructing an officer.

Search warns were issued for both restaurants and Wiki's home. Judge Gilbert set a cash bond of $2 million. Upon release, Wiki is to surrender her passport and is not allowed to sell any major items without permission of the court.

She is also not allowed to open or reopen any businesses without the approval of the business bureau. Wiki's preliminary hearing and arrangement is set for April 21 at 3.30pm at the Wood County Circuit Court.

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction is pushing back against demands from the federal government. Savannah Tome Olsen explains,

The Trump administration is telling state education departments to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion measures or risk-losing funding.

Now state superintendent Jill Underlee is asking for more clarification.

A letter from the Department of Education gave leaders 10 days to have school districts sign a form that essentially says they want to adhere to the law.

Later, that deadline was extended, schools now have until April 24. The Department of Education said if school leaders did not sign that form, they could risk losing access to title 1 for the law.

Underlee wrote a letter back to the Department of Education saying they would not be collecting signatures from school districts.

Saying the request breaks rules is redundant and intimidates school districts. Wisconsin got $216 million from Title 1 programs this school year.

For civic media news, I'm Savannah Tome Olsen.

When sports teams use tax exempt municipal programs to fund stadiums, it costs the federal government in tax revenue.

One congressman from Wisconsin wants to put a stop to it. Lisa Hale has more.

U.S. Representative Glenn Growthman of the Sixth Congressional District is among those backing a bipartisan effort in Congress to prevent the use of taxpayer subsidies for the construction of sports stadiums.

Under the law, as it stands, pro sports teams are allowed to finance construction using tax exempt municipal bonds, costing about $4 billion in lost federal revenue in the past two and a half decades.

By serve forum, American family field and yes, even Lambo field have all had work funded by taxpayer dollars.

Growthman says a similar bill is also under consideration in the U.S. Senate.

The debate about what to do about gray wolf populations is back on in Washington, DC.

Civic media's Jimmy Kuska has the story.

Senator Ron Johnson has reintroduced legislation that would remove the gray wolf from the endangered and threatened species list.

The gray wolf was added to the list after a federal court ruling in 2022.

Johnson argues that state wildlife agencies not the federal government should manage gray wolf populations.

House representative Tom Tiffany first introduced the measure back in January.

In Wisconsin, a 2012 state law requires an annual gray wolf hunt in each year that the species is not a federal endangered species.

As the weather is warming, city officials are reminding pet owners to keep their dog on a leash.

In many municipalities, including Wisconsin Rapids and Stevens Point, you're required to keep your dog on a leash and under control when it's off your private property.

There are specified off leash areas where you can let your dog run.

Stevens Point and Wisconsin Rapids have dog parks, but be sure to carry bags or tools for collecting any refuse they leave behind.

I'm Melissa K for WFHR and WIRI News.

The Brewers head to Arizona. Hi, I'm Mike Clemens with Sports.

Baseball, the Brewers and Phoenix open a three game weekend series against the Diamondbacks tonight.

The crew losing to the Rockies yesterday, seven to two, Colorado coming up with a five run rally in the eighth.

But right hander Quinn Priester picked up in that trade with the Boston Red Sox this week had a good outing.

In his debut with the Brewers, allowing just one run in five innings.

I thought I settled in later in the game nicely.

You know, it's all the heck this week getting through those first three, even those little little sloppy.

Thought it was a good job of just limiting the damage.

NBA, the Bucks beat the Pelicans 136 to 111.

Now they have two regular season games left.

Tonight in Detroit, then Sunday, they host the pistons before heading into the postseason.

Then what? Doc Rivers.

Going in the playoffs healthy, we have an entire week after these two games to get ready for whoever opponent is.

Or at least five days, let's say, that'll get his rest, that'll get his ready.

That's the Bucks, Doc Rivers with sports on Mike Clemens.

On your entertainment beat, I'm Pete Schwabba.

So what do you do after you show the world how you do for play and it goes viral?

Then you're accused of building investors from a bad Bitcoin deal.

For Haley Welch, also known as the Hawk 2 a girl, you do a cameo on Glenn Powell's new show on Hulu called Chad Powers.

The jury is still out on whether or not she can act, but she did cooperate with authorities who investigated her Bitcoin dealio.

She was cleared of any wrongdoing.

There is also a documentary on the way about her quick rise to fame called Doc Tua.

Get ready for round two of Haley's 15 minutes.

The Hunger Games prequel has some cast news.

The Hunger Games sunrise on the reaping is in pre-production and set 24 years before the original Hunger Games.

The rap.com reports that L-fanning has been offered the role of young F.E. Trinket.

The character played by Elizabeth Banks in the first four films.

She has not officially accepted the role yet.

The Hunger Games sunrise on the reaping will hit theaters November 20th of 2026.

Here's one of Pete's picks.

I just finished the show Adolescence.

I thought it was absolutely outstanding.

The show follows a 13 year old boy who was accused of murdering a female classmate and how the incident affects his family and community.

Steven Graham is one of the show's creators and plays the boy's father.

Without saying too much, the four episode miniseries is excellent, start to finish and I highly recommend it.

Speaking of Adolescence, which is one of Netflix's most popular shows, there is already talk of the season two.

In addition to Graham's writing and producing the show, executive producer Brad Pitt's production company Plan B says they are interested in another season.

Plan B producer D.D. Gardner says they are looking to widen the aperture, stay true to its DNA and not be repetitive.

I'm going to go get my Hollywood to English Dictionary and look that up, but I think that sounds positive.

Sure, Harvey Weinstein was the face of the Me Too movement and a total creep.

But don't forget about Bugsy screenwriter James Tobak, who apparently was equally as horrible.

Tobak, who was one of the first names mentioned in the Me Too movement, was just ordered to pay 1.7 billion to 40 victims who testified at his seven day trial in New York.

Maybe he and Harvey can be soulmate. Whoops, I mean cellmates.

When she's not running into a fellow skier on the slopes and being taken to court or creating products called Goop,

Wenith Paltrow is the host of her own podcast, also called Goop.

The Shakespeare and Love Star was joined on the podcast by her husband since 2018 TV producer Brad Fulcher.

Paltrow made a point of saying he will join her on her podcast to talk about step parenting.

For more show of his fun, tune in to Nightlight with me, Peach Wabe, weeknights from 6 to 8 p.m. on the Civic Media Radio Network.

We have some really nice weather coming our way as we head into the weekend today.

Sunshine with a high in the low to mid fifties this afternoon.

Tonight partly cloudy into the low to mid thirties tomorrow.

Sunshine upper fifties to low sixties on Sunday, a few showers with a high in the upper fifties to low sixties.

I meteorologist Sean cable outside now. It's 35.

That's your W F H R N W I R I daily news roundup from Civic Media.

Subscribe to this podcast on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Find more news at W F H R dot com or West Country. That's W I S Country dot com.

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.