Good morning, I'm Wayne Mouser for Civic Media News.
A pilot from Colorado experienced mechanical problems and had to crash land in Marquette County on Sunday.
Officials with the Marquette County Sheriff's Office said a 911 call came in around 3.07 p.m.
Sunday from the pilot of a small airplane saying they were having mechanical problems and the plane was going down.
The plane then crashed in a marshy area along the shore of the Fox River west of Lake Puckaway in the town of Montello.
The pilot, the only person
on the plane was on their way from Erie, Colorado to Oshkosh for EAA Air Venture.
No injuries were reported and the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the crash.
Meanwhile, this year's EAA Air Venture at Whitman Regional Airport in Oshkosh, which gets underway today, will feature a lot of red, white and blue colors.
Bob Nelson has the story for Civic Media News.
Dick Nipinski of Air Venture says they're supporting the American 250 program, celebrating the country's 250th anniversary.
He says even NASA got into the spirit of things, bringing in some aircraft that decorated in patriotic fashion.
They're bringing in a couple of very interesting aircraft.
They painted an F-15 and an F-18 in America 250 colors, stars and stripes, that they are just gorgeous aircraft.
He says during AirVenture, Whitman Regional Airport becomes one of the busiest airports in the world, which can be a humbling experience for those seeing it for the first time.
There are more airplanes at Whitman Regional Airport than some countries have in their entire nation.
and they are just in awe.
And I can tell you, Bob, no one has ever come to AirVenture and turned to me and said, you know, it's smaller than I thought it would be.
Opening day highlights today include a big program by the Air Force, including the swearing-in of new recruits, and country star Tyler Hubbard will perform at theater in the woods.
I'm Pop Nelson for Civic Media News.
And the EAA AirVenture Cup race is postponed to today
due to wildfire smoke reducing visibility below the minimum required to compete.
Oshkosh firefighters responded to a fire on a coach bus on Interstate 41 southbound Saturday morning, about 8.42 a.m.
The fire was reported to be in a wheel area.
But when fire crews arrived, the passenger area of the bus was fully engulfed in fire.
All occupants were able to safely exit the bus.
No injuries or smoke inhalation were reported.
The bus is considered a total loss.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
The 21-year-old Rosendell Mann suspected of attacking a woman while she was
walking her one-year-old son on the Mescuton Trail last month is free on bond.
Miles Jeffrey Yeager posted a $200,000 cash bond during a hearing Friday in Fond du Lac County Court.
An effort by his lawyer to get the amount of bond reduced was rejected by Judge Andrew Christensen.
The judge did add some extra added conditions.
Yeager is not allowed to have contact with the victim, possess any dangerous weapons, drive, or be out in public without a parent present.
Yeager recently entered
guilty by reason of mental disease or defect police to the charges he's facing, a mental examination was ordered, a status conference in the case scheduled for September 17th.
Oshkosh police are looking for an 18-year-old Oshkosh man to question him about an incident in which a weapon was fired in the air.
Officers were dispatched to the 1200 block of Titan Court at 1.49 Thursday morning.
No one was injured by the gunfire.
Police are looking for Javion Stark, who was wanted on a
felony warrant by probation and parole.
He should be considered armed and dangerous.
The investigation is ongoing.
Anyone with information on his whereabouts is asked to call Oshkosh Police at 920-236-5700, option one.
The Chief Deputy for the Greenland County Sheriff's Office urges residents to practice safe boating no matter what type of watercraft they're using.
Recently, five children were involved in a collision between two personal watercrafts on Big Green Lake.
Two were injured, but are doing well now.
Chief Deputy Matt Vandicoke says, fortunately, all five are wearing personal flotation devices, which are always a good idea.
He also recommends carrying a kill switch with you for your boat in case someone accidentally ends up in the water.
Vandicoke also suggests operating your boat defensively if you're on a busy waterway because you never know what others are going to do
or if they're distracted.
Other tips include making sure your boat is operating properly before you hit the water.
You also urge those boaters to be sober if they're operating a watercraft.
I'm Wayne Mauser for Civic Media News.
This morning our guest is a Ryan Walshmit who is the Fond du Lac County Sheriff.
Good morning.
Good morning Bob.
So how did things go for the Sheriff's Department at the County Fair this past
week?
Oh it went pretty well.
You know the week started early on with a lot of heat, a lot of smoke unfortunately, but then we ended up having a really nice weekend for the big headliners and Friday night and Saturday night we had
great crowds, a lot better weather, it cooled off a little bit, the smoke cleared out a bit, and I don't know, you could probably hear it in my voice.
I still have a raspy voice from Talking Loud all night Saturday.
I was out there a couple times this week, but I was out there all day or all afternoon and evening Saturday until, well, until about 12.30 Sunday morning is when I left with the rest of the deputies that worked Saturday night for the big headliner, Trace Atkins.
Yeah, it was a great night, great fair, no significant major events, and we actually, aside from the smoke and the heat, we didn't have any big thunderstorms.
Usually we're due for one or two rounds of severe storms, which we never like to see, especially when there's large gatherings at the fair, but we didn't have that this year, so that was a good thing too.
But held off, there's possibility of that today, right?
There is, yeah, keep your eyes and ears open for weather reports today.
My phone already has, again, been giving me the alerts.
We're in an enhanced risk area, so we'll see what this afternoon or this evening brings, but stay tuned to the radio and keep your eyes and ears peeled for what may come later this afternoon.
All
right, one of the big topics continues to be the jail and a possible new justice center.
I believe the
County Board is going to get an update on what is it schematic designs tomorrow night?
Correct on their agenda tomorrow is the update from Venture Architects the architectural firm that they selected to do drawings and last month they heard from Tom Weber who was the independent consultant that they hired to do an analysis of the justice system in Fond du Lac County as well as
A independent bed count study for the size of the jail that you know and his expertise believes Should be built and or that should be considered by the county board So they received that comprehensive report last month.
That was well over an hour of his report and presentation and question and answers and You know, they asked a lot of great questions got a lot of information there got a I believe it's a 60 some page report.
I didn't
count them all but I read it all and so they got a very comprehensive analysis from him and this month it's just an update on the status of the drawings which is the phase that the county is in now and then after some drawings for both a downtown option across the street from the existing jail is one option being considered and then out on Scott Road by the highway department near 151 in Hickory
Interchange there is the other option or the other sites that is being proposed or being considered and so Cost estimates will be put together once those designs are done Operational costs meaning the staffing it will take to staff the two different designs.
They'll be very different designs Because across the street we're kind of limited with
the space we have to fit it within a city block.
So that'll be more of a vertical structure, multi-story structure, whereas out on Scott Road, it would be more of a horizontal structure, a pod style construction similar to the Green Lake County Jail and how that's laid out.
So we'll get those cost estimates from the consultants and then the County Board will move into the phase of
Discussing and deliberating that and then those community listening sessions.
I want to be sure to add that in there to that community listening sessions are very much in the plans and no decisions will be made until there are those listening sessions held all around the county and I'm confident that one of the areas that it will be held is likely the city of Ripon.
I know the county board wants to spread them across the county and hold multiple sessions so that people can easily access and don't have to travel long distances to get to those if they so choose and then also a informational website when the information is complete and available um you know numbers are put together there will be an informational website that'll be published as well that anybody can go to at any time to read up on the topic so
A lot more to come on that.
No decisions have been made and there will be big decisions moving forward to see how the County Board ultimately wants to proceed on that.
Another topic that I guess could affect the Sheriff's Office is the possible closing of the acute unit.
The County Board will consider that tomorrow evening and I guess a closing would be at the start of 2027.
How would that impact the Sheriff's Office?
Well, it impacts really every law enforcement agency in the county including the sheriff's office So all of us there's a process or procedure called an emergency detention when we encounter somebody who's in crisis that's typically it's suicidal and We we work with the acute unit staff to place them on an emergency detention if the acute unit
determines that that's the best placement for that person to keep them safe.
And so traditionally, we would take that patient, get them medically cleared at a hospital and then transfer them or transport them to the acute unit.
And again, every law enforcement agency does that.
But if it was a situation in the city of Rippon, for example, the Rippon Police Department would transport to the hospital and then ultimately to the acute unit.
And then on the sheriff's office end of things, obviously, if we take a call in the county where we have primary jurisdiction, we would do the same.
But then on the back end of those processes, those patients have the right to be heard in court and due process.
And so all of the court transports, regardless of where they were initially placed on that emergency detention, fall on the sheriff's office statutorily.
So even if it was a ripping
uh incident and rippin police department place them in the acute unit the sheriff's office is responsible for all of the court movement or transport after that and so uh and obviously too when rippin when those officers are tied up and they have to travel to the city of fondle act um to uh get somebody to the acute unit on their transport if another significant event happens in rippin and they need backup our sheriff's deputies are their primary
line a backup that would respond into the city to assist there too.
So law enforcement has a significant role in this, but the director of human services is who brought forward this proposal to close the acute unit.
I gotta make sure everybody's aware too that there is a behavioral health inpatient unit at St.
Agnes Hospital at SSM, just adjacent to the acute unit, literally across the parking lot.
And so there is still going to be a local unit that emergency detention patients are placed on or can be placed on.
And that's just that St.
Ignace Hospital instead of at the acute unit.
But the director of human services, as I said, was proposing this for a variety of reasons.
And she wants to kind of retool or remodel the behavioral health and the mental health help that she oversees as part of DHS in the county.
And she wants to kind of front load more resources toward getting people in crisis connected with resources sooner and try to catch them before they regress to the point of needing an emergency detention.
There's a lot of factors that go into it.
I've also heard, I'll just say this, it has nothing to do with the jail.
I've heard the rumors are out there and you see some of the comments online that they're closing the acute unit to save money to build a bigger jail and put those mental health patients in jail and incarcerate them instead of getting the mental health help.
That's completely false.
The two topics are completely unrelated in terms of
how this came forward, who moved it forward and proposed this, and it's the director herself that is proposing this.
So I know there will be a lot of discussion and deliberation among the board tomorrow night.
On this topic, I've had probably more conversations with county board supervisors reaching out to ask the same questions you did.
How does this affect law enforcement and our sheriff's office?
And I know they're weighing the options and
really digging into it to learn the facts and before so that they can make an informed decision Potentially tomorrow night.
It's on the agenda There is a resolution to close the unit which then as part of budget planning Which is upon us now as well the county has begun their budget planning process for the 2027 budget if the closure were to occur then the budget planning for
DHS looks differently because the funding that goes to the acute unit now would be repurposed to those other crisis resources to enhance those front-end crisis workers and So they're hoping to have an answer tomorrow, but I don't know what's what's going to happen It's in the hands of the county board and we'll see tomorrow night.
I'm sure like I said, there will be a lot of lively discussion and Questions and answers so
Well, we're out of time.
We always run out of time.
Never run out of
topics, but we always run out of time.
That's all right.
There's a lot, and I always appreciate the opportunity to be on your show and talk a little bit about what's going on.
Ryan, thank you for joining us this morning.
Appreciate your
time.
appreciate it, take care Bob.
We've been talking with the Fond du Lac County Sheriff Ryan Waldschmidt.
This morning our guest is a Ryan Walshmit who is the Fond du Lac County Sheriff.
Good morning.
Good morning Bob.
So how did things go for the Sheriff's Department at the County Fair this past
week?
Oh it went pretty well.
You know the week started early on with a lot of heat, a lot of smoke unfortunately, but then we ended up having a really nice weekend for the big headliners and Friday night and Saturday night we had
great crowds, a lot better weather, it cooled off a little bit, the smoke cleared out a bit, and I don't know, you could probably hear it in my voice.
I still have a raspy voice from Talking Loud all night Saturday.
I was out there a couple times this week, but I was out there all day or all afternoon and evening Saturday until, well, until about 12.30 Sunday morning is when I left with the rest of the deputies that worked Saturday night for the big headliner, Trace Atkins.
Yeah, it was a great night, great fair, no significant major events, and we actually, aside from the smoke and the heat, we didn't have any big thunderstorms.
Usually we're due for one or two rounds of severe storms, which we never like to see, especially when there's large gatherings at the fair, but we didn't have that this year, so that was a good thing too.
But held off, there's possibility of that today, right?
There is, yeah, keep your eyes and ears open for weather reports today.
My phone already has, again, been giving me the alerts.
We're in an enhanced risk area, so we'll see what this afternoon or this evening brings, but stay tuned to the radio and keep your eyes and ears peeled for what may come later this afternoon.
All
right, one of the big topics continues to be the jail and a possible new justice center.
I believe the
County Board is going to get an update on what is it schematic designs tomorrow night?
Correct on their agenda tomorrow is the update from Venture Architects the architectural firm that they selected to do drawings and last month they heard from Tom Weber who was the independent consultant that they hired to do an analysis of the justice system in Fond du Lac County as well as
A independent bed count study for the size of the jail that you know and his expertise believes Should be built and or that should be considered by the county board So they received that comprehensive report last month.
That was well over an hour of his report and presentation and question and answers and You know, they asked a lot of great questions got a lot of information there got a I believe it's a 60 some page report.
I didn't
count them all but I read it all and so they got a very comprehensive analysis from him and this month it's just an update on the status of the drawings which is the phase that the county is in now and then after some drawings for both a downtown option across the street from the existing jail is one option being considered and then out on Scott Road by the highway department near 151 in Hickory
Interchange there is the other option or the other sites that is being proposed or being considered and so Cost estimates will be put together once those designs are done Operational costs meaning the staffing it will take to staff the two different designs.
They'll be very different designs Because across the street we're kind of limited with
the space we have to fit it within a city block.
So that'll be more of a vertical structure, multi-story structure, whereas out on Scott Road, it would be more of a horizontal structure, a pod style construction similar to the Green Lake County Jail and how that's laid out.
So we'll get those cost estimates from the consultants and then the County Board will move into the phase of
Discussing and deliberating that and then those community listening sessions.
I want to be sure to add that in there to that community listening sessions are very much in the plans and no decisions will be made until there are those listening sessions held all around the county and I'm confident that one of the areas that it will be held is likely the city of Ripon.
I know the county board wants to spread them across the county and hold multiple sessions so that people can easily access and don't have to travel long distances to get to those if they so choose and then also a informational website when the information is complete and available um you know numbers are put together there will be an informational website that'll be published as well that anybody can go to at any time to read up on the topic so
A lot more to come on that.
No decisions have been made and there will be big decisions moving forward to see how the County Board ultimately wants to proceed on that.
Another topic that I guess could affect the Sheriff's Office is the possible closing of the acute unit.
The County Board will consider that tomorrow evening and I guess a closing would be at the start of 2027.
How would that impact the Sheriff's Office?
Well, it impacts really every law enforcement agency in the county including the sheriff's office So all of us there's a process or procedure called an emergency detention when we encounter somebody who's in crisis that's typically it's suicidal and We we work with the acute unit staff to place them on an emergency detention if the acute unit
determines that that's the best placement for that person to keep them safe.
And so traditionally, we would take that patient, get them medically cleared at a hospital and then transfer them or transport them to the acute unit.
And again, every law enforcement agency does that.
But if it was a situation in the city of Rippon, for example, the Rippon Police Department would transport to the hospital and then ultimately to the acute unit.
And then on the sheriff's office end of things, obviously, if we take a call in the county where we have primary jurisdiction, we would do the same.
But then on the back end of those processes, those patients have the right to be heard in court and due process.
And so all of the court transports, regardless of where they were initially placed on that emergency detention, fall on the sheriff's office statutorily.
So even if it was a ripping
uh incident and rippin police department place them in the acute unit the sheriff's office is responsible for all of the court movement or transport after that and so uh and obviously too when rippin when those officers are tied up and they have to travel to the city of fondle act um to uh get somebody to the acute unit on their transport if another significant event happens in rippin and they need backup our sheriff's deputies are their primary
line a backup that would respond into the city to assist there too.
So law enforcement has a significant role in this, but the director of human services is who brought forward this proposal to close the acute unit.
I gotta make sure everybody's aware too that there is a behavioral health inpatient unit at St.
Agnes Hospital at SSM, just adjacent to the acute unit, literally across the parking lot.
And so there is still going to be a local unit that emergency detention patients are placed on or can be placed on.
And that's just that St.
Ignace Hospital instead of at the acute unit.
But the director of human services, as I said, was proposing this for a variety of reasons.
And she wants to kind of retool or remodel the behavioral health and the mental health help that she oversees as part of DHS in the county.
And she wants to kind of front load more resources toward getting people in crisis connected with resources sooner and try to catch them before they regress to the point of needing an emergency detention.
There's a lot of factors that go into it.
I've also heard, I'll just say this, it has nothing to do with the jail.
I've heard the rumors are out there and you see some of the comments online that they're closing the acute unit to save money to build a bigger jail and put those mental health patients in jail and incarcerate them instead of getting the mental health help.
That's completely false.
The two topics are completely unrelated in terms of
how this came forward, who moved it forward and proposed this, and it's the director herself that is proposing this.
So I know there will be a lot of discussion and deliberation among the board tomorrow night.
On this topic, I've had probably more conversations with county board supervisors reaching out to ask the same questions you did.
How does this affect law enforcement and our sheriff's office?
And I know they're weighing the options and
really digging into it to learn the facts and before so that they can make an informed decision Potentially tomorrow night.
It's on the agenda There is a resolution to close the unit which then as part of budget planning Which is upon us now as well the county has begun their budget planning process for the 2027 budget if the closure were to occur then the budget planning for
DHS looks differently because the funding that goes to the acute unit now would be repurposed to those other crisis resources to enhance those front-end crisis workers and So they're hoping to have an answer tomorrow, but I don't know what's what's going to happen It's in the hands of the county board and we'll see tomorrow night.
I'm sure like I said, there will be a lot of lively discussion and Questions and answers so
Well, we're out of time.
We always run out of time.
Never run out of
topics, but we always run out of time.
That's all right.
There's a lot, and I always appreciate the opportunity to be on your show and talk a little bit about what's going on.
Ryan, thank you for joining us this morning.
Appreciate your
time.
appreciate it, take care Bob.
We've been talking with the Fond du Lac County Sheriff Ryan Waldschmidt.