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Category: politics

  • Monumental fight waged over national monuments

    If a tree falls at the Giant Sequoia National Monument in California, will a friend of Donald Trump get rich?

    This is the question that circulated on social media in late April, as Trump signed yet another executive order — this time directing Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review the designations of dozens of national monuments on federal lands.

    Trump signed the order April 26, three days before he both hit his 100-day mark — which he dismissed as “a ridiculous standard” — and faced renewed resistance in the form of another global protest, the People’s Climate March.

    The order could lead to the removal of protections enacted by Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama under the 1906 Antiquities Act, which authorizes presidents to declare federal lands as monuments to guard culturally or environmentally significant lands and waters from exploitation.

    Zinke accused prior presidents of using the Antiquities Act as a political tool, and Trump said he wanted to end “another egregious abuse of federal power.”

    However, environmentalists say he wants to open federal resources to plunderers.

    “Blowing up more than 100 years of bipartisan tradition to rob our kids of their natural legacy is shameful and sad,” said David Yarnold, president and CEO of the National Audubon Society. “These are places Americans hold in their hearts.”

    The order called for a review of 27 monuments — every area larger than 100,000 acres protected since 1996 — including:

    • Bears Ears National Monument in Utah, a 1.3 million-acre monument established by Obama near the end of his presidency.
    • Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument in Maine, designated by Obama in 2016 and the Atlantic Ocean’s first marine national monument, with 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains.
    • Giant Sequoia National Monument, which President Bill Clinton established in 2000 to expand the number of protected Sequoia groves.

    Timber companies want access to Sequoia. The commercial fishing industry wants access to Seamounts. And the energy industry wants in at Bears Ears, home to a million acres of land sacred to Native Americans.

    “Trump and the anti-public-lands zealots in Congress are plotting to destroy some of the country’s most stunning landscapes and cultural treasures,” said Randi Spivak, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s public lands program. “Their goal is to hand our public lands to corporations to mine, frack, bulldoze and clear-cut till there’s nothing left to dig up.”

    Offshore drilling

    Two days after signing the order requiring the monuments review, Trump signed another order aimed at expanding drilling in the Arctic and opening other federal areas to oil and gas exploration.

    “This executive order starts the process of opening offshore areas to job-creating energy exploration,” Trump said during the White House signing ceremony. “It reverses the previous administration’s Arctic leasing ban and directs Secretary Zinke to allow responsible development of offshore areas that will bring revenue to our treasury and jobs to our workers.”

    The president also directed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to conduct a review of marine monuments and sanctuaries designated over the past 10 years. This could directly impact efforts to protect resources in Lake Michigan.

    “Trump’s shortsighted order reverses climate progress and imperils coastal communities, irreplaceable wildlife and our shared future,” said Trip Van Noppen, president of Earthjustice. “We will go to court to enforce the law and ensure President Obama’s protections remain in place.”

    Did you know?

    National monument designations date to Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, and some of the nation’s most treasured national parks were first protected as monuments, including Grand Teton, Grand Canyon, Bryce, Zion, Acadia and Olympic.

    Note: This story was originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Climate change could collapse songbird population

    Birdwatchers in the Midwest know the Acadian flycatcher’s song goes “peet-sah, peet-sah.” But will birders a century from now know the call?

    New research from the University of Missouri suggests the common songbird is at risk of severe population decline within the century due to global warming.

    “The possibility that an abundant species could approach near-extinction from the region within 90 years clearly demonstrates the significant impact of a warming climate on songbird populations,” said Thomas Bonnot, an assistant research professor at the university’s School of Natural Resources.

    For years, the Audubon Society and other groups have warned of the impact of climate change on bird populations, especially species considered threatened.

    Bonnot’s research looks at a common species.

    He worked with a former adviser, Frank Thompson of the U.S. Forest Service, who has spent more than two decades researching the Acadian flycatcher, an olive and yellowish bird with a long and broad bill.

    They made projections from data on the effects of higher temperatures on breeding, running through the year 2100.

    The researchers found that a warming climate would have a severe impact on breeding, threatening the flycatcher population.

    If climate change continues at its current pace, the flycatcher’s breeding productivity would fall below 1 fledgling per female per year by 2100, according to the study published in the Nature Climate Change Journal.

    However, the research model shows that if greenhouse gas emissions are lowered and the course of climate change stabilizes, the future for the Acadian flycatcher improves.

    Bonnot said other common birds could face similar threats.

    Note: This story was originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Watershed campaign: Milwaukeeans unite behind water initiative

    For some Milwaukeeans, summer begins with a dance in the Summerfest water fountain during PrideFest.

    For others, it begins with a starry night paddle on the Milwaukee River or the first beach day.

    Water puts the sparkle in Milwaukee’s summers and helps define the city’s identity.

    “I live to be on the water,” says Bobby Lagerstrom, an avid kayaker and competitive swimmer. “That’s what brought me here. Milwaukee is a great water town.”

    In mid-May, Milwaukee Water Commons, a project of the Milwaukee Environmental Consortium, brought several hundred people together at the Best Place at the Historic Pabst Brewery for the Confluence Gathering. The event was the culmination of a two-year process involving 1,300 people and more than 30 groups interested in shaping a vision to make Milwaukee a model water city.

    “It was a very robust conversation,” said Milwaukee Water Commons executive director Ann Brummitt. “We talked to people about water — what matters, what are the issues, what are the concerns. And then we really asked people about a vision going forward.”

    Milwaukee Water Commons’ slogan is “Together, we’re shaping Milwaukee’s water future.” The nonprofit abides by these principles: Water is an essential element for all life on Earth. Water belongs to no one and cannot be owned. People have a responsibility to protect and preserve clean fresh water. Decisions about the care and use of water must involve everyone. And the Great Lakes are a gift, having “nurtured our ancestors and shaped us as a people and as a community. They continue to sustain us.”

    The group operates a water school that collaborates with other organizations on specific programs and cultivates neighborhood leadership. MWC also conducts town hall-style meetings and workshops and works with local artists.

    The Confluence Gathering provided the opportunity to launch six water initiatives under the “Water City Agenda.” The vision is for Milwaukee to:

    • Be a national leader in “blue-green” jobs. Work is underway to promote the blue-green economy in the city, but the scale needs to grow, according to Brummitt, who previously directed the Milwaukee River Greenway Coalition and worked as a school teacher.

    • Make safe, clean and affordable tap water available to every Milwaukeean. A chief concern in Milwaukee, as it is nationally, is aging pipes. “While our tap water that comes out of Milwaukee Water Works is very good, by the time it gets to your kitchen faucet, there’s a chance of lead,” Brummitt said.

    • Advance green infrastructure practices across the city. “There’s a lot of really good energy going into this goal already,” according to Brummitt, who said elements in new developments might include rain gardens and green roofs, bioswales and curb cuts.

    • Make Milwaukee’s three rivers and Lake Michigan swimmable and fishable.

    • Offer every Milwaukeean meaningful water experiences. Brummitt made this observation: For all the sailing, kayaking, swimming, fishing and strolling that takes place in Milwaukee, there are children in the city who’ve never been to one of the rivers.

    • Celebrate local waters in arts and culture.

    “There’s a lot of work to be done,” said Brummitt. “As strong as our water culture is, we’re still losing ground. We can’t keep pace with the environmental degradation. So that’s where we felt there was room to bring in more people and more perspective. Everybody has something to say about the future of water in Milwaukee.”

    In the coming months, think tanks will be established to tackle each initiative and, Aug. 7, an annual H20 happening — We Are Water — will be held at Bradford Beach on the Lake Michigan shore.

    Institutional partners in carrying out the Water City Agenda include the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee School of Freshwater Sciences and the Metropolitan Milwaukee Sewerage District.

    “The science is there, the tools are available and our water policy researchers are ready to help turn these transformative ideas into reality,” Jenny Kehl, director of the Center for Water Policy at UW-M, said in a news statement.

    Nonprofit partners in the campaign include leading environmental groups, as well as community and neighborhood organizations such as Alice’s Garden, a nonprofit in the Johnsons Park neighborhood.

    “The work Milwaukee Water Commons has taken on is some of the most important work this city will do,” said Venice Williams, director of Alice’s Garden. “It is about preserving the dignity of the ancestral waters of Lake Michigan. It is also about helping every human being who quenches their thirst, bathes their body, rinses their clothes, mops their floors, enjoys their cup of tea to understand one cannot exist without water.”

    A sister project, with a regional focus, is the Great Lakes Commons, and organizers in other Great Lakes cities, specifically Toronto and Cleveland, are at work employing the “commons” concept.

    “When we started this work, we started to look and see if there was a model for this kind of thing,” said Brummitt. “But there just isn’t a well established framework for a water city. This is our foray into creating that. It will be developed. That’s coming. We’re shaping the agenda in Milwaukee.”

    Become a commoner

    For more information or to get involved with Milwaukee Water Commons, visit milwaukeewatercommons.org.

    Save the date

    On Aug. 7, Milwaukee Water Commons will present We Are Water 2016, a communitywide celebration at the north end of Bradford Beach. The event will feature song and dance, artwork and spoken word, and the creation of a large, illuminated image of the Great Lakes in the sand.

    In related news …

    Carpenter raises concerns for pipeline spills

    Wisconsin Sen. Tim Carpenter, D-Milwaukee, asked U.S. Sens. Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson to join with U.S. Sens. Gary Peters and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan to make sure the Department of Transportation classifies underwater pipelines in and around the Great Lakes as “offshore” facilities.

    Why? Carpenter said under federal law cleanup for “onshore” facilities is capped at $634 million but “offshore” facilities must have resources to cover all costs.

    If there were a spill in the water from the pipeline that’s transporting 23 million gallons of crude oil and liquid gas daily, the cleanup could be $1 billion. The pipeline crosses the Straits of Mackinac, connecting Lake Michigan and Lake Huron.

    “Our incentives should be to protect the waters and avoid economic catastrophe of spills,” Carpenter said.

    — WiG

  • Decoding your life, growing family trees with DNA tests

    You’re not who you think you are, and now science can prove it.

    Individuals might have genes from ancestors who practiced discrimination as well as genes from the people against whom they discriminated.

    As gay poet Walt Whitman wrote in 1855, “I am large. I contain multitudes.”

    Today, with a little spit and about $200, millions of people are learning about the multitude of ancestors embodied in their DNA. Through personal genomic testing, they’re gaining unprecedented insights into themselves and their family histories.

    People are also reaching a better understanding of how they connect to one another. Simply looking at our ancestral composition map elicits a feeling of connectedness as a species.

    “You can find out if you’re part Irish, Scandinavian, Cameroonian or one of the other 23 ethnicities. And you might even discover cousins you never knew you had,” AncestryDNA says in its promotion inviting people to test the test sold by Ancestry, the parent of Ancestry.com.

    While the world seems to be divided along racial, ethnic and geographic lines, our genes tell a story of just how connected humans are on planet Earth. Diversity resides in harmony within all of us.

    “What do the 23 pairs of chromosomes in your DNA say about you?” teases 23andMe, Ancestry.com’s chief rival in the consumer market and the maker of probably the best-known home DNA test kit.

    With these the tests, people around the world are gaining new perspectives on their personalities and their health. And, many are getting surprises — large and small — with their results.

    One member of WiG’s extended family took the test and learned that the family trees buried in a memory box at the back of her closet contain errors and are vastly incomplete, while the family crests her dad’s been buying over the years apparently belong to someone else’s family.

    Using 23andMe, she learned that she’s 0.8 percent Middle Eastern/North African, less than 0.1 percent East Asian/Native American and 99.1 percent European.

    The analysis of her European ancestry shows her to be: 94.1 percent northwestern European, including 49.1 percent British/Irish; 15.4 percent French/German; 2.3 percent Scandinavian; 0.1 percent Finnish; and 28 percent “broadly Northwestern European.”

    She has 289 Neanderthal variants, which is more than 69 percent of other 23andMe customers, but her Neanderthal ancestry accounts for less than 4 percent of her overall DNA.

    Laura Weber of Green Bay took the test last year and found that Neanderthal ancestry accounts for less than 3 percent of her overall DNA.

    “I learned that I’m not 100 percent German, which my mom led me to believe for 56 years,” Weber said.

    On Mother’s Day, Weber said she might ask her mom to take the test, just to be certain she’s her mom.

    She was joking, but people who use 23andMe and AncestryDNA can make life-changing discoveries.

    How it works

    Here’s how 23andMe testing and analysis works:

    A kit is purchased online for about $200 and, soon after, a small box containing instructions and a vial is delivered. This is the “home-based saliva collection kit.”

    An account is created on 23andMe.com and the unique identifier code that arrived with the kit is registered with the account.

    Then, taking care to rinse out the mouth first, the customer spits into the vial, places the sample in a plastic bag that’s tucked into the box and ships the package — postage pre-paid — to the lab.

    After that, there’s a wait until one day an email arrives with a notice that the analysis is complete and the results are ready.

    The customer signs on to 23andMe.com to dive in and learn about his or her genetic code. An individual’s 23 pairs of chromosomes provide a lot of information about ancestry, health and traits. There are reports for:

    • Ancestry composition and maternal and paternal lineage, probably the first batch of information viewed by a new customer.

    • Wellness research for lifestyle choices, including research about lactose intolerance, muscle composition, sleep movement, and caffeine consumption.

    • Traits, from physical attributes to food preferences. Traits include: asparagus odor detection, bitter taste perception, cheek dimples, cleft chin, earlobe type, earwax type, eye color, finger length ratio, freckles, hair curliness, hair loss, reflex, toe-length ratio, and widow’s peaks.

    • Carrier status and inherited conditions, including for cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, hereditary hearing loss.

    For a couple of years, 23andMe couldn’t provide health-related information in the United States by order of the Food and Drug Administration. The government’s concern was that the information might lead people to take steps to mitigate serious diseases that they don’t have — or to ignore symptoms assuming they can’t have an illness.

    Last year, 23andMe launched a new user experience, which provides carrier status, wellness, traits and ancestry reports

    “My family did it for Christmas,” said Kevin Laws of Madison. “It really was pretty cool.”

    Growing knowledge base

    Laws, who has a background in chemistry, said he’s most interested in the health information and taking the 23andMe surveys to further research. People take the test and then take online surveys linked to scientific studies, which grows the knowledge base.

    There’s a broad range of surveys.

    Earlier this year, a study based on a 23andMe survey was published in Nature Communications and identified 15 locations in DNA associated with “morningness.”

    “In this study, we set out to discover more about an individual’s preference toward rising and were able to identify the genetic associations with ‘morningness,’ as well as ties to lifestyle patterns and other traits,” said Youna Hu, the lead author on the paper. “This type of study speaks to the power of the 23andMe database, which can yield genetic insights into a variety of conditions and traits and potentially (show) how those genetic factors are affected by behavior and environment.”

    The study of more than 89,000 customers found that seven of the loci associated with “morningness” are near genes previously known to be involved in the circadian rhythm.

    Additionally, the study found 56 percent of those surveyed considered themselves night owls. Women and adults over age 60 are more likely to be morning people, and morning people are less likely to suffer from insomnia or need eight hours of sleep each day.

    Weber said she’s a morning person. Laws is an owl.

    “The beauty of 23andMe is the ability to conduct research on common traits like being a lark or a night owl, which affect everyone, yet typically wouldn’t receive funding for a study,” said 23andMe senior scientist David Hinds, a co-author of the paper. “With the information we have, we can uncover the genetics behind a variety of conditions and diseases, and hopefully reach a better understanding of how we differ from one another.”

    In addition to accessing reports and taking surveys, customers on 23andMe, which partners with MyHeritage.com, can opt to share their genetic fingerprints, which allows for relatives — close and distant — to connect with them.

    Customers also can learn ancestral compositions and build family trees using Ancestry.com and its AncestryDNA autosomal DNA test, which costs about $100.

    Branching out

    Using MyHeritage and Ancestry.com, a person can grow a family tree from a sapling to a redwood overnight.

    Both websites offer tools to search billions of historical records, find archival photos, collect newspaper articles and bookmark histories.

    When MyHeritage and 23andMe announced their collaboration, MyHeritage CEO Gilad Japhet said, “Combining genealogy with DNA-based ancestry is the next evolution in uncovering family history. DNA testing can connect you to relatives you never knew existed, who descend from shared ancestors centuries ago. … Family trees and historical records are critical to map and fully understand these connections.”

    Laws said he was surprised to find a marriage record showing he had great-great-grandparents, who married in their teens. Weber said she was thrilled to come across a census account showing 12 people in her family lived together during World War II in an apartment on Chicago’s West Side.

    The services also can do the work of building a tree, which makes adding ancestors as easy as making friends on Facebook.

    “The next thing for me is to find out who all these people were,” said Laws, whose tree currently goes back to 1587. “Right now, they are names and dates and some bits of information.”

    Polling conducted by Ancestry.com for its Global Family History Report found that Americans would prefer to find they are descendants of explorers, royalty, Mayflower travelers and Revolutionary and Civil War veterans. That could explain why one WiG staffer knew two people who claimed to have learned from psychics that they were the reincarnation of Cleopatra. The ensuing feud over who was the real Egyptian queen ended their friendship.

    Genetic science, unlike psychics, tells the truth, which often is less glamorous. Most people learn they descend from World War II vets, immigrants and entrepreneurs.

    And Americans, the polling found, would prefer not to find thieves, drunkards or murderers in their family tree.

    Though Laws said he wouldn’t mind a thief if he left a fortune.

    DNA USA

    An early 23andMe study examined what DNA reveals about the U.S. population, migration and the rate of “ancestry mixing” among populations.

    The research, led by Katarzyna Bryc, showed the signature of historical migrations in the United States can be found in the DNA of today’s population.

    • About 3.5 percent of European Americans have 1 percent or more African ancestry.

    • European Americans with African ancestry are found at much higher rates in the southern states.

    • The highest levels of African ancestry among self-reported African Americans are found in the southern states, especially South Carolina and Georgia.

    • One in every 20 African Americans has Native American ancestry.

    • Among self-reported Latinos in the United States, those from the South and Southwest have the highest percentage of Native American ancestry.

    — Lisa Neff

    Did you know?

    National DNA Day is observed annually on April 25 to celebrate the discovery of DNA’s double helix in 1953 and the completion of the Human Genome Project in 2003. This year, the National Human Genome Research Institute celebrated with a series of events.

  • Massive environmental march a prelude to U.N. meeting

    The alarm has sounded for years. Now, a draft U.N. report on the environment warns that global warming is here, caused by people, unquestionably dangerous and possibly irreversible.

    With this news, activists from across the country will converge on New York City on Sept. 21 for what could become the largest climate change march in history — the People’s Climate March.

    “Thousands of people from across the world, from all walks of life, will stand as one calling for global climate action,” said Frances Beinecke of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “This event will show the world’s most powerful leaders that people are united in their support of this cause and want to see ambitious climate action today. It is time for world leaders to rise to the challenge.”

    In late August, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change circulated the draft of a 127-page report on the state and the future of the planet. “Continued emission of greenhouse gases will cause further warming and long-lasting changes in all components of the climate system, increasing the likelihood of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts for people and ecosystems,” the paper states.

    The report warns that if the world continues to pump greenhouse gases at an accelerating rate, it’s likely that by mid-century temperatures will increase by about another 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit compared to temperatures from 1986 to 2005. And by the end of the century, that scenario will bring temperatures that are about 6.7 degrees warmer.

    “Climate change is the crisis of our times,” said Bridget Burns, advocacy and communications director of the Women’s Environment and Development Organization. “For too long now, political posturing, greed and complacency in ‘business as usual’ has taken precedent over justice, equality, action and ambition. But change is not something which you wait for, it’s something that you make happen.”

    WEDO is one of the many organizations involved in the march, which is being held to demand action from world leaders who, in the fal,l will begin 18 months of international negotiations. Climate negotiators will meet in New York and Copenhagen this fall, then head to Peru in December to work on a global climate deal. In September 2015, world leaders will again meet in New York to adopt the Sustainable Development Goals. Three months later, leaders will gather in Paris to negotiate a climate treaty.

    Some 750 groups — from the largest transit workers union in New York City to a coalition of Buddhist monks — are involved in staging the march.

    The scale of organizing rivals a major electoral campaign, with thousands of volunteers, daily phone-banks and canvases in New York City, and a major online operation to turn out people for the march that begins at Columbus Circle.

    Trains and hundreds of buses are bringing people to New York, including dedicated trains from San Francisco and D.C. and buses from multiple points outside of New York, including Madison. Much of the recruitment is taking place on college campuses.

    “Young people are coming to the streets of New York in huge numbers to stand up and say we’ve had enough — we’re not going to sit back and wait for politicians to save our future,” said Adam Hasz of the environmental group SustainUS. “Instead, we’re on the front lines fighting extractive industries and proposing just policies to confront climate change and its impacts on the most vulnerable. The People’s Climate March will show that a better future is not only possible, but underway.”

    In August, at a warehouse in Bushwick, artists were at work creating giant sculptures, floats and banners for the march. Others were designing posters for a subway campaign.

    “The energy buzzing around the march organizing headquarters here in New York is palpable,” said May Boeve, executive director of the activist group 350.org. “Every day, volunteers are hitting the phones, streets and Internet to turn people out. …This effort has already helped build the type of movement infrastructure we need to take the climate fight to the next level.”

    Hundreds of events coincide with the NYC march: 

    • In New Delhi, people will take to the streets on Sept. 20 to demand a renewable energy revolution.

    • In Australia, organizers are expecting hundreds of individual events to take place across the country.

    • In London, groups are planning a march through the city to the steps of Parliament.

    • In Berlin, three parallel marches will combine forces in a festival.

    • In Paris, local groups will create the Paris Marche pour le Climat, with parades, marches and bicycle rides planned across the bridges of the Seine.

    • Events are also being organized in Kathmandu, Rio, Sao Paulo, Jakarta, Dublin, Manila, Seoul, Mumbai, Istanbul, Ghana, Kenya, DRC, Nigeria, Guinea and Johannesburg.

    Marching out of Madison

    Activists with 350 Madison are organizing a Wisconsin contingent for the People’s Climate March in New York on Sept. 21.

    “We will bring our message that Wisconsin is becoming a major battleground in the fight against climate change,” said a statement from the grassroots environmental group.

    350 Madison said utilities in Wisconsin are proposing “billing schemes that are a huge detriment to renewable energy and energy efficiency” and that the Canadian company Enbridge Energy “plans to expand the Line 61 pipeline, which traverses our beautiful state from Superior to Delavan, to carry more toxic tar sands than what the controversial Keystone XL pipeline would carry.”

    The grassroots group also raised concerns for “trains, carrying the potentially explosive Bakken oil,” traveling through many Wisconsin communities.

    Get connected

    For more information, details on travel scholarships or to purchase tickets for the bus trip from Madison to New York City, go online to http://350madison.wordpress.com/upcoming-events/peoples-climate-march-nyc/.

  • Saving time: Is time running out on daylight saving time?

    Is time running out on daylight saving time?

    Ask a group of students waiting in the dark for a school bus their opinion of daylight saving time, and some will say, “What’s that?” Others might shrug and reply, “Whatever.” “Meh.”

    Ask a group of adults around the workplace coffee maker about springing forward and falling back and one may mention that she appreciates the opportunity to play 18 holes of golf after work in May. But the others will likely offer a litany of complaints about late starts, missed commitments, groggy afternoons and sleepless nights. And there’s a good chance farmers will get blamed for the time change, even though the farming community has opposed daylight saving time for about a century or more.

    In most of the United States, people will dial back the clocks one hour at 2 a.m. on Nov. 2, when daylight saving time ends. And they’ll wonder why.

    A Rasmussen Report survey this year found that just 33 percent of Americans think DST is worth the hassle, a decline from 37 percent in 2013 and 45 percent in 2012. The same survey found that 48 percent of Americans say the clock-changing ritual is not worthwhile.

    Meanwhile, petitions on Change.org to either abolish DST or establish year-round DST get endorsed with the type of vigor and venom usually associated with such hot-button topics as the minimum wage, abortion rights and marriage equality.

    Historians and policy experts say the debate: Does daylight saving time conserve or waste energy? Harm health or expand recreational opportunity? Reduce or raise the risk of traffic accidents? — has been going tick-tock for about a century.

    People can’t even agree on who gets the credit or blame for daylight saving time.

    Ben Franklin wrote about the concept of making the sun set an hour later to conserve candles. But the first widespread implementation of daylight saving time didn’t occur until World War I in an effort to conserve energy. The theory was that the demand for artificial illumination would be less during lighter evenings.

    Congress reinstated daylight saving time during World War II, but after that, with no federal law mandating DST, states and localities determined for themselves whether to implement time changes.

    Wisconsin didn’t warm up to DST until the late 1950s. Milwaukee had flirted with DST in the 1920s, but opposition was so strong elsewhere that lawmakers passed a measure mandating standard time throughout the state and establishing penalties — fines and jail time — for rogue time-changers in Milwaukee.

    Wisconsin continued to oppose daylight saving time during the war years, going so far as to suggest the state shift to Mountain Time, according to William F. Thompson, author of Continuity and Change, 1940-1965: History of Wisconsin. In 1947, Wisconsin voters defeated 379,740 to 313,091 an advisory referendum proposing a post-war period of statewide daylight saving time. Rural counties voted 4-1 against DST.

    “The time change was a sore spot for farmers,” said Darcie Patterson, who grew up on a farm in Waupaca County. “Dad said putting the clocks forward in the spring messed with milking the cows and also getting out in the fields because they were still wet with dew in the mornings.”

    In 1957, with a population shift to the cities and more than half the states observing DST, Wisconsin voters approved a ballot measure 55-45 percent to institute DST statewide. Another decade ticked away before Congress passed the Uniform Time Act. Congress voted to extend daylight saving time during the 1970s energy crisis, and lengthened DST in 1986, during the Reagan administration, and again in 2005, during the Bush administration.

    Backed by some national studies and research out of California, political advocates cite energy conservation as the chief reason for the time change, but other studies reveal flaws in the argument. An investigation conducted in Indiana showed an increase in electrical bills after the state shifted to DST — residential demand for artificial lighting dropped but demand for air-conditioning increased.

    “Policy that reduces energy consumption is important, but there’s a lot of debate about daylight saving time. We certainly don’t live like we did in 1944,” said Patterson, a supporter of the environmental group Earth Action. “Daylight saving time really isn’t about energy policy anymore, if it ever really was. You know, gasoline consumption actually tracks up during daylight saving time.”

    This might explain why lobbying for daylight saving time comes from the retail, tourism and recreation industries, not from environmental groups. When the federal government extended DST in the 1980s, 7-Eleven and Clorox, parent company of Kingsford Charcoal, provided funding for the Daylight Saving Time Coalition. The Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association and the National Association of Convenience Stores drove the more recent extension. Why? Because setting the clock ahead in the spring expands evening recreation, barbecue enthusiasts can fire up the grill and golfers can hit the links even on a weekday night.

    This leads some to say that daylight saving time boosts health and wellness.

    However, research reveals that the time change can adversely impact health:

    • A Better Sleep Council survey found that about 61 percent of adults feel the effects of DST the Monday after resetting their clocks.

    • From the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Dr. David Plante, an expert in sleep disorders, said the time changes in the spring and fall could disrupt sleep controls, causing something akin to jet lag. People with sleep disorders can suffer even more.

    • Research released in 2012 from the University of Alabama-Birmingham revealed an increase of 10 percent in the risk of heart attack on Monday and Tuesday after DST begins and a decrease by about 10 percent in the days immediately after DST ends in the fall. Study author Martin Young, in a statement with the study, said, “Exactly why this happens is not known, but there are several theories. Sleep deprivation, the body’s circadian clock and immune responses all can come into play when considering reasons that changing the time by an hour can be detrimental to someone’s health.”

    • A study from Stanford University analyzed 21 years of traffic data and showed a small but statistically significant increase in fatal traffic accidents on the Sunday after a time change, even more so after the fall change.

    • However, a review of data by the Rand Corporation suggested no impact on automobile crashes in the short-term and, in the long run, a drop in vehicular-pedestrian accidents and a decline of as much as 10 percent in vehicular crashes after DST was expanded from the last Sunday to the first Sunday in April in 1986.

    • Studies on crime rates and DST also conflict. The research seems inconclusive.

    With questions about the pros and cons, Colorado, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and especially Utah are re-evaluating daylight saving time. Arizona and Hawaii are the only states that do not observe DST.

    Utah lawmakers could propose legislation next session to end or permanently establish DST — or take the issue to the voters. Earlier this year, the state invited public comment and found 62 percent in favor of eliminating daylight saving time.

    “Recreation enthusiasts argue that the springtime change brings tourism and recreation dollars into the state coffers and farmers and ranchers have more daylight to complete their work,” Utah state Rep. Ronda Menlove stated. “However, parents and educators argue that the change has a negative impact on student learning at a critical point in the school year, when end-of-level tests are administered. Public safety officials note an increase in accidents at each change of time. This issue needs to be properly weighed and debated.”

    So,  the age-old debate continues, especially around the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November. Expect the conversation to begin on schedule, right after someone asks, “Is that old time or new time?”

  • Change of season for resistance activists

    Rise up.

    Move on.

    Forward Indivisibles.

    Progressive activists challenging the policies of the Trump administration and the GOP agenda are transitioning from a summer campaign to a fall initiative — and they’re recruiting.

    “It was a long, hectic summer, but something tells me it’s going to get even hotter when Congress returns to work,” said Jessie Sanchez, who joined in a Labor Day protest march in Milwaukee. “We need all the people we can muster.”

    Sanchez said he participated in protests this summer organized by Voces de la Frontera, MoveOn and Indivisible chapters in Wisconsin and Illinois.

    “In the political world, we can make a world of difference,” he said.

    In the weeks before Labor Day, progressive activists in Wisconsin and elsewhere engaged in a “resistance recess,” a series of actions focused on reaching members of Congress on recess and back home. Protesters converged on district offices, packed town halls, and, when representatives refused to hold open forums, activists staged their own.

    Among their goals were holding accountable the lawmakers who voted for legislation that would have repealed the Affordable Care Act, encouraging support for Medicare for all, and demanding censure of the president for failing to denounce white supremacy.

    DACA demands and Trump’s response

    Over the Labor Day weekend, grassroots activists in Wisconsin and elsewhere staged a series of actions urging the president and Congress to make permanent the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. The Obama-era program shields young immigrants — dubbed “dreamers” — from deportation and makes it possible for them to work legally in the U.S.

    Almost as if in response, the Trump administration announced Sept. 5 the end of DACA — then challenged Congress to do something.

    In Racine, near House Speaker Paul Ryan’s district office, young immigrants went on a hunger strike Sept. 1, demanding the Republican leader support legislation to make DACA permanent without further militarization of the border.

    “If DACA is rescinded, I and 800,000 others will be robbed of the ability to contribute to our communities, and we will be at immediate risk of deportation along with our families,” said Valeria Ruiz, an organizer with Voces de la Frontera and Youth Empowered in the Struggle. “Ryan must urge the president to keep DACA, and he must support legislation to make DACA permanent without giving in to white supremacist mass deportation demands.”

    Ryan, during a radio interview Sept. 1, did encourage Trump not to kill the program before a way forward is designed: “These are kids who know no other country, who were brought here by their parents and don’t know another home,” he said, adding that he preferred a legislative solution to the dreamers’ future.

    The dreamers’ hunger strike, coordinated by Voces de la Frontera and Youth Empowered in the Struggle, launched five days of actions in Wisconsin, including the occupation of Monument Square in Racine, a Labor Day march in Milwaukee, and another march on Sept. 5.

    Time to fight for $15

    The marchers also walked in support of the Fight for $15, a national campaign for a higher minimum wage. Cooks and cashiers from McDonald’s, Burger King and other restaurants walked off their jobs on Labor Day to join the march in Milwaukee and other major U.S. cities.

    “Rampant racism. Wage cuts. Attacks on unions. It’s time to fight back,” read a statement from the Fight for $15 campaign.

    Other groups bringing activists to Labor Day actions included the United We Dream immigrant rights effort, MoveOn.org, affiliates of the 350.org environmental organization, and Indivisible chapters.

    The Indivisible chapters formed following Trump’s inauguration and the release of Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda, a Google Doc outlining how to engage politically.

    About 6,000 groups are registered as Indivisible affiliates, including 112 groups in Wisconsin.

    For months, Indivisible has provided regular “to-dos” to subscribers to newsletters. A recent weekly advisory — issued under the subject “the sun sets on August recess” — instructed “Dear Indivisibles” to defend DACA, speak against Trump’s ban on transgender troops joining the military, oppose Trump’s warmongering, join in a Facebook Live forum against white supremacy, and support progressive groups assisting Hurricane Harvey survivors.

    The post-Labor Day “weekly Indivisible to-dos” encouraged “Dear Indivisibles” to show up for dreamers, respond to Harvey, stay vigilant on ACA, stop Trump’s tax scam giving massive tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations and stop Trump from starting war with North Korea.

    “Together, we will win,” the Indivisible team wrote — in solidarity.

    On the web

    For more on local Indivisible groups, visit indivisibleguide.com/act-locally.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Ride on: Public transportation use reaches 57-year high, but not in Wisconsin

    Ride on: Public transportation use reaches 57-year high, but not in Wisconsin

    Americans took 10.7 billion trips on public transportation in 2013, which is the highest annual public transit ridership number in 57 years.

    “Americans in growing numbers want to have more public transit services in their communities,” said American Public Transit Association board chair Peter Varga, who also is the CEO of The Rapid transit system in Grand Rapids, Mich. “Public transportation systems nationwide — in small, medium and large communities — saw ridership increases. Some reported all-time high ridership numbers.”

    But the trend didn’t carry over to Wisconsin: Madison’s system reported a slight bump in bus use, an increase of 1.02 percent, but Port Washington reported a decrease of 2.78 percent. Milwaukee reported a decrease of 2.36 percent and Racine’s system reported a 3.7 percent drop in bus ridership, according to APTA.

    The public transit agencies reporting record ridership in 2013 included Ann Arbor, Mich.; Cleveland; Denver; Espanola, N.M.; Flagstaff, Ariz.; Fort Myers, Fla.; Indianapolis; Los Angeles; New Orleans; Oakland, Calif.; Pompano Beach, Fla.; Riverside, Calif.; Salt Lake City; San Carlos, Calif.; Tampa, Yuma, Ariz.; and New York City.

    Ridership was up 37.2 percent since 1995, outpacing population growth, which was up 20.3 percent, and outpacing vehicle miles, which was up 22.7 percent since 1995.

    “There is a fundamental shift going on in the way we move about our communities. People in record numbers are demanding more public transit services and communities are benefiting with strong economic growth,” said APTA president and CEO Michael Melaniphy. “Access to public transportation matters. Community leaders know that public transportation investment drives community growth and economic revitalization.”

    Another reason behind the ridership increases is the economic recovery in certain areas. When more people are employed, public transportation ridership increases — nearly 60 percent of the trips taken on public transportation are for work commutes, according to the APTA.

    In the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’s most recent report, Wisconsin ranked 35th in job creation.

    “The federal investment in public transit is paying off and that is why Congress needs to act this year to pass a new transportation bill,” said Melaniphy.

    The report showed:

    • Bus ridership increased by 3.8 percent in cities with populations below 100,000. Nationally, bus ridership in communities of all sizes remained stable.

    • Large bus systems with increases were reported by Washington, D.C., Houston, Cincinnati and Seattle.

    • Subway and elevated train ridership increased by 2.8 percent across the country as eight out of 15 transit systems reported increases.

    • Commuter rail ridership increased by 2.1 percent across the country, with 20 out of 28 transit systems reporting increases. With a new rail line that opened in December 2012, commuter rail in Salt Lake City saw an increase of 103.3 percent. Meanwhile, double-digit increases were reported in Austin, Texas; Harrisburg-Philadelphia; Anchorage, Alaska; Lewisville, Texas; Stockton, Calif.; Minneapolis, Minn.; and Portland, Ore.

    • For light rail — modern streetcars, trolleys and heritage trolleys — ridership increased 1.6 percent in 2013 with 17 out of 27 transit systems reporting increases.

    Wisconsin lags

    As for public transportation bus trips, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation says there’s been a decline from 76.4 million in 2000 to 65.7 million in 2012.

    Transportation experts cite state funding cuts as a reason for the decline.

    Al Stanek, parking and transit systems manager for Racine, said state cuts led the Belle Urban System to raise its fares but reduce its bus service hours by more than 10 percent in two years. “In the middle of the day, we went to buses running just once an hour,” he said. “It’s about the bare minimum you can provide service. If you missed the bus, now you’d be standing out in the cold for an hour, an hour and a half.”

    Milwaukee County avoided cuts in bus service with a federal grant that runs out this year, said Brendan Conway, spokesman for Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele. But the county already had been raising fares and cutting services for more than a decade. Buses in the Milwaukee area travel 22 percent fewer miles than they did in 2000.

    Wisconsin also discourages commuters with its lack of rail service and rapid transit, said Rob Henken, president of the Public Policy Forum. Rail services showed the biggest gains in ridership in the APTA report, he noted.

    Republican Gov. Scott Walker killed a high-speed rail project planned under former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle to connect Madison and Milwaukee.

    To deal with the decline in service, a group of 15 state senators has introduced bills aimed at improving public transportation in the state. The proposals would:

    • Require the DOT to submit a state rail plan every two years.

    • Increase state aid for each class of mass transit systems in the state and restore transit cuts made in 2011.

    • Require the DOT to establish a transit capital assistance program.

    • Increase funding for the specialized transportation assistance program.

    Sponsoring state Sen. Mark Miller, D-Monona, said, “Transit plays such a critical role in the vitality of our communities. The direct benefit to public transit users is enormous. For many Wisconsin residents, their only means of getting to a job, to go to a store or to the polls is by public transit.”

    The AP contributed to this report.

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  • Wisconsin Assembly votes to lift barrier to new nukes

    “No nukes now. No nukes probably forever,” says environmental activist Kevin Moore.

    Moore, in the late 1980s, went to jail as a protester seeking to block the licensing of nuclear power plants.

    He’s remained active since. And, like many no-nuke demonstrators who committed to the cause in the late 1970s and 1980s, he’s baffled by the current campaign to build new plants.

    “Did I miss something?” the 72-year-old activist asked. “Did they figure out what to do with the waste?”

    The answer is no.

    Yet, the Wisconsin Assembly has passed AB 384, which would remove a barrier to building new nuclear plants enacted in 1983, four years after a meltdown at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania and three years before the explosion and fire at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine. Current state law prohibits new plants until a federal storage facility for nuclear waste is constructed.

    A Senate committee held a hearing on its version of the pro-nuclear bill, SB288, on Jan. 5, but had not voted on the measure when WiG went to press.

    Republican state Rep. Kevin Petersen, in a memo introducing the bill, described nuclear power as affordable, clean, safe and necessary.

    Proponents also argue Wisconsin needs nuclear options to comply with the Obama administration’s clean power plan, requiring energy producers to reduce carbon emissions.

    But opponents say that’s a false argument.

    “Nuclear energy is a distraction from realistic, cost-effective methods to reduce carbon emissions in Wisconsin: energy efficiency and renewable energy,” the Clean Wisconsin environmental group said in a statement on AB 384. “Nuclear is exorbitantly expensive and new plants take decades to get up and running.”

    The Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters refers to AB 384 as the “Nuking Wisconsin’s Energy Priorities Law” and has urged members to lobby their legislators.

    The Sierra Club-John Muir Chapter also opposes the measure.

    Meanwhile, the national Sierra Club has responded to a renewed nuclear energy push with a “nuclear-free future” campaign.

    “The Sierra Club remains unequivocally opposed to nuclear energy,” read a statement from the leading environmental group.

    “Although nuclear plants have been in operation for less than 60 years, we now have seen three serious disasters,” the statement continued, referring to Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and the disaster in Fukushima, Japan, in 2011. “Nuclear is no solution to climate change and every dollar spent on nuclear is one less dollar spent on truly safe, affordable and renewable energy sources.”

    The Sierra Club’s nuclear-free campaign emphasizes:

    • The issue of what to do with the long-lived waste created by the fissioning of uranium remains unresolved.

    • Uranium mining has contaminated large sections of the southwestern United States and many other areas in the world.

    • Older nuclear plants sit in areas more densely populated than when they were built and almost all leak tritium and other radionuclides into groundwater.

    • Newer nuclear plants remain expensive and need enormous amounts of water.

    • Despite what energy industry leaders claim, nuclear power has a huge carbon footprint. Carbon energy powers uranium mining, milling, processing, conversion and enrichment, as well as the formulation of fuel rods and the construction of plants.

    A letter that Sierra’s John Muir chapter sent to Wisconsin lawmakers on behalf of a Carbon-Free, Nuclear-Free Coalition warned that passage of the pro-nuclear bill could lead to the state becoming a depository for nuclear waste.

    Elizabeth Ward of the Sierra Club-John Muir Chapter, Katie Nekola of Clean Wisconsin, Amy Schulz of Physicians for Social Responsibility, Peter Skopec of Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group and Al Gedicks of Wisconsin Resources Protection Council signed the letter, along with Chuck Baynton and Judy Miner.

    The coalition said passage of the bill could “send a strong message to the Department of Energy that Wisconsin is open to hosting a nuclear waste repository. In the 1980s, the DOE ranked Wisconsin’s Wolf River Batholith as No. 2 for a second high-level nuclear waste repository. A 2008 DOE Study on the Need for a Second Repository listed Wisconsin as one of the top potential states based on our granite geology. After the cancellation of the potential Yucca Mountain repository, the DOE is desperate to find an alternative.”

    Wisconsin’s energy mix

    Wisconsin has one operational nuclear power plant, Point Beach, north of Two Rivers.

    About 15.5 percent of Wisconsin’s electricity is nuclear-generated, 62.3 percent is coal, 13.2 percent natural gas, 3.4 percent hydroelectric and 5.5 percent renewable.

    — Lisa Neff

  • State of the Birds: 230 species face serious threats

    In 40 years, the population of wild passenger pigeons went from 2-3 billion to none. Today, hundreds of species, with their habitats disappearing and their climate changing, face critical threats and need conservation help.

    This week, 100 years after the extinction of the passenger pigeon, a team of scientists involved with the U.S. Committee of the North American Bird Conservation Initiative released the expansive 2014 State of the Birds Report. The document is based on extensive reviews of population data from long-term monitoring of species.

    The report’s authors identified aridlands of the West as the habitat with the steepest population declines in the nation. The report shows a 46 percent decline since 1968 for birds in Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, places where desert, sagebrush and chaparral habitats have been destroyed or fragmented by development.

    The report also emphasizes a significant threat to species that breed in the nation’s grasslands, such as the eastern meadowlark and the bobolink.

    “This report,” says Wayne Clough, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, “highlights the threats that birds face, but it also offers hope for their future if we act together.”

    Habitat loss and fragmentation are at the top of the threat list, but invasive species also are seriously impacting birds, especially on the islands of Hawaii. One-third of U.S. federally endangered birds are Hawaiian species, according to the report’s authors.

    Meanwhile, shorebirds along the U.S. coasts are being “squeezed into shrinking strips of habitat due to development.”

    The report’s authors created a watch list, which names 233 species that are endangered or at risk of becoming endangered without significant conservation, and a list of 32 common birds in steep decline.

    The watch list includes 42 open ocean species, including the Laysan albatross and the black-footed albatross, both threatened by increased levels of oil contamination, plastic pollution and reduced prey fish due to commercial fishing operations.

    The watch list includes half of the shorebird species found in the United States, including the red knot, piping plover and long-billed curlew.

    Thirty neotropical migrants — birds that breed in North America and migrate south of the border in the winter — are on the watch list.

    The positive emphasized in the State of the Birds Report: Targeted conservation efforts directly benefit birds. The scientists observed a steady rise in populations among 49 coastal species that have access to national wildlife refuges and national seashores.

    And in the Appalachian Mountains and the Northwest, land conservation has helped declining species such as the golden-winged warbler and the oak titmouse.

    In a news release issued with the report, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said, “Because the ‘state of the birds’ mirrors the state of their habitats, our national wildlife refuges, national parks, national seashores and other public lands are critical safe havens for many of these species — especially in the face of climate change — one of the biggest challenges to habitat conservation for all species in the 21st century.”

  • Frac sand mining threatens health, welfare in Wisconsin

    Frac sand mining threatens health, welfare in Wisconsin

    Victoria Trinko hasn’t opened the windows in her Wisconsin farmhouse in two years. And when she goes outdoors on the farm her family has operated in Chippewa County since 1936, she often wears a mask.

    Trinko lives less than a mile from a frac sand mining operation — and that’s nothing like living less than a mile from a sandy beach.

    There has been a lot of attention to the harms associated with the hydraulic fracturing method of gas and oil extraction, but much less focus on related industries. Fracking involves intensive use of chemicals, water and fuel at drilling sites, as well as extensive build-out of pipelines and the heavy use of transportation fuel for trucks, barges and train engines. It produces huge volumes of liquid waste. And fracking requires enormous volumes of fine-particle sand found in certain regions of the country, including Wisconsin and Minnesota.

    A frac sand mining operation began in 2011 near Trinko’s farm. Throughout the summer and fall of that year, Trinko, a town clerk for Cooks Valley, raised concerns at local meetings. The “dust” from the mining clung to her clothes. Grit coated her teeth. Whatever she was breathing, it irritated her throat and damaged her respiratory system.

    In a raspy voice, Trinko recently described life near a frac sand mine. She was participating in a Sept. 25 news conference call prompted by the release of a report on the proliferation of such operations in Wisconsin and Minnesota and the medical, environmental, economic consequences.

    “The billowing of silica sand has not abated since the mine was constructed in 2011,” she said.

    Trinko now suffers from asthma and lives with the daily use of an inhaler and nasal spray. People don’t like to visit the farmhouse, which her daughter said smells like someone “just swept the garage.” Trucks rumble past the farm every few minutes, five or six days a week.

    Her home, Trinko said, “is not a healthy place to live.”

    Her daughter “worries that my life expectancy is going to be shortened,” she added.

    Communities at risk

    A new report, Communities at Risk: Frac Sand Mining in the Upper Midwest, warns that thousands face threats from the 164 frac sand mining facilities concentrated in Wisconsin and Minnesota. They operate with little or no government oversight for the impacts on air and water.

    Researchers examined permitting and monitoring, water and air quality, impacts of silica dust on human health, projected declines in property values and the expense of building and rebuilding infrastructure.

    In fracking, the sand holds open the fractures created by the water, sand and chemicals pumped into the earth to allow for the extraction of natural gas and oil. The more frac sand used per well, the higher the yield. Frackers will use about 95 billion pounds of frac sand this year.

    Researchers have identified 164 active frac sand facilities and proposals for another 20 in Wisconsin and Minnesota. Their report said Wisconsin was “overrun by the industry prior to any understanding of the scale and impacts of the industry,” while Minnesota has been more cautious. The number of operations in Wisconsin increased from seven in 2010, the year Scott Walker was elected governor, to 145.

    Midwest mining

    A frac sand operation involves:

    • Removing the plants, soil or rock above a sand deposit.

    • Excavating the sand, which includes blasting and crushing.

    • Processing the sand, including rinsing it with water and chemicals.

    • Piling and storing the sand.

    • Transporting the sand.

    Eventually, the mined-out property is reclaimed, which may or may not include an effort to restore any vegetation. Opponents liken frac sand mining to mountaintop removal.

    “Rural communities are becoming industrialized. … Eliminating the bluffs facilitates groundwater contamination. Runoff into streams, wetlands and lakes threatens habitats and fisheries,” the report stated.

    Living downwind and on the route

    The mining is concentrated in southwest Wisconsin and southeast Minnesota in what is known as the Driftless Area, 23,000 square miles famous for its sandstone bluffs. It’s an area with protected and unique species and scenery that draws many tourists.

    Mapping by the Environmental Working Group found mining sites “in close proximity to schools, hospitals and clinics, where children and patients may be exposed to airborne silica,” said EWG executive director Heather White. Data indicated that in a 33-county area there are about 58,000 people living within a half mile of an existing or proposed frac sand mine or processing site. The number of people living within a mile is 162,000.

    “None of the states at the center of the current frac sand mining boom have adopted air quality standards for silica that will adequately protect the tens of thousands of people living or working near the scores of recently opened or proposed mining sites,” said White.

    “Citizens living near frac sand mining in Wisconsin are witnessing a massive destruction of their rural landscape,” said Kimberlee Wright, executive director of Midwest Environmental Advocates. “Elected officials and our states’ natural resources protection agency have largely dismissed local citizens’ concerns about their health, the health of their environment and their quality of life. Without a clearer view of the big picture of frac sand mining’s impact, laws that protect our communities’ air and water aren’t being developed or enforced.”

    Less than 10 percent of Wisconsin’s frac sand facilities are required to monitor air emissions, prompting MEA to circulate a petition asking the Wisconsin Natural Resources Board to conduct a health and environmental study.

    The report states that it was written “in an attempt to fill the vacuum of government leadership and regulatory authority” and the researchers are raising questions that “should have been posed long ago.”

    Those involved in the report recommended “a step back” in the process and more review and regulation.

    Report co-author Grant Smith said, “It is essential that local and state governments assess and take action based on the impacts of the full cycle of shale oil and gas drilling, including frac sand mining. Health, water and … economic concerns should be addressed comprehensively, rather than being ignored or dismissed. Protecting public health and safety is the first responsibility of government.”

    White added, “We need strong state action to protect the public health from yet another troubling side effect of the unprecedented wave of shale gas development.”

    The urgency is that frac sand mining grew 30 percent from 2013, 50 percent more than projected, and it could spread to other states with untapped or largely untapped frac sand deposits, including Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia.

    Serious concerns

    White and Trinko detailed the concerns for mining in the area, along with Wright; Dr. Peter W. Holm of Chippewa Falls; Civil Society Institute energy policy adviser Smith; and Crispin Pierce, of the Environmental Public Health Program at University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.

    The issues:

    • A mining operation daily withdraws up to 2 million gallons of water that is mixed with a compound called polyacrylamide flocculent to treat the sand. That compound itself is non-toxic. But its production method may leave minute traces of a neurotoxin. As piled sand dries, acrylamide-laden water can seep into groundwater. Also, there can be acid runoff from mines.

    • The primary air pollutant is silica dust. The most dangerous type of  particle mentioned in the report is fine particulate matter, dust smaller than 2.5 micrometers, less than one-seventh the width of a human hair. These particles are associated with asthma, lung disease, cardiovascular disease, birth defects and premature death. Silica particles — they aren’t weatherworn like beach sand but instead have sharp, jagged edges — are produced in mining and dispersed in the processing and hauling of the sand.

    • Crystalline silica, created when silica is crushed or exploded, occurs in the operations. The tiny particles can be ingested and become lodged in the lungs. Intense exposure can cause disease in a year, but it can take 10-15 years for symptoms to appear. Exposure has been linked to tuberculosis, emphysema, bronchitis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, anemia, chronic thyroiditis and kidney-related diseases.

    • Before-and-after satellite images at mining sites show devastating impacts on the landscape.

    • Frac sand mining can result in substantial declines in property value, local tax revenues, business revenue, decreased life span of roads, increased health care costs and negative impacts on school funding.

  • Multiple choice: Third party candidates complete ballot

    Casey McDonough is a Goldilocks in the voting booth.

    She’s not fickle, but she likes a candidate to be just right. Often, that means she votes Democratic. Rarely has it meant that the progressive Wisconsinite has voted for a Republican. But occasionally, she finds an independent or a third-party candidate who fits.

    “I’m not beholden to anyone or any party,” she said.

    National polls show a growing interest among American voters in third parties. Last fall, amid the partial shutdown of the federal government, 60 percent of Americans said a third major party is needed. The percentage was the highest in the 10-year history of Gallup asking that question and consistent with polls showing favorability plummeting for the Democratic and Republican parties. Among independents, 71 percent said America needs a major third party to emerge as an alternative to the two that have dominated politics for 150 years.

    “I’m loyal to my beliefs and to people,” said independent Wisconsin voter Paul Williams. “If you want to vote for the third-party candidate, do it. The only wasted vote is the one not cast.”

    Without saying how they will vote on Election Day or in early voting, Williams and McDonough pointed out that their general election ballots contain independents, as well as candidates with the Libertarian, Green, Peoples and Pirate parties.

    The Libertarian Party is running candidates for all the statewide offices. Haven’t heard of Robert Burke, the Libertarian running for governor? He is not raising money, which is a primary reason he’s been excluded from the TV debate process. The Wisconsin Broadcasters Association invites candidates who have raised at least $250,000 and who are polling at least 10 percent.

    The new Peoples Party also fielded a candidate for governor — founder Dennis Fehr, who is calling for higher tech in government, a simplified tax code, judicial reform, a lower drinking age and legalized marijuana, which also is on Robert Burke’s platform.

    “We believe people have lost faith in our polarized two-party system and think an alternative is needed for the people and families of Wisconsin,” Fehr said when he announced.

    Going down the ballot, there are third-party or independent candidates for many offices, including:

    • Joseph Thomas Klein, a candidate for Assembly District 19 from the Wisconsin Pirate Party. Klein, in a statement, said his political party is “dedicated to the transparency and accountability of government, the upholding of civil rights for all citizens and the personal privacy of citizens in all their effects. … This upholding of civil rights means equal rights without regard for sexual identity and for keeping the government out of your bedroom and whom you choose to love.”

    • Angela Walker, an independent socialist candidate for sheriff in Milwaukee County, in a race against incumbent Democrat David Clarke. She said, “I believe that it’s time to rethink criminal justice. It’s time we look at the impact poverty and harsh punitive measures have on crime rates and advocate for policy changes that will increase opportunity for everyone in our community.”

    • Ron Hardy, on the ballot as a Wisconsin Green Party candidate for state treasurer. Hardy is polling at 10 percent or better and has said, “With support from progressives, fiscal conservatives, independents and anyone who’s fed up with politics as usual, I can win this race.”

    The Green platform begins, “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that we must treat each other with love, respect and fairness, and that we must protect the earth for future generations. The crises of our times demand a fundamental shift in human values and culture, and in our social, economic and political institutions.”

    This appeals to voter J’acki Hayes, but she has a common concern. “I don’t want to split the vote or spoil an election,” said Hayes, a pragmatic person who remembers the 2000 presidential race in which Democrat Al Gore “lost” Florida by 537 votes to George W. Bush. Environmentalist and reformer Ralph Nader ran as a Green Party candidate and won 97,421 votes in the Sunshine State.

    The dispute continues over whether Nader served as a spoiler, but third-party advocates emphasize the myriad problems with the balloting in that election and the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that halted a recount.

    “Ralph Nader didn’t wreck the election,” said McDonough. “We can’t be intimidated by polls or bullied by parties. I was inspired by Nader’s candidacy in 2000.”

    Walker exemplifies third-party runs

    That year, Walker, who is a native of Milwaukee, was living in the South and she participated in the Florida recount. Like McDonough, she’s found inspiration in independent and third-party candidates, among them socialist Kshama Sawant, who was elected to the Seattle City Council last fall and proved instrumental this year in enacting the nation’s highest minimum wage.

    Walker has worked as a bus driver and the legislative director for her transit workers union and she has a history of activism, including engagement in the movement against the war in Iraq and the Occupy protests. “I was taught from an early age to fight for what you believe,” she said.

    Walker shares Sawant’s holistic approach to politics and, as she campaigns for sheriff, she focuses on social justice. “Criminal justice,” said Walker, is an oxymoron.

    Walker, with no background in law enforcement, decided to campaign for sheriff after a friend suggested she could talk about the roots of violence and crime in Milwaukee. “I’m not affiliated with any particular party and that frees me up to say anything. … I can be as blunt as I need to be and I think that works in my favor.”

    Poverty, she said, is violence that can lead to more violence. Her platform includes advocating for:

    • A broader living wage ordinance.

    • Full funding of public schools.

    • Expanded alternatives to incarceration.

    • Decriminalization and legalization of marijuana.

    • Restoration of voting rights for people who have been incarcerated.

    • A healthy transit system.

    • Invoking the 2012 Immigration and Customs Enforcement Detainer Ordinance that allows the sheriff to refrain from ICE sweeps.

    Walker talked with WiG about her candidacy one recent afternoon after addressing a rally in Milwaukee organized by Voces de la Frontera, an immigrant rights group. At the rally, Walker talked about solidarity and the power of the people.

    “I want to remind voters that you are more powerful than you think you are,” said Walker.

    She added, “The right to vote was paid for in blood. So vote. Please.”

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  • Rattling the cage: Court weighs in on personhood for non-humans

    Rattling the cage: Court weighs in on personhood for non-humans

    A New York court will decide this fall whether to apply “legal personhood” to an animal in a first-of-its-kind lawsuit filed on behalf of Tommy the Chimp.

    On Oct. 8, a panel of five judges for the New York State Appeals Court heard from attorney Steven M. Wise, with the nonprofit Nonhuman Rights Project, on behalf of a 26-year-old chimpanzee.

    Tommy is owned as a pet and kept in a “dank shed” in upstate New York. Wise wants him to be relocated to the world’s largest chimpanzee retreat, the Save the Chimps sanctuary in Fort Pierce, Florida. He also wants to convince the court that primates and other intelligent animals are entitled to “legal personhood” and deserving of such basic rights as freedom from imprisonment.

    “No one has ever demanded a common law legal right for a nonhuman animal until now,” Wise said, asserting that his legal claim for Tommy is rooted in genetic, cognitive, evolutionary and taxonomic evidence that chimps are self-aware and autonomous.

    Tommy’s case was filed in New York’s court system in December 2013, along with other lawsuits seeking the release of:

    • Kiko, a 26-year-old chimp who lives in a cage on private property in Niagara Falls and was previously used in the entertainment industry.

    • Hercules and Leo, young chimps who are owned by the New Iberia Research Center and used in biomedical research in the anatomy department at Stony Brook University in Stony Brook, New York.

    In a parallel campaign, the NHRP is building a series of lawsuits on behalf of elephants, another highly intelligent species, being held in circuses and zoos.

    Other organizations also are advocating personhood status for animals — elephants, dolphins and whales, as well as chimps, gorillas, orangutans and bonobos, humans’ closest relatives in the animal kingdom.

    “There are 15 features to the human personality,” said animal rights advocate Shirley Maewhether of Madison. “A corporation doesn’t have them and yet it can have legal personhood. The great apes do have them all: intelligence, self-control, sense of time, sense of past, concern and care for others, curiosity, an ability to reason, feelings.

    “They are not things. They are nonhuman persons.”

    On Oct. 8, the judges in Albany who heard Tommy’s case asked:

    • Isn’t legal personhood just about human beings? Wise observed that courts have extended legal person status to non-human entities and things.

    • If relocated, wouldn’t Tommy still be confined? Wise said the chimp currently is in solitary confinement in a warehouse-like setting, but the sanctuary consists of 13 islands and an artificial lake.

    • Why aren’t animal welfare groups involved in the case? Wise said Tommy’s case is about unlawful imprisonment rather than animal welfare.

    “Keeping a legal person in solitary confinement in a cage is unlawful,” Wise said.

    The appeals court is expected to issue a ruling in six to eight weeks.

    Then, in December, comes Kiko’s day in court.

  • By the numbers: Before the votes, the polls

    By the numbers: Before the votes, the polls

    More ads. More speeches. More press statements. More fundraising pleas. More PAC involvement. And some high-profile pitches followed the news that the Marquette University Law School Poll in early October showed Scott Walker and Mary Burke tied at 47-47 percent among likely voters in the Wisconsin governor’s race.

    That tie between Walker and Burke has disappeared in the two weeks between the Marquette polls. In the poll released Oct. 29, which surveyed 1,409 registered voters, 1,164 of whom said they were likely to vote, Walker is favored by 50 percent of likely voters, while Burke is down to 43 percent. Poll director Charles Franklin attributes the change to shifting turnout intentions. Effectively, he said at a poll release event, more Walker supporters say they will vote than Burke supporters.

    What else were polls showing in the weeks ahead of the high-stakes Nov. 4 election?

    • The gender gap in the governor’s race, shrinking in the last poll, is back. Among likely male voters, Walker is favored 58-36 percent, and among likely female voters, Burke is favored 49-43 percent. In the six Marquette Polls since July, Walker has averaged 55-40 percent among men and Burke has averaged 52-42 percent among women. At one time, Walker had a 28-point advantage among men and Burke had an 18-point edge with women.

    • Burke’s favorability rating has declined in recent weeks, dropping from a 44 percent tie to 39 percent favorable and 49 percent unfavorable among likely voters in the most recent poll. Walker’s current favorability rating among likely voters is 51 percent favorable and 46 percent unfavorable, a ratio that has remained consistent throughout the race.

    • About 49 percent of likely voters agree that Walker cares about people like them; 47 percent say that about Burke.

    • About 43 percent say Burke is “able to get things done,” and 65 percent say that about Walker.

    • That increase in Walker’s numbers in the Marquette Law Poll is faintly reflected in the responses given to questions about Wisconsin’s future. Among likely voters, 54 percent say Wisconsin is headed in the right direction, versus 42 percent who say it is on the wrong track.

    • Walker and Burke supporters are split on almost every issue, and the biggest one is, unsurprisingly, the issue of Act 10 and collective bargaining. Just 9 percent of Walker supporters would restore collective bargaining, in comparison to 79 percent of Burke supporters, according to the latest Marquette Poll.

    • On the other hand, Wisconsinites don’t disagree on everything. The latest Marquette poll found that a majority of both Walker and Burke supporters favor criminal penalties for first offense OWI (52 from Walker and 62 from Burke). Numbers are also close when it comes to the proposed Kenosha casino. 39 percent of Burke supporters and 44 percent of Walker supporters are in favor of the casino, while 37 percent of Burke supporters and 36 percent of Walker supporters oppose it.

    Other polls reveal what’s going on outside the governor’s race:

    • A new survey from the Pew Research Center found notable differences between where liberals and conservatives find their news. Conservatives reported that they find their news from a single source, 47 percent of them saying that source is Fox News. “Consistent liberals” list a wider range of news outlets as main sources.

    • A recent Gallup poll found the economy is the top concern in America as midterms approach, followed sequentially by dissatisfaction with government, unemployment and jobs, health care, and immigration. The Ebola virus made its first appearance on the monthly poll, though, a concern among 5 percent of surveyed Americans.

    • Polls show less enthusiasm for discussing 2016 presidential politics. That’s probably because the clear favorite among Democrats, Hillary Rodham Clinton, hasn’t announced her intention to run, and because no Republican yet has broken from the pack. Mitt Romney, who lost in 2012, is not jockeying for the nomination.

    • In Marquette’s Oct. 15 poll, 25 percent of likely voters in Wisconsin would like to see Walker run for president in 2016; 40 percent would like to see Ryan run.

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  • Activists fight to protect wolves from hunts

    The U.S. House of Representatives recently voted to strip wolves of federal protections in Wyoming, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

    The 242–161 vote was on amending a hunting bill, the Sportsmen’s Heritage and Recreational Enhancement Act. 

    “This vote by the U.S. House of Representatives is a crack at the very foundation of the Endangered Species Act, a law that has a 99 percent success rate at pulling species back from the brink of extinction,” said Drew Caputo of the environmental group Earthjustice. “Ninety percent of Americans from across the political spectrum support the act. If we continue down this slippery slope, we could end up in a world where our children or grandchildren might never again see a bald eagle, or a breaching whale, or hear the cry of a wolf in the wild.”

    Amendment sponsors include U.S. Reps. Reid Ribble of Wisconsin, Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, Dan Benishek of Michigan, and Collin Peterson of Minnesota.

    Their measure, which the House voted for in late February, would override the federal court rulings that state management plans do not sufficiently protect wolves and return species management to states. This could again allow for the trophy hunting of Great Lakes wolves and the killing of wolves in most of Wyoming, where a management plan would provide for shooting wolves on site.

    The amendment also contains a clause precluding further judicial review of the removal of federal protections in Wyoming, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

    “If enacted, this legislation could prove devastating for the recovery of wolves in the continental United States,” said Caputo. “What’s at stake here is whether wolves in Wyoming and the Great Lakes will again face the same unregulated killing that nearly wiped them out in the first place.”

    The House vote came less than two months after Congress rejected a rider to an omnibus spending bill that would have removed Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in the Great Lakes and Wyoming.

    A similar push is on in the U.S. Senate. In January, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works added a provision to the Sportsmen’s Act to subvert the judicial process and delist wolves. Currently, gray wolves in Minnesota are listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act and as “endangered” in Wyoming, Wisconsin and Michigan.

    Both the House and Senate measures would order the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to reissue a rule to delist the gray wolf. The rule was first issued in late 2011 and cleared the way for states to manage wolf populations, which quickly led to the slaughter of wolves.

    Hunting wolves

    Wisconsin legislators legalized the use of firearms and crossbows to kill wolves. The state also legalized the baiting, trapping and hounding of wolves.

    “In Wisconsin, wolves are killed in some of the most brutal ways,” said Wendy Keefover, manager of The Humane Society of the United States’ native carnivore protection program. “Wisconsin is the only state where you can hound wolves. You can bait wolves. You can use neck snares to trap a wolf. …Wisconsin has some of the most egregious ways to kill.”

    Different numbers can be found for the wolf hunts held in 2012–13, 2013–14 and 2014–15 in Wisconsin.

    Data from HSUS shows:

    • 2012–13: The 2012 winter wolf count was 779–804 in 205 packs. The proposed hunting quota was 201 wolves. The DNR reported the killing of 117 wolves: 56 hunted and 61 trapped.
    • 2013–14: The wolf population was 660–689 in 197 packs. During that “season,” 17 wolf packs disappeared and the population declined by 19 percent. The HSUS said 65 wolves were killed for livestock depredation, 21 died in vehicle collisions, 59 were killed illegally, and hunters and trappers killed 257 wolves. Some 16,672 applications were filed and 1,879 permits were sold for the trophy hunt.
    • 2014–15: The state issued 1,500 permits to hunters and trappers and set a hunt quota of 156 wolves, prompting an appeal from The HSUS, which said the pace of trophy hunting, along with poaching, would cause a population crash. The HSUS estimated the total number of wolves killed was 301. Less than a week into the hunt, the DNR closed four of the six zones, with half the zones exceeding quotas.

    “There was such a rush to hunt,” said Melissa Tedrowe, Wisconsin state director for The HSUS.

    “After delisting, the only management tool offered by our state or the other states was to kill wolves,” said environmental activist Kelly Powell of Madison. “That isn’t a management plan. That’s slaughter. That isn’t the way to deal with a recovering species.”

    The official wolf hunting season in Wisconsin ended in early December 2014.

    That month, a federal judge overturned the delisting of the Great Lakes wolves, putting permitted hunts on hold.

    Benishek, in a statement, said the delisting amendment “was based on valuable input from both Michigan and federal officials in order to use sound science to responsibly manage the wolf population while also meeting the needs of local communities. As the number of wolves has increased well beyond the recommended number for recovery, there has been a negative impact on other species and a constant threat to livestock and pets.”

    The delisting measure has the support of Safari Club International, a hunting group, and the National Rifle Association, the largest gun ownership group in the United States.

    On the opposing side, Earthjustice, the Center for Biological Diversity and The Humane Society of the United States, along with many state and local organizations, maintain that the congressional push to delist wolves does not involve sound science or responsible management, nor does it have widespread public support.

    “I just really want to emphasize that the American public and the majority of Wisconsinites value and appreciate wolves as they icon that they are,” said Keefover.

    She and Tedrowe said the drive to delist is based on myths about wolves as predators and ignores the role of large carnivores in the ecosystem.

    A year ago, a coalition of animal protection and conservation organizations suggested reclassifying the gray wolf under the Endangered Species Act as threatened throughout the contiguous United States. That move would continue federal oversight and funding for species recovery efforts but provide some regulatory flexibility to address wolf conflicts.

    “A congressional end run around science and the Endangered Species Act will create more controversy and put wolves and the law itself in jeopardy,” Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, said at the time. “The better path is to downlist wolves to threatened, replace the failed piecemeal efforts of the past with a new science-based recovery strategy and bring communities together to determine how wolves will be returned to and managed in places where they once lived.”

    The proposal pending in the Senate and the measure that passed the House does not take that approach. Another version of the Senate bill lacks the delisting amendment, and others opposed by animal welfare advocates and environmentalists.

    Activists also have grave concerns that lawmakers may attach riders to budget bills providing for the delisting of gray wolves in the Great Lakes and Wyoming.

    Recommended reading …

    Wyoming’s dire plans for the wolves by Tim Preso of EarthJustice.

  • Hemp happenings: Industry to cultivate support during Hemp History Week in June

    More than 250 hemp happenings take place in early June, when Hemp History Week arrives.

    The campaign — set for June 4–10 — is coordinated by the Hemp Industries Association and Vote Hemp. HIA is a nonprofit trade group representing hemp companies, researchers, farmers and supporters. Vote Hemp is a nonprofit advocacy group.

    Hemp History Week is an industrywide effort sponsored by brands such as Dr. Bronner’s, Manitoba Harvest, Nature’s Path Organic, Nutiva, Pacific Foods and Plus+ CBD Oil.

    A focus will be on lobbying in Washington, D.C., and at state capitols, but some 250 other grass-roots events also are planned — plantings, markets, film screenings and more.

    Last year, more than 25,000 acres of hemp were planted and harvested in the United States. That’s a record in the few years since passage of the 2014 Farm Bill, which has resulted in 34 states lifting a ban on industrial hemp farming at the state level.

    States that legalized industrial hemp farming — per provision Sec. 7606 of the Farm Bill — include Wisconsin, as well as Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wyoming.

    Still, federal law prohibits commercial industrial hemp cultivation. And challenges for the industry include:

    • Inability of hemp farmers to obtain crop insurance and financing.

    • Difficulties involved with sourcing certified hemp seed.

    • Lack of adequate processing infrastructure in the United States for raw hemp materials.

    • Government interference with the interstate commerce of U.S.-grown and manufactured hemp products.

    • Misregulation of CBD products.

    Organizers of Hemp History Week plan to lobby to change state and federal laws, expose the depth of the industry’s roots in the United States and build awareness to the health, economic, technological and sustainability benefits of hemp.

    Celebrities and wellness experts onboard for the campaign include Dr. Andrew Weil, Alicia Silverstone, Phil Lempert, Ashley Koff R.D., Brendan Brazier, Elizabeth Kucinich, Ziggy Marley, Alexandra Jamieson, Jason Mraz, Dar Williams, Michael Franti, John Salley, Doug Fine and Ozomatli.

    With months still to go before Hemp History Week, organizers of the campaign in mid-February released a new video, “Deep Roots,” which was filmed at the Rodale Institute Experimental Farm in Pennsylvania.

    The video explores the research on cultivating hemp in a regenerative organic no-till agriculture model. In an interview, Rodale farm manager Ross Duffield talks about how industrial hemp could play a key role in rejuvenating the soil and economic health of U.S. farmlands. Also, research technician Tara Caton discusses the attraction pollinators demonstrate toward hemp.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Study: Trump’s border wall threatens 93 species

    President Donald Trump’s planned border wall threatens 93 species, including jaguars, ocelots, Mexican gray wolves and cactus ferruginous pygmy owls, according to a new study by the Center for Biological Diversity.

    The study also found 25 threatened or endangered species have been designated “critical habitat” on the border, including more than 2 million acres within 50 miles of the border.

    “Trump’s border wall is a disaster for people and wildlife alike,” said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the center. “It could drive magnificent species like the jaguar and ocelot to extinction in the United States.”

    The study identified threatened, endangered and “candidate” species — those being considered for protection — that have ranges near or crossing the border.

    These include:

    • 57 endangered species.

    • 24 threatened species.

    • 10 species under consideration for protection.

    • 2 species of concern — golden and bald eagles.

    Construction of the 1,200-mile wall — along with related infrastructure and enforcement — would have far-reaching consequences for wildlife, including cutting off migration corridors, reducing genetic diversity, destroying habitat, and adding vehicles, noise and lights to vast stretches of the wild borderlands.

    “The border wall won’t be effective at stopping people seeking a better life from getting to this country, but it will destroy habitat and divide wildlife populations,” Greenwald said in a news release. “Building a wall across the entirety of the border would cause massive damage to one of the most biologically diverse regions in North America and would be a boondoggle of the highest order.”

    The sections of border wall already built have had a range of negative effects on wildlife, including direct destruction of thousands of acres of habitat, indirect impacts from noise and light pollution, and division of cross-border wildlife populations like bighorn sheep and jaguars.

    The border wall would cut through the Cabeza Prieta, Buenos Aires and several other national wildlife refuges, along with Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Big Bend National Park and many other natural areas.

    Last month, the center and U.S. Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva, D-Ariz., sued the Trump administration over the proposed border wall and other border security measures.

    The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, is the first targeting the administration’s plan to vastly expand and militarize the U.S.-Mexico border.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Rise and resist: The story of the year

    Rise and resist: The story of the year

    The largest single-day protest in U.S. history — the Women’s March on Washington — took place the day after Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the United States.

    The mass mobilization of demonstrators exceeded the expectations of organizers at the main march in the U.S. capital. The estimated 1 million attendees also far surpassed the number who attended the inauguration.

    There were sister marches held in 672 other cities around the world. Estimated participants worldwide: almost 5 million people.

    Aerial photographs popped with the pink of the pointy-eared pussyhats worn by so many marchers — reminding the world of Trump’s vulgar boasts about sexually assaulting women.

    Protesters carried signs that read, “Repeal and Replace Trump,” “Viva La Vulva,” “I’m with her,” “Ikea has better cabinets,” “Tweet women with respect” and “We shall overcomb.”

    The Women’s March on Washington began to come together in the first week after Election Day in 2016.

    The organizing statement read, “We stand together in solidarity with our partners and children for the protection of our rights, our safety, our health and our families — recognizing that our vibrant and diverse communities are the strength of our country.”

    Sister marches took place in every U.S. state, including Wisconsin, as well as 60 other countries representing every continent.

    As many as 100,000 marched in Madison that day, the crowd rivaling the largest demonstrations staged in 2011 against Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal that ended collective bargaining for public workers in the state.

    Among the Madison marchers was Shelly Clarke of Racine, who said, “I went out to protest Donald Trump — his policies, his misdeeds and his hateful, sexist, racist, offensive language.”

    The protests did not end with the Women’s March, as grass-roots groups across the country formed to stage weekly demonstrations outside congressional offices, state capitals and city halls.

    And, in the months after the inauguration, there were marches for science, immigrant rights, the environment, fair wages, gun reform, LGBT equality, universal healthcare, net neutrality, peace, justice and black lives matter.

    About the People’s Climate March in April, Kieran Suckling of the Center for Biological Diversity said, “From coast to coast we’ve seen a massive movement building to resist Trump and any policies that would hurt wildlife, marginalize entire classes of people and drive the climate deeper into crisis.”

    Resisting Trump in Milwaukee

    One of the larger demonstrations in Wisconsin occurred in February with the Day Without Latinx, Immigrants and Refugees. People went on strike, closed their businesses and withdrew kids from schools to join the protest, which culminated with a march to the Milwaukee County Courthouse.

    There, the demonstrators heard from Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, state Rep. JoCasta Zamarripa and Voces de la Frontera executive director Christine Neumann-Ortiz.

    “Today, we escalate the national and international struggle against Trump’s executive orders, which aim to expand the machinery of mass deportation and legalize discrimination based on race and religion,” Neumann-Ortiz said.

    Rebecca Schulz was among the protesters that day and she also participated in the Women’s March on Madison Jan. 21.

    She said the election outcome of 2016 drove her to march in 2017. “I was angry, furious about what happened on Election Day,” Schulz recalled. “That drove me.”

    The question now: How will the “rise and resist” movement mature as the nation approaches the 2018 midterms?

    More Flashback 2017:

    Donald Trump turned his back on the planet

    2017 saw accelerating attacks on the state’s environment

    Responding to gun violence, GOP moves to weaken gun laws

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Students leading the way forward on gun sanity

    Students leading the way forward on gun sanity

    The shots fired Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, reverberated across the country.

    They echoed in classrooms from Miami to Milwaukee as students and educators dealt with fear and anger over at least the 170th school shooting since the killing of 13 at Columbine High School in 1999. In Parkland, 17 people died and 16 were injured by a shooter armed with an AR-15-style semi-automatic weapon.

    The shots reverberated in legislative chambers and at the U.S. Capitol as well, as lawmakers debated whether to answer mass shootings by arming more people with weapons or restricting access to semi-automatic assault weapons.

    They resonated in corporate offices, too, where executives debated whether to continue dealing with the gun lobby and selling weapons to teenagers.

    Weeks after the shooting, the echoes had not died down. And they likely will not fall silent, as young people have mobilized to build a movement that’s inspired their parents, teachers and principals — and that could provoke political change from school boards to the White House.

    Students plan at least two major campaigns in March:

    • On March 14, 17-minute walkouts from school.

    • On March 24, a national march in Washington, D.C., and “sibling marches” around the world. Multiple marches are set to take place that day in Wisconsin and transportation is being arranged for students to travel from the state to Washington.

    The March For Our Lives mission statement reads, in part: “Not one more. We cannot allow one more child to be shot at school. We cannot allow one more teacher to make a choice to jump in front of a firing assault rifle to save the lives of students. We cannot allow one more family to wait for a call or text that never comes. Our schools are unsafe. Our children and teachers are dying. We must make it our top priority to save these lives.”

    The campaign was created by students “who will no longer risk their lives waiting for someone else to take action to stop the epidemic of mass school shootings that has become all too familiar.”

    “We are marching out of the classrooms to the campus and the Capitol,” said Milwaukee high school student Melinda Greski. “We demand safe schools. We demand an America where we can grow up.”

    Remarkable accomplishments 

    How powerful can the movement become?

    Consider how influential it was in its first couple of weeks.

    Some of the nation’s large retailers of guns, including Dick’s Sporting Goods, discontinued the sale of assault weapons and large-capacity magazines and raised the minimum age to purchase firearms to 21.

    On March 1, gun control activists launched a boycott of companies with ties to the National Rifle Association. Before the boycott hit, more than a dozen companies, including MetLife, Hertz and Delta Air Lines, stopped offering discounts or perks to NRA members and flatly rejected threats of retaliation from the organization.

    “The NRA has turned our country into a war zone and Americans are done dying for you,” said Brandon Wolfe, a survivor of the June 2016 mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. “Our children are done being your sacrifices.”

    Wolfe said two friends died at the gay nightclub and he endorsed a national campaign demanding that candidates and elected officials return NRA contributions.

    Many Democratic politicians backed the effort.

    “The students of Florida are holding public officials accountable to save lives,” House Minority Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said at the California Democratic Convention. “Let us salute students for their courage and clarity; and let us salute them by pledging not to take any NRA money.”

    Confronted by the outrage and eloquent student speakers, gun-friendly Republicans such as President Donald Trump, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida shifted their stances on gun control — but kept their NRA money.

    Widespread support for student activists

    Support for students is coming from gun control groups such as Everytown for Gun Safety, progressive institutions like Planned Parenthood, and progressive lawmakers, including state Reps. David Bowen and Jonathan Brostoff — who joined a Gun Violence Prevention panel in Milwaukee to tackle the issue — and especially school administrators, teachers and their unions.

    In late February, as news outlets reported a school district in Wisconsin would punish students who participated in the Youth Empower walkout, Milwaukee Public Schools Superintendent Darienne B. Driver sent a letter to the “Dear MPS Family.”

    “Our students have the constitutional right to free speech and peaceful assembly,” Driver wrote. “We support student-led civic engagement efforts and actions, as long as they are done in a safe and respectful manner. I stand with our students.”

    To assist students in preparing for this month’s actions — some 200,000 students at more than 1,900 schools are expected to participate in the walkouts — the American Civil Liberties Union has provided online training and “Know Your Rights” guides.

    For the marches, organizations are raising money to help students travel to Washington. Businesses are providing meeting spaces for organizers, eliminating fares and covering bills. Celebrities are writing checks for expenses. And longtime activists are schooling young leaders on voter registration efforts, because much of the responsibility for change rests with lawmakers.

    Demanding gun legislation

    March For Our Lives demands a “comprehensive and effective bill be immediately brought before Congress to address these gun issues.”

    The march statement says, “No special interest group, no political agenda is more critical than timely passage of legislation to effectively address the gun violence issues that are rampant in our country.”

    It’s before Congress and GOP-controlled legislatures that the #NeverAgain movement faces its largest hurdles to accomplishing that goal.

    In Madison, during the last scheduled floor session for the Assembly, Democrats backed universal background checks and Republicans went against them.

    “UBC should be the base policy where we can all agree and move forward together from,” Brostoff said.

    State Sen. Chris Larson, on March 1, reported Democrats introduced seven measures for “common-sense gun reform,” but the GOP leadership refused to hold hearings on the bills. Republicans did advance legislation to repeal the requirement to obtain a permit to carry a concealed gun, lower the age for conceal and carry to 18 and provide grants to schools for armed guards.

    Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., House Speaker Paul Ryan met with students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

    Afterward, Ryan called the students smart and passionate, thanked them for speaking with him, and said, “We will continue to work to find common ground on solutions that can help prevent the kind of senseless violence these students endured.”

    Yet as of March 7, Ryan, who received more from the gun lobby in 2016 than any other House member, had yet to allow a vote on any legislation to tighten gun laws to prevent mass shootings, not that there wasn’t plenty of legislation proposed.

    Newtown Action Alliance said at least 56 gun control bills were introduced in the 115th Congress — legislation to ban semi-automatic rifles and pistols, prohibit possession of large-capacity ammunition feeding devices, authorize funding for the CDC to research gun violence prevention, require background checks for purchases at gun shows, require reporting on bulk purchases of ammunition, list those prohibited from buying a firearm in a national database and establish a seven-day waiting period to buy semi-automatic weapons, silencers and armor-piercing bullets.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Poll: On abortion, widening divide between young Americans and seniors

    A new PRRI poll on a range of reproductive rights and women’s health issues shows stark generational divisions.

    On questions of personal beliefs about abortion, access to abortion and availability of abortion services, young and older Americans are deeply divided.

    A look at the PRRI “Widening Generational Divides on Abortion and Reproductive Rights” survey:

    • About 44 percent of young Americans say abortion goes against their personal beliefs, compared to 60 percent of Americans over 65.
    • Nearly two-thirds of young people, compared to 51 percent of seniors, agree that abortion should be legal in most or all cases.
    • Nearly seven in 10 young people, compared to 46 percent of seniors, agree that at least some health care professionals in their community should provide legal abortions.
    • A majority of young adults, compared to 42 percent of seniors, say abortion services should be covered by most health care plans.

    “The relative stability of attitudes in the general public toward the legality and availability of abortion over the past few years has masked a growing polarization of opinion between younger and older Americans,” said PRRI CEO Robert P. Jones. “As this younger generation continues to flex its political muscles — as we saw in the response to the Parkland shooting — they could also reshape the national conversation on women’s health issues.”

    Younger and older Americans also have different perceptions of how difficult it is to access abortion services in their communities.

    Among Americans overall, 38 percent say obtaining an abortion in their community is somewhat or very difficult, compared to 46 percent who say it is not too difficult or not at all difficult.

    Nearly half of young Americans, compared to 35 percent of seniors, say abortions are somewhat or very difficult to obtain in their communities.

    Trump undermining women’s health

    The PRRI poll was released just a week before Planned Parenthood’s lobby day, when more than 600 staff, patients and supporters came together to sound an alarm about the Trump administration’s efforts to undermine essential health services for women.

    At a news conference April 25, Planned Parenthood executive vice president Dawn Laguens joined U.S. Reps. Gwen Moore, D-Milwaukee, and Gene Green, D-Texas, to talk about the ways the GOP-controlled Congress and the Trump-Pence administration rolled back access to affordable birth control, cut evidence-based teen pregnancy prevention programs and tried to block patients from accessing Planned Parenthood health centers.

    Moore, speaking outside the Capitol, said, “Who’d have thought it, that we’d still be out here protesting and trying to protect women’s rights to control their own bodies?”

    The lawmaker said the U.S. Supreme Court “is on our side,” as well as scientific and economic arguments, yet the Trump-Pence administration and Republicans in Congress and state legislatures continue to work to chip away at women’s access to care.

    “This is a nationwide problem, but it is also very, very local,” Moore said. “Because of the Trump administration’s willingness to provide waivers, states like my own state of Wisconsin are taking it upon themselves to continue to advance anti-choice initiatives.”

    Tanya Atkinson, CEO of Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, also spoke at the news conference. Moore introduced her as a soldier and a good friend.

    Atkinson said Gov. Scott Walker and “other extreme politicians in Wisconsin have been pushing policy after policy to take away our basic rights and care. In Wisconsin, we’ve seen an unprecedented attack on women’s health.”

    As a result, there are fewer clinics and options for the 70 percent of young people who, according to the PRRI survey, believe that at least some health care professionals in their community should provide legal abortions.

    PRRI — the Public Religion Research Institute — is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to conducting independent research at the intersection of religion, culture and public policy.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Supreme Court watch: Wedding cake ruling muddies the equality waters, more decisions to come

    Civil rights groups emphasized the narrowness of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this month that favored a Colorado baker who refused to serve a gay couple wanting to buy a cake for their wedding reception.

    But the ruling means more business owners will try to use their religious beliefs to discriminate against people based on their sexual orientation — or other status. Just a day after the Supreme Court ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, there were news reports from around the country — Indiana, Arizona, Texas, Colorado, California and Georgia — of business owners announcing plans to refuse service or sales to LGBT people.

    Meanwhile, Jack Phillips — the baker at the center of the high court case — faced a torrent of criticism, especially on the food-focused social-media platform Yelp.

    In 2012, Charlie Craig and Dave Mullins asked Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in suburban Denver, to make them a wedding cake. He refused, he said, because he’s a Christian.

    The couple turned to the state of Colorado, which has legislation banning discrimination based on sexual orientation — and a process for determining whether bias has occurred.

    The Colorado Civil Rights Commission decided that Phillips discriminated against the gay couple, violating their rights.

    Phillips, represented by the right-wing Alliance Defending Freedom and supported by the Trump administration, sought a higher review and ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Arguments took place in December 2017 and the 7-2 ruling was issued June 4.

    Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy said the state violated the baker’s rights under the First Amendment but said the broader issue of whether there can be faith-based exemptions to anti-discrimination laws “must await further elaboration.”

    Kennedy, during oral argument, signaled trouble with what appeared to him to be anti-religious comments by a member of the Colorado commission.

    “We read this decision as a reaffirmation of the court’s longstanding commitment to civil rights protections and the reality that the states have the power to protect everyone in America from discrimination,” said James Esseks, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union LGBT and HIV Project. The ACLU represented Craig and Mullins.

    The ACLU and a host of LGBT groups pointed to a passage in the decision, joined by liberals Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer, that said disputes “must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.”

    Still, in on-the-street interviews and on-the-web surveys by WiG, people repeatedly asked: How could the court not see Craig and Mullins were subject to indignities because of the baker’s bias?

    And clearly, each side involved in the case interpreted the decision differently.

    Esseks said the court did not say Phillips was free to turn away gay customers. Phillips’ attorney, Kristen Waggoner at the ADF, said the baker can refuse a same-sex couple service without fear of another legal fight.

    Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented in Masterpiece. Ginsburg wrote, “I strongly disagree … with the court’s conclusion that Craig and Mullins should lose this case.”

    Later this month, the justices could decide to take a case involving a florist who refused to serve a same-sex couple. Other similar disputes involve video producers, graphic artists, photographers and lodgers who say they oppose same-sex marriage on religious grounds and don’t want to participate in same-sex weddings.

    “The court did not rule that the Constitution grants the right to discriminate, quite the contrary, the decision maintains the longstanding principle that business owners cannot deny equal access to goods and services,” said Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference Education fund.

    “But make no mistake,” she added, “the decision makes clear that our fight for equal rights and dignity for all must continue. Yesterday it was barbecue. Today, it’s cake. Tomorrow it will surely be something else. And we will be there fighting.”

    High court decisions to come

    Still to come this month from the court is a ruling in a potentially landmark case out of Wisconsin on partisan gerrymandering: Gill v. Whitford. The court additionally heard redistricting cases out of Texas and Maryland.

    In Gill, the court is expected to decide whether the district court had the authority to hear a statewide challenge to the GOP-crafted redistricting plan for Wisconsin rather than district-by-district, as well as whether the lower court properly held the redistricting was an impermissible partisan gerrymander.

    There are other questions before the court in Gill, a case brought to the justices by the Walker administration after losing in the lower courts. Two key ones are whether partisan-gerrymandering claims are justiciable and whether the lower court wrongly adopted what the state called a watered-down version of a partisan-gerrymander test.

    Nearing the end of their nine-month term, the justices also are due to deliver decisions in:

    • Trump v. Hawaii, on the constitutionality of President Donald Trump’s travel ban.
    • Carpenter v. United States, dealing with the warrantless seizure and search of cellphone records to track locations.
    • Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, dealing with whether public-sector employees can refuse to pay dues to their union.
    • Minnesota Voters Alliance v. Mansky, dealing with whether a law banning political apparel at polling places violates the First Amendment.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Reaction as U.S. Supreme Court punts on Wisconsin gerrymandering case

    Reaction as U.S. Supreme Court punts on Wisconsin gerrymandering case

    The U.S. Supreme Court has issued its ruling in the partisan gerrymander case out of Wisconsin. The high court June 18 said the plaintiffs failed to show they had standing to challenge the Republican-drawn statewide legislative map.

    First reports from the press at the Supreme Court described the much-anticipated decision as making a “punt” and taking a “pass.” The court terms are “vacated” and “remanded.”

    Here’s is the decision in Gill v. Whitford from the high court, issued shortly after 10 a.m. EST and written by the chief justice.

    “What is stunning about the ruling is that the U.S. Supreme Court found a technicality allowing it to avoid immediately ruling on the constitutionality of partisan gerrymandering,” said Robert Kraig, executive director of Citizen Action of Wisconsin. “It is highly significant that the court refused to uphold the hyper-partisan districts created by Wisconsin Republicans, or reverse earlier federal court decisions which found them unconstitutional. There is nothing stopping the Legislature from from creating an independent redistricting process that serves the interests of the people of Wisconsin, not the partisan interests of political parties and politicians.”

    The case was argued before the justices last October, and progressives in Wisconsin and beyond had hoped the court would find that the partisan gerrymander was so egregious it was unconstitutional.

    Gill  involved a challenge to a Wisconsin map drawn after Scott Walker became governor and Republicans seized control of the redistricting process. The Democratic challengers, at the lower court level, showed Republicans drew the map in secret with the purpose of locking in their control of the Legislature.

    But the Supreme Court did not rule on the broader issue of whether the Constitution allows for electoral maps to be drawn to give an unfair advantage to a political party.

    Back at the lower court, the challengers — Democratic voters — still could another opportunity to prove injury by the redistricting plan, but it is unlikely that could happen before the November general election.

    “This case is very much still alive,” said Paul Smith the vice president of litigation and strategy at Campaign Legal Center, who argued the case before the court. “We now have the opportunity to demonstrate the real and concrete harms that result from partisan gerrymandering in the lower court, the same court that struck down the Wisconsin mapping scheme to begin with.”

    Smith also said, “When legislators draw voting maps to favor one party over another and to stay in power, voters no longer have a voice in the political process. Extreme partisan gerrymandering is increasingly getting worse — damaging our democracy and eroding voters’ confidence in our system. We will continue advancing efforts, in this case and others as well as through the political process, to end this practice and safeguard every citizen’s fundamental right to vote and have it count.”

    Democratic Party of Wisconsin chair Martha Laning issued this statement following the Gill v. Whitford  decision: “In 2011, Republicans in Wisconsin set out to draw maps that diluted the power of Democratic voters to ensure indefinite Republican control. The result has been an unfair electoral system that flies in the face of the foundational values of our representative democracy.

    “Regardless of today’s ruling, Democrats in Wisconsin will continue to compete everywhere possible in 2018. We will continue to mobilize and we will continue to build the infrastructure necessary for more victories for the people of Wisconsin.”

    The court also ruled June 18 on a case out of Maryland, Benisek v. Lamone, finding that the voters in the challenge failed to show how they were injured by a redistricting plan.

    Common Cause, responding this morning, said this is by no means the end of the road and referred to page 16 in the Gill decision: “We leave for another day consideration of other possible theories of harm not presented here and whether those theories might present justiciable claims giving rise to statewide remedies.”

    “With Wisconsin and Maryland’s cases still alive and Common Cause’s North Carolina case awaiting review by the Supreme Court, the fight to establish constitutional limits on partisan gerrymandering is very much alive,” said Karen Hobert Flynn, president of the organization.

    In Wisconsin, Jay Heck, the long-time executive director of Common Cause in Wisconsin, said, “Today, the U.S. Supreme Court today did not address the unconstitutionality of one of the most partisan gerrymanders of state legislative districts (2011) in American history, but we remain hopeful that standing can be addressed and we can win justice in the courts.”

    He added, “We even more urgently renew our call on the Wisconsin Legislature replace this broken system with a transparent, non-partisan process modeled after our neighbor, Iowa, in time for the 2021 redistricting cycle.”

    More reaction to the decisions

    From Democratic gubernatorial candidate Kelda Roys came this reaction: “Today, the Supreme Court remanded Gill v. Whitford, the Wisconsin gerrymandering case, to allow the plaintiffs to have their claim of harm reviewed by a lower court. This case was an important one to bring. Millions of Americans are now aware of how gerrymandering and rigged maps distort our democracy.

    “We knew that, regardless of the court’s decision, we would still have work to do to guarantee fair maps and representation for Wisconsinites. It will be up to the next governor and legislature to pass independent redistricting reform — something I will prioritize.

    “Democracy demands accountability. If legislators are not serving their constituents well, they should be voted out of office. Competitive elections help to ensure that legislators meet the needs of the people they serve or risk losing re-election. Competition also engenders a willingness to listen to those with whom we disagree — a skill that is in short supply.

    “Wisconsin Republicans effectively silenced half the voters in our state — preserving their own political power and changing the rules to prevent voters from holding them accountable. They knew their decisions were unpopular, but rather than face the voters, they chose to rig the maps, change campaign finance laws and suppress votes.”

    In a statement to the press, state Sen. David Hansen said, “The court’s decision shows just how much work needs to be done to restore fairness to our elections. It is time for legislators from both parties to come together and pass a real non-partisan redistricting law that will take the responsibility for drawing legislative district boundaries out of the hands of the politicians in Madison and replace it with one that gives the voters a voice in the process and at the ballot box.

    “We already know that nonpartisan redistricting can work because we’ve seen it in action in states as close as Iowa, which our plan is modeled after. Nonpartisan redistricting not only takes the politics out of the map-drawing process, it does far more than our current system to ensure open, fair and competitive elections.

    “I intend to re-introduce our Fair Maps redistricting plan as soon as I am able to when the Legislature convenes in January.”

    “The Supreme Court did not give us the ruling we had hoped against partisan gerrymandering,” said Erin Grunze, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin. “As we explained in our amicus brief, the Wisconsin maps deny many citizens the full power of the vote and should be redrawn. The current redistricting process protects the party in power — whichever party it is — and is not an open and transparent process carried out in the interest of the voters. It is notable that the Court ruling still allows the plaintiffs a chance to demonstrate this in further legal proceedings.

    “Regardless of what happens in the courts, Wisconsin can still right this wrong. So far, 39 of 72 Wisconsin counties have passed resolutions in support of a nonpartisan redistricting process. Lawmakers in the Wisconsin Capitol need to be accountable to voters and support legislation that will take the power of map drawing out of partisan control and give it to an independent body, with plenty of public input, in the interest of fairness and democracy. Wisconsin voters are demanding this reform and the League of Women Voters will continue to advocate for a nonpartisan redistricting process.”

    Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, chair of the Democratic Governors Association, said, “Americans cannot wait for the Supreme Court to stop the gerrymandering that poisons our democracy. The most important thing we can do in 2018 to stop gerrymandering is to elect Democratic governors who will fight for fairer maps. This November’s gubernatorial elections will determine the makeup of Congress and state legislatures for more than a decade. The Supreme Court today affirmed what we have known for some time: The best defense against gerrymandering in 2021 is a Democratic governor in the state house.

    “This November, Americans will elect more than 25 governors with veto power over 2021 maps. Governors with a veto pen in hand hold tremendous power to end extreme partisan gerrymandering and stand up for fair maps and fair representation. Democratic governors are ready to follow the path blazed by Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf in fighting for maps that provide fairer Congressional and legislative districts. That’s why the DGA launched the Unrig The Map project to support this critical mission.

    “Today, Justice Kagan warned: ‘The 2010 redistricting cycle produced some of the worst partisan gerrymanders on record. … The technology will only get better, so the 2020 cycle will only get worse.’ Justice Kagan is right: And that’s why we need Democratic governors at the table to stop Republican map-rigging after the 2020 Census.

    “While the Supreme Court’s decision not to act on partisan gerrymandering today was disappointing, it reaffirms that electing Democratic governors in states is the single best path to unrigging the map across the United States. While Americans wait for the court to take on redistricting in 2019, we can take action in 2018 to elect Democratic governors and stop extreme gerrymandering in its tracks.”

    Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel issued the following statement: “I am pleased that the highest court in the land has unanimously reversed the trial court’s erroneous decision invalidating Wisconsin’s Assembly map. Today is win for the rule of law in Wisconsin, and a testament to the talented attorneys at the Wisconsin Department of Justice.”

    “We continue to stand proud that a group of citizens came together and took a case all the way to Supreme Court,” said Sachin Chheda, director of the Fair Elections Project, which originally organized and launched the lawsuit. “This is definitely not the end of the road.

    “The lawyers are reviewing the decision, & the plaintiffs will examine their options,” continued Chheda, who also serves as co-chair of the WI Fair Maps Coalition, 13 Wisconsin organizations fighting for the end of partisan gerrymandering. “In the meantime, we will immediately focus on gaining more support for independent redistricting reform & passing legislation in the coming term to ensure next round of map-drawing is fair.”

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Democratic AGs form defensive line against Donald Trump

    Eight Democratic attorneys general recently filed litigation seeking to block the Trump administration from eliminating long-standing protections under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

    The lawsuit, led by New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood, will be considered in the Southern District of New York alongside National Audubon Society v. Department of Interior, a case filed in May. 

    For 100 years, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act has prevented threatened waterfowl, raptors and songbirds from going extinct in the United States. Yet, the Trump administration wants to reverse decades of bipartisan support for implementing and enforcing the law.

    Conservationists say they’re buoyed by the suit filed Sept. 5.

    “To borrow a phrase, this is welcome wind beneath our wings in the fight to keep this vital bird protection law intact,” Sarah Greenberger, senior vice president of conservation policy for Audubon, said of the suit.

    Democratic attorneys general have held the line in other fights against the Trump administration. A Washington Post piece called them the “muscle of the resistance.”

    An association of Democratic AGs is leading a nationwide effort to elect more of them on Nov. 6, including in Wisconsin, where Josh Kaul seeks to unseat Republican incumbent Brad Schimel.

    The Democratic Attorneys General Association, in collaboration with the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, has launched a site spotlighting “Schimel’s incompetence,” according to a news release. 

    At backlogbrad.com, the DAGA says that, among many other things, Schimel “completely botched” the probe of a youth prison and let the state’s backlog of untested rape kits linger for years without taking action.

    “The role of a state attorney general is to put the best interests of the people first — and that means testing rape kits, taking investigations seriously and holding other elected officials accountable,” said Sean Rankin, executive director of the DAGA. “Instead, Brad Schimel spent time appeasing a GOP governor, cozying up to lobbyists and passing out cheesy promo gear.”

    DAGA’s goal is to familiarize people with the vital roles that AGs play in state and government policies. As the heads of each state’s department of justice, the attorney general’s job is to function as the “people’s lawyer” — to represent the best interests of their states’ citizens.

    On most big issues that have reached the courts in recent years, AGs have taken sides, filed briefs and made arguments.

    In Wisconsin, under Republicans, attorneys general have participated in lawsuits opposing marriage equality, unions, women’s reproductive freedom, gun reform, living and equal wages, transgender access to necessary care, protection for immigrants and asylum seekers, and affordable health care.

    Meanwhile, across the border in Illinois, Democratic Attorney General Lisa Madigan has countered Republican executives in the state capital and at the White House by pushing progressive reforms.

    Madigan was among the Democratic attorneys general who filed briefs supporting unions in the U.S. Supreme Court case Janus v. AFSCME Council 31. So was Lori Swanson, the attorney general in Minnesota.

    After the ruling against unions, 20 Democratic attorneys general issued a statement: “We understand and appreciate the crucial role unions and collective bargaining play in our democracy and our economy. As the people’s lawyers, we are committed to ensuring working people can join together for fair and livable wages, workplace safety, pensions, paid sick days, health care services and other important protections. We will continue this work.”

    The Democratic attorneys general also have been at the forefront of opposition to the Trump administration’s separation and detention of families at the border, travel bans and environmental rollbacks. And, earlier this summer, they went to court to prevent the nationwide release of downloadable programs that enable people to make guns using three-dimensional printers. 

    Most recently, Democratic attorneys general faced Republicans in a Texas courtroom over the Affordable Care Act. 

    Attorneys general in GOP-led states, including Schimel in Wisconsin, brought the lawsuit, arguing the entire health care law — but most significantly the protection for people with pre-existing conditions — was rendered unconstitutional after Congress repealed the “individual mandate” that required most Americans to buy insurance or risk a tax penalty.

    The Associated Press said Texas v. Azar is the most high-profile legal challenge to “Obamacare” under Trump, whose administration is not defending the law in court. 

    Defense, in a sense, was left to the Democratic attorneys general, and at stake in Wisconsin are protections for an estimated 2.4 million people with pre-existing conditions.

    “This November, there is an opportunity to oust an attorney general (who) consistently fails to do his job and elect a new attorney general who is ready to protect the people,” said Rankin.

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • March for Science to protest Trump’s onslaught

    March for Science to protest Trump’s onslaught

    A resistance is rising to challenge the flat-Earth mentality governing Washington, D.C., and some state capitols.

    Efforts by the Trump administration to silence scientists and stifle their research are driving a global protest that will come together on Earth Day as the first-ever March for Science.

    Scientists will march on Washington April 22 and in more than 280 satellite marches around the globe. They’ll be rallying under the banner “Science, not Silence.”

    Organizers say the coalition involved in the march represents millions of scientists, engineers, researchers and students.

    As of March 3, more than 50,000 people had volunteered to help stage the demonstrations.

    “Scientific integrity serves everyone and we need to speak out for science together,” said Valorie Aquino, one of the march’s three national co-chairs and an anthropology Ph.D. candidate at the University of New Mexico. “We’re thrilled and inspired that our message is resonating with so many organizations and so many people who have been advancing and defending science for years.”

    The Trump administration’s efforts to censor scientists include removing research, data and other materials on climate change from government sources. Republican state governments, including Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s administration, also have worked to conceal science-based information on climate change.

    March co-chair Caroline Weinberg, a health educator and science writer, said a goal will be “holding our leaders — both in science and politics— accountable to the highest standards of honesty, fairness and integrity.”

    Partners in the effort include the Earth Day Network, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Entomological Society of America, NextGen Climate America, 500 Women Scientists, the American Anthropological Association, the American Society for Cell Biology, Center for Biological Diversity, the League of Extraordinary Scientists and Engineers, Research!America, the Union of Concerned Scientists and many more.

    Earth Day and science

    The D.C. actions will begin at 10 a.m. April 22 with a teach-in and rally on the National Mall, followed by a street march. An announcement said the rally would “call for politicians to implement science-based policies” and serve as a celebration of “science and the enormous public service it promotes in our democracy, our economy and in all our daily lives.”

    Earth Day, organizers said, seems an appropriate time for the action.

    “This year’s global Earth Day theme is climate and environmental literacy and of course science speaks directly to our mission,” said Kathleen Rogers, president of the Earth Day Network.

    On the web

    Follow developments on the March for Science at marchforscience.com and on social media with #ScienceServes.

    Trump administration records requested

    The Center for Biological Diversity has filed public records requests seeking details about reported gag orders in place at the EPA, the Interior Department and the Department of Agriculture.

    “The American people have a right to know what their government is up to, especially one with such close ties to the very industries it’s charged with regulating,” said Meg Townsend, an attorney for the center. “Without this information, we can’t know whether agencies are actually safeguarding the well-being of our natural heritage or whether they’re selling our air, water and wildlife to the highest bidder.”

    Republicans work again to ban fetal tissue research

    Republican state lawmakers are renewing their push to ban research on aborted fetal tissue in Wisconsin.

    Private and university researchers who have blocked similar efforts the past six years remain firmly against anything that would impinge on their work.

    Three Republican lawmakers have circulated a bill that would prohibit the sale and research of fetal tissue starting in 2018. The measure would essentially duplicate federal law in Wisconsin.

    Other proposals would end the sale and use of fetal tissue and body parts obtained from abortions.

    Those against a ban say it would curtail promising research on potentially life-saving cures and treatments and hurt the state’s economy.

    Cures for Tomorrow

    A coalition of Wisconsin academic research institutions, bioscience-related trade groups and health care providers said given federal law and policies governing the use of fetal tissue and cells, “we strongly believe that no additional regulation by the state of Wisconsin is needed.” — AP

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • In Trump times, a revival of Poor People’s Campaign

    Protesters launched a six-week season of nonviolent, direct action on May 14, marching in Madison and rallying at the state Capitol.

    They will return on Mondays, as part of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. It’s an effort in at least 35 states inspired by the civil rights movement of the 1960s but rooted in the politics of today.

    The protests in May focused on the connection between systemic racism, poverty and suppression.

    Demonstrators called for an end to gerrymandering, reversal of state law barring municipalities from raising wages, immigration reform that protects immigrants and strengthens democracy and full restoration of the Voting Rights Act.

    Some demonstrators carried signs that read, “Voter Suppression = The True Hacking of our Democracy” and “Systemic Racism is Violence.”

    Similar demonstrations took place in other capitals on May 14, including Washington, D.C., resulting in hundreds of arrests in the most expansive wave of nonviolent civil disobedience in U.S. history, according to organizers.

    The co-chairs of the campaign, the Revs. William J. Barber of North Carolina and Liz Theoharis of New York were among those arrested.

    For two years, the leaders of the campaign carried out a listening tour across the country, meeting with tens of thousands of people, gathering testimonies and building a “Moral Agenda.”

    They announced the agenda in April and released details of an “audit of America,” which shows that Americans are in many ways worse off than they were in 1968, when the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders launched the Poor People’s Campaign.

    As the campaign continues through the summer with teach-ins, marches, voter registration drives and more, activists will call for change to address racism, ecological devastation, the war economy and, according to a news release, “our distorted moral economy.”

    They will demand repeal of the 2017 federal tax law and push for universal, single-payer health care, clean water for all and better wages. 

    For more information about the campaign and to read the “Moral Agenda,” visit www.poorpeoplescampaign.org. 

    Note: This story originally published in the Wisconsin Gazette.

  • Anti-choice laws topple

    The U.S. Supreme Court on June 27 struck down anti-choice legislation in Texas with a decisive 5-3 ruling, imperiling similar measures in other states.

    By June 28, the high court had ruled against Wisconsin and Mississippi, where Republican leaders sought to appeal lower court rulings on their anti-choice provisions.

    Also, the Alabama attorney general announced the state would no longer defend its admitting-privilege requirements.

    The “complete and total victory … renews the promise of Roe v. Wade for the next generation,” said Nancy Northrup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights.

    At the ACLU, Jennifer Dalven of the Reproductive Freedom Project said, “The Supreme Court’s decision made crystal clear that laws like Alabama’s, Mississippi’s and Wisconsin’s that rely on sham justifications to prevent a woman from having an abortion are unconstitutional.”

    Such laws are called Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers or TRAP measures.

    “Wisconsin has not been immune to its share of TRAP laws,” said U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Wis. “In the last year alone, Gov. Scott Walker signed two different bills with the goal to defund our state’s Planned Parenthood centers. These health clinics are vital to the well-being of our communities.”

    Moore said she was thrilled by the developments at the Supreme Court, beginning with that Monday morning decision in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt out of Texas.

    The Texas measure

    The Texas law, HB2, was devastating in its impact on women and their families in just a few years.

    More than 40 abortion clinics were open in January 2013, when Rick Perry led an avowed push to end abortion in Texas.

    The law, signed by Perry in July 2013, required that doctors who perform abortions have admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles of their clinic and required clinics to meet hospital-like standards for outpatient surgery. Such standards include requirements for corridor width, floor tiles, parking spaces, elevator size, electrical wiring, plumbing and even the angle water flows from drinking fountains.

    Proponents of HB2 said the intent was to protect women undergoing medical procedures.

    Critics said the intent was to reduce or eliminate women’s access to abortions and to force clinics out of business.

    By the time the justices issued their ruling on June 27, only 19 clinics remained open in Texas.

    Planned Parenthood and other providers filed the first challenge to HB 2.

    A federal judge blocked implementation of the measure in October 2013, but an appeals court lifted the hold in March 2014.

    Whole Woman’s Health and other providers brought a new challenge in 2014. A district court ruled the admitting privileges and clinic requirements were an unconstitutional burden on women’s access to reproductive health care, but an appeals court again reversed the lower court.

    Care providers turned to the Supreme Court, which put a hold on further enforcement of the law and then heard the merits of the case in March.

    During oral arguments, it was clear where the court’s four liberal justices stood, where the court’s three most conservative justices stood, but not which side Justice Anthony Kennedy would stand on. His vote, always crucial, had even more impact after the death of Antonin Scalia in February.

    Kennedy and Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan were in the majority.

    Breyer wrote the opinion for the majority: “The surgical-center requirement, like the admitting privileges requirement, provides few, if any, health benefits for women, poses a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions and constitutes an ‘undue burden’ on their constitutional right to do so.”

    Ginsburg wrote a concurring opinion, saying the Texas law, and laws like it, “do little or nothing for health, but rather strew impediments to abortion, (and) cannot survive judicial inspection.”

    Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the dissenting opinion, which was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito.

    Thomas said the court has a “troubling tendency to bend the rules when any effort to limit abortion, or even to speak in opposition to abortion, is at issue.”

    President Barack Obama and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton praised the decision, as did many Democrats across the country — from Capitol Hill to state capitols and city halls.

    Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards, in a conference call with reporters after the June 27 announcement, called the decision an enormous victory for women.

    And Teri Huyck, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, said, “We applaud the court’s ruling affirming that abortion is a decision that should be between a woman and her doctor and a decision that should be made without politicians interfering.

    “Yet, today’s victory does not undo the past five years of damage and restrictions already written into law. No woman or doctor should be punished for receiving or providing essential medical care.”

    On the opposing side, Judie Brown of the American Life League responded to the court decision with a call to escalate anti-choice campaigns. She said the decision “serves as a blaring wake-up call to the mainstream pro-life movement that dinking and dithering over regulating the killing can never serve as a replacement for the fundamental battle that is not being fought — the battle for the recognition that every innocent preborn human being is a unique person from the moment of his biological beginning.”

    The impact

    Within hours of the court ruling, the Alabama attorney general announced the state would not defend its admitting-privileges requirements.

    Then, on June 28, the Supreme Court rejected appeals from Wisconsin and Mississippi.

    “The Supreme Court’s decision today denying cert in Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin v. Schimel is not surprising given the court’s decision yesterday in a similar Texas abortion law case,” said Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel in a statement to the press. “The opinion of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals stands and those portions of our law addressed by the decision are now permanently enjoined.”

    Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin said the court’s rejection of the appeal means the case is over and Republicans’ admitting-privileges restrictions are permanently blocked.

    Planned Parenthood was involved in the lawsuit, along with Affiliated Medical Services. They were represented by attorneys from Cullen Weston Pines and Bach, Planned Parenthood Federation of America and the ACLU.

    “We are pleased the Supreme Court recognized the true intention behind this law,” said Tanya Atkinson, executive director of PPAW. “Gov. Walker’s relentless pursuit and defense of unconstitutional laws clearly show just how much elections matter. We need to elect leaders who understand that abortion is a deeply personal decision that a woman should be able to make in consultation with her family, her faith and her health care provider — without government interference.”

    At WiG press time, other states with admitting-privilege requirements included Missouri, North Dakota and Tennessee, where they were in force, and Kansas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, where they were on hold.

    Other states with laws requiring clinics to follow hospital-like surgery center standards include Michigan, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Tennessee.

    Planned Parenthood’s Richards said the ruling in Whole Woman’s Health was just the beginning:

    “This decision has opened the door to go state by state, legislature by legislature, law by law, and restore access to safe, legal abortion.”

  • Supreme Court deadlocks on immigration case

    Supreme Court deadlocks on immigration case

    Karla Cano faces uncertainty. She had expected to qualify for deferred action under the Obama administration’s executive orders on immigration. But a tied decision by the U.S. Supreme Court creates uncertainty for Cano and her family.

    “All that is unjust about my situation will continue,” said Cano, 21, a senior at Mount Mary University and the mother of a 2-year-old son.

    “I am in college so I can have a career helping others, but I cannot start a career like that without work authorization,” she said. “We just want to help this country and support our families like anyone else.”

    The court, on June 23, deadlocked on President Barack Obama’s executive actions taken to shield millions living in the United States from deportation.

    The 4–4 tie means the next president and a new Congress will determine any change in U.S. immigration policy. The president said the court’s deadlock “takes us further from the country we aspire to be.”

    Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for president, called the court ruling unacceptable and pledged to “do everything possible under the law to go further to protect families.”

    The dispute before the eight justices — the case was heard in April, after the death of Antonin Scalia — was over the legality of the administration’s orders creating “deferred action for parents of Americans and lawful permanent residents” or DAPA and expanding “deferred action for childhood arrivals” or DACA.

    Basically, the actions would have protected from deportation and provided three-year work permits to about 5 million undocumented parents of U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, as well as undocumented people who came to the United States before the age of 16.

    The president announced the orders in 2014 and, soon after, they were challenged by 26 states led by Republican governors, including Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

    Federal district and appeals courts sided with the states and said the executive office lacked the authority to issue orders shielding immigrants from deportation.

    The high court tie means the appeals court ruling stands. But the ruling in United States v. Texas did not set any landmark standards in the dispute over immigration.

    The U.S. Justice Department brought the case to the Supreme Court, seeking to overturn the appeals court decision.

    The American Civil Liberties Union was among the many groups to file a friend-of-the-court brief in the case.

    Cecillia Wang, director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, said, the “4–4 tie has a profound impact on millions of American families whose lives will remain in limbo and who will now continue the fight. In setting the DAPA guidelines, President Obama exercised the same prosecutorial discretion his predecessors have wielded without controversy and ultimately the courts should hold that the action was lawful.”

    Reaction from the U.S. progressive community was swift and compassionate.

    “This split decision deals a severe blow to millions of immigrant families who have already been waiting more than 18 months for the DAPA and DACA programs to be implemented,” said Alianza Americas’ executive director Oscar Chacón. “The cold fact is that millions of parents and children will go to bed tonight knowing once again that their families could be torn apart at any moment.”

    At the Center for Popular Democracy, co-executive director Ana Maria Archila said, “If the highest court in the land cannot find a majority for justice and compassion, there is something truly broken in our system of laws, checks and balances.”

    In Wisconsin, Voces de la Frontera held news conferences in Green Bay, Madison and Milwaukee. LULAC, Centro Hispano and the Southside Organizing Committee also were involved.

    “This is very sad for me,” said Jose Flores, a factory worker, father of four and also the president of Voces de la Frontera. “I have been waiting and fighting for reform like DAPA for years. But we are not giving up. I refuse … to shrink back into the shadows.”

    Cano, a member of Voces de la Frontera, said, “I am not giving up on the struggle. We need more people to get involved in the upcoming elections, because this decision shows the importance of both the presidential and U.S. congressional elections and who the next president will nominate to the U.S. Supreme Court.”

  • House Democrats stage sit-in, demand vote on gun control

    House Democrats stage sit-in, demand vote on gun control

    Democrats staged a 1960s-style sit-in on the U.S. House floor June 22–23, chanting, “No bill. No Break.” The protest was intended to call attention to Republicans’ inaction against gun violence in the wake of the largest mass shooting in modern history at a gay dance club in Orlando.

    House Speaker Paul Ryan responded by shutting off all public access to the scene.

    “Speaker Ryan may have turned off the floor cameras in an attempt to silence us, but we will continue to stand up and give a voice to the majority of Americans who demand commonsense gun safety reforms,” said U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison.

    U.S. Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, a longtime veteran of the civil rights movement, organized the protest along with Reps. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts and David Cicilline of Rhode Island.

    In the hours that Democrats held the floor, they spoke about an epidemic of violence in the United States. With the blackout on C-SPAN’s coverage — the service does not control the floor cameras — members took videos of each other to share on social media.

    California Democrat Eric Swalwell videotaped New York Congressman Jerrold Nadler’s speech, delivered at about 2 a.m. June 23.

    “No other country in the world, other than those involved in active wars, have gun deaths more than three digits,” Nadler said. … We have 33,000 a year. We’re told this is because of insanity. Because we have mentally ill people. But we don’t have thousands of times more mentally ill people than other countries.”

    Nadler said if House Republicans refuse to pass an assault weapons ban or prohibit large capacity clips, they could at least close the loopholes in background checks and bar people on the no-fly list from gun purchases.

    Ryan dismissed the sit-in as a political stunt.

    He also dismissed the idea of “no fly, no buy,” saying it would deprive people of due process and the constitutional right to possess guns.

    Meanwhile, in the U.S. Senate, Democrats continued to press for reform even after failed votes on measures to expand background checks and keep people on the no-fly list from getting guns.

    President Barack Obama and presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton echoed the calls for tighter gun laws. Clinton, early in her campaign, made enacting gun control measures a priority.

    Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee for president, suggested the solution to gun violence is arming more people with guns.

    “It’s too bad that some of the young people that were killed over the weekend didn’t have guns, you know, attached to their hips, and you know where bullets could have flown in the opposite direction,” Trump told radio host Howie Carr on June 13, the day after the shooting in Orlando. Later, Trump said he was referring to guards and employees.

    Chad Griffin, the president and CEO of the Human Rights Campaign, said the shooting was a “toxic combination of two things: a deranged, unstable individual who had been conditioned to hate people and easy access to military-style guns.”

    HRC is the nation’s largest LGBT civil rights group. In late June, its board of directors adopted a resolution on gun control measures, an unprecedented move for the group.

    Americans are divided on gun control.

    Polls put those favoring gun control over gun rights at about 50 percent, down from 57 percent in 2000. Those who favor gun rights over gun control increased from about 29 percent in 2000 to 47 percent in 2015.

    When particular gun control steps are considered, however, the picture changes. A Pew poll conducted last August showed:

    • 85 percent of people support background checks for purchases at gun shows and in private sales.

    • 79 percent support laws to prevent the mentally ill from buying guns.

    • 70 percent support a federal database to track gun sales.

    • 57 percent support a ban on assault weapons.

    “Congress can’t even pass mild, commonsense gun control legislation supported by vast majorities of Americans,” said Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the activist group CODEPINK, which recently staged a die-in at NRA headquarters in Fairfax, Virginia. “The stranglehold the NRA has on our elected officials is breathtaking, and its effects are devastating to our families and communities.”

    Big bucks for big guns

    Gun rights groups contributed $33,925 to U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, who is running for re-election in Wisconsin against Democrat Russ Feingold.

    The No. 2 payout was to U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, whose campaign has received $29,295 from gun rights groups, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

    Since the start of 2015, Senate Republicans have received $304,319 from gun rights groups. During that same period, Democrats have received $7,250.

  • Terror in the ‘Happiest Place on Earth’

    Terror in the ‘Happiest Place on Earth’

    An act of terror.

    An act of hate.

    The world responded with love and compassion, fury and fight.

    Early on the morning of June 12, a gunman armed with an assault rifle and a handgun went on a rampage at the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando, Florida. He killed 49 people and wounded more than 50 others — some gravely.

    The 29-year-old killer was an American who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, abused his wife, used slurs against blacks, Jewish people, women and gays — although he himself was a regular patron of Pulse. He went on to terrorize LGBT people in that place that existed to celebrate Pride and provide sanctuary.

    Orlando — famously known as the “Happiest Place on Earth” — became the site of the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, a massacre that left Americans mourning the many lost and struggling to address extremism, prejudice and gun access.

    “I can’t stop crying. I can’t make any sense of it all,” said Henry Rivera of Orlando, a transgender man who works at a restaurant just outside Disney World. “Everything seems different now.”

    Music, dancing, and terror

    On June 11, more than 300 people crowded into the high-energy club on South Orange Avenue for Latin night, an evening that promised entertainment by two drag performers, as well as dancing and music — salsa, meringue, bachata.

    Shortly after 2 a.m. on June 12, Omar Mateen, armed with a semi-automatic rifle and a Glock handgun, attacked the club, according to reports from the Orlando Police Department and FBI. As WiG to press, authorities were still compiling a detailed and complete timeline of what happened at Pulse.

    Survivors described chaos as Mateen launched a barrage of bullets, striking people at the bar, on the dance floor, in the restrooms and elsewhere.

    An off-duty Orlando police officer working as a security guard at the club responded to the gunfire. More officers arrived and Mateen retreated deeper into the club, then into a bathroom.

    At 2:09 a.m., an alert was posted on Pulse’s Facebook page: “Everyone get out of Pulse and keep running.”

    Dozens of people ran from the club, and more than 100 police officers responded to what became a standoff.

    Police believe Mateen killed most of his victims in the first 30 minutes. Those remaining in the bar were either hostages or in hiding.

    At 2:39 a.m., Eddie Justice texted his mother from the bathroom in the club:

    “Call them mommy”

    “Now”

    “I’m still in the bathroom”

    “Hes coming”

    “Im going to die.”

    Justice did die. His last text from the club was at 2:50 a.m.

    At about 5 a.m., police used a controlled explosion and an armored vehicle with a battering ram to clear a way for people inside the club to escape.

    Mateen died in an exchange of gunfire with police shortly after that.

    Violent, conflicted and radicalized

    The killer talked with police three times during the standoff, FBI Director James B. Comey said in a televised news briefing from headquarters in Virginia on June 13. Comey said calls from the killer to law enforcement began about 2:30 a.m. During those calls, Mateen, who was born in New York, claimed allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State, as well as to the perpetrators of the 2013 Boston Marathon attack and to a Florida man who died as a suicide bomber in Syria.

    “These are strong indications of radicalization by this killer and of potential inspiration by foreign terrorism organizations,” Comey said.

    He added that the bureau, along with state and local law enforcement, were trying to understand “every moment of the killer’s path” leading up to the shooting.

    The FBI was already familiar with Mateen. In May 2013, the bureau began investigating him after co-workers said the contract security guard made inflammatory comments and claimed a family connection to al-Qaida. He was interviewed twice but the case was closed.

    Two months later, Mateen’s name came up as a casual acquaintance of a Florida man who blew himself up in Syria.

    “Our investigation turned up no ties of any consequence between the two of them,” Comey said. “We will continue to look forward in this investigation and backward. We will leave no stone unturned.”

    According to AP, the investigation found that Mateen, the son of an Afghan immigrant, was a bodybuilder who attended a mosque in Fort Pierce, Florida, and wanted to become a police officer.

    AP also reported questions were emerging about whether Mateen was conflicted about his sexuality. He allegedly cased Gay Days at Disney World about a week before the shooting and was seen regularly at Pulse. He apparently used gay dating apps as well.

    Mateen’s first wife, from whom he was divorced, has said he was abusive and suffered from mental illness. The killer’s father said Mateen expressed a hatred of gays, recently expressing anger at seeing two men kiss.

    Mateen’s father also made homophobic remarks to the press, saying that it was wrong for his son to shoot gay people because their punishment should come from God.

    “While the motive behind this crime remains unclear, our resolve to live openly and proudly remains undiminished. Now is a time for the whole nation to stand together against violence,” Rea Carey, the executive director of the National LGBTQ Task Force, said June 12.

    Chad Griffin, the president and CEO of the Human Rights Campaign, said, “This tragedy has occurred as our community celebrates Pride, and now more than ever we must come together as a nation to affirm that love conquers hate.”

    Memorials and mobilizing

    Vigils took place as early as June 12 and continued for days after the shooting.

    Many of the observances included a moment of silence and a reading of the victims’ names (see “The slain, next page). Many vigils ended with candleholders singing “Over the Rainbow.”

    Hundreds sang, “If happy little bluebirds fly/Beyond the rainbow, why, oh, why can’t I?” at the end of a vigil June 13 in Sarasota, Florida, the hometown of Edward Sotomayor Jr., who recently helped to organize the first LGBT cruise from Florida to Cuba. Sotomayor was shot while trying to get his boyfriend to safety.

    Many at the Sarasota vigil called the mass shooting a hate crime, and though there were demands for stricter gun control, the focus was on anti-LGBT violence.

    “This attack was with guns, but our people have been killed with knives and bombs and fists, too,” said Patricia Callahan of Lakeland, Florida. “We can’t forget.”

    Vigils took place across the country, at city halls and courthouses, plazas and parks, community centers and gay bars.

    “This unimaginable atrocity has not only robbed countless people of their loved ones, it has also stolen a sense of safety within the LGBTQ community,” said GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis.

    In New York City, many gathered outside the Stonewall Inn, considered the birthplace of the modern LGBT civil rights movement. There, they chanted, “No hate, no hate! More love, more love.”

    In Wisconsin, multiple vigils took place, including in Milwaukee, Madison, Racine and Appleton.

    There also were many memorials outside the United States. In Paris, U.S. and gay Pride flags flew at city hall and the Eiffel Tower was lit up like a rainbow.

    Heads of state sent letters of condolence and issued condemnations. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said his country stands “shoulder to shoulder with our American brothers and sisters,” and Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah called the shooting a “senseless act of terror and hate.”

    Afghanistan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah urged “collective actions to end such attacks.”

    At the United Nations, High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein decried insufficient gun control in the United States and criticized the irresponsible pro-gun propagandizing in the country.

    ‘America’s rifle’

    Criticism also was leveled in the United States.

    The massacre is “a further reminder of how easy it is for someone to get their hands on a weapon that lets them shoot people in a school, or in a house of worship or in a movie theater or in a nightclub,” President Barack Obama said June 12, in remarks from the White House. “And we have to decide if that’s the kind of country we want to be.”

    Mateen was armed with the handgun and a Sig Sauer MCX semi-automatic rifle — marketed in the U.S. as a “modern sporting rifle.” He purchased it at the St. Lucie Shooting Center in Florida. Semi-automatic rifles also were used in mass shootings in Newtown, Connecticut; Aurora, Colorado; San Bernardino, California; and elsewhere. The NRA calls that weapon class “America’ rifle.”

    After the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, the president dedicated the start of his second term to pushing legislation that would have banned certain assault-style weapons and capped the size of ammunition clips. The effort, however, failed in the U.S. Senate due to heavy opposition from Republicans who are backed by the National Rifle Association.

    In the years since, some reforms have taken place at the state level. But GOP-headed states, including Wisconsin, have enacted measures to weaken gun control laws.

    On June 13, Senate Democrats renewed calls for reform and Hillary Clinton, the Democrats’ presumptive nominee for president, repeated her call to keep weapons of war off the streets and “out of the hands of terrorists or other violent criminals.”

    Clinton and the president postponed a campaign visit to Green Bay scheduled for June 15, as the president made plans to visit Orlando on June 16 to “stand in solidarity with the community.”

    The slain

    As WiG went to press, these were the known dead in the Pulse terror attack:

    Stanley Almodovar III, 23; Amanda Alvear, 25; Oscar A. Aracena-Montero, 26; Rodolfo Ayala-Ayala, 33; Antonio Davon Brown, 29; Darryl Roman Burt II, 29; Angel L. Candelario-Padro, 28; Juan Chevez-Martinez, 25; Luis Daniel Conde, 39; Cory James Connell, 21; Tevin Eugene Crosby, 25; Deonka Deidra Drayton, 32; Simon Adrian Carrillo Fernandez, 31; Leroy Valentin Fernandez, 25; Mercedez Marisol Flores, 26; Peter O. Gonzalez-Cruz, 22; Juan Ramon Guerrero, 22; Paul Terrell Henry, 41; Frank Hernandez, 27; Javier Jorge-Reyes, 40; Jason Benjamin Josaphat, 19; Eddie Jamoldroy Justice, 30; Anthony Luis Laureanodisla, 25; Christopher Andrew Leinonen, 32; Alejandro Barrios Martinez, 21; Brenda Lee Marquez McCool, 49; Gilberto Ramon Silva Menendez, 25; Kimberly Morris, 37; Akyra Monet Murray, 18; Luis Omar Ocasio-Capo, 20; Geraldo A. Ortiz-Jimenez, 25; Eric Ivan Ortiz-Rivera, 36; Joel Rayon Paniagua, 32; Jean Carlos Mendez Perez, 35; Enrique L. Rios, Jr., 25; Jean C. Nives Rodriguez, 27; Xavier Emmanuel Serrano Rosado, 35; Christopher Joseph Sanfeliz, 24; Yilmary Rodriguez Solivan, 24; Edward Sotomayor Jr., 34; Shane Evan Tomlinson, 33; Martin Benitez Torres, 33; Jonathan Antonio Camuy Vega, 24; Juan P. Rivera Velazquez, 37; Luis S. Vielma, 22; Franky Jimmy Dejesus Velazquez, 50; Luis Daniel Wilson-Leon, 37; Jerald Arthur Wright, 31.

    Donations and support

    Equality Florida, the statewide LGBT civil rights group, established a GoFundMe page to raise money to support those injured and the families of those killed at Pulse. Donations are accepted at www.gofundme.com/pulsevictimsfund.

    The Associated Press contributed to these reports.

    For updates and continued coverage, go to www.wisconsingazette.com.

  • Voters go to court over ‘worst partisan gerrymander’

    Voters go to court over ‘worst partisan gerrymander’

    A dozen Wisconsin voters and their attorneys will go to federal court in May to present their case challenging one of the worst partisan gerrymanders in modern American history.

    They count among their supporters Republican and Democratic politicians, good-government forces, First Amendment advocates, progressive philanthropists and fellow citizens who want their votes to count.

    To trial

    A four-day trial is set to begin May 24 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin over Act 43, the state’s 2012 redistricting plan for the Wisconsin Assembly.

    The crux of the complaint, Whitford v. Nichol, is that the 2012 map was drawn unconstitutionally in a way to keep Republican control of the state Legislature and minimize Democratic influence.

    “The plaintiffs look forward to presenting evidence at trial showing that the plan was drawn in secret, in consultation with a political scientist and without any input from Democrats, in an attempt to maximize Republican wins and minimize Democratic influence over the political process for as long as the plan was in place,” stated Gerry Hebert, executive director of the Campaign Legal Center, the co-counsel in the case against the state.

    The outcome of the case could have far-reaching consequences in Wisconsin, as well as chart challenges to redistricting maps in other states and guide the drafting and adoption of fair maps.

    The case likely will reach the U.S. Supreme Court, which has said excessive partisan gerrymandering is unconstitutional but has yet to develop a judicially manageable standard for courts to decide such cases.

    The plaintiffs, their attorneys and their expert witnesses think they have the standard — and this is what both sides will focus on at the trial.

    The plaintiffs are Democrats William Whitford, Roger Anclam, Emily Bunting, Mary Lynne Donohue, Helen Harris, Wayne Jensen, Wendy Sue Johnson, Janet Mitchell, Allison Seaton, James Seaton, Jerome Wallace and Donald Winter.

    Their legal team includes the CLC, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that works on campaign finance, voting rights and government ethics.

    The effort draws strong support from the Fair Elections Project, co-chaired by former Sen. Dale Schultz, a longtime leader in the Republican Party, and Democratic Sen. Tim Cullen.

    “We want the practice to end,” said FEP director Sachin Chheda. “This is a nonpartisan effort and we are starting in Wisconsin because the most egregious example is in Wisconsin.”

    The defendants are Gerald C. Nichol, Thomas Barland, John Franke, Harold V. Froehlich, Kevin J. Kennedy, Elsa Lamelas and Timothy Vocke as members of the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board.

    The plaintiffs, as summarized by the federal district court, allege:

    • Wisconsin Act 43, the 2012 redistricting plan for the Wisconsin Assembly, is an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander, “one of the worst partisan gerrymanders in modern American history.”

    • The redistricting plan was adopted and implemented in violation of the Equal Protection Clause with the intent to discriminate by benefiting one party and disadvantaging another.

    • Republicans were successful in their attempt to maximize their influence and minimize Democratic influence with the gerrymander with GOP gains in Assembly seats in 2012 and 2014.

    “There’s always going to be some measure of partisan influence,” Chheda said. “But if it goes too far, if it is just too much, we believe that is unconstitutional.

    “Our view is that this map is unconstitutional and people’s rights are being violated. It’s not fair.”

    Motions denied

    The state filed a motion seeking to dismiss the complaint, which the court denied in December 2015 after determining the plaintiffs’ allegations were sufficient to state a plausible claim for relief.

    The state also filed a motion for summary judgment, which was denied after considering: Are challenges to a partisan gerrymander justiciable? Do plaintiffs have standing to sue? Have plaintiffs stated a plausible claim for relief?

    The court answered yes to those questions.

    “In denying Wisconsin’s motion for summary judgment and setting the case for trial … the three-judge court has left it to us to develop a workable standard that reflects a voter’s right to fair and effective representation,” Ruth Greenwood, senior redistricting counsel for the CLC, stated in a news release. “And that’s exactly what we plan to do.”

    Cracking and packing

    There are some buzzwords trial-watchers will hear and read about: “cracking,” “packing” and “efficiency gap.”

    The efficiency gap, the challengers contend, is a tool or figure showing the difference between parties’ “wasted votes” in an election. High school civics teachers and get-out-the-vote advocates may tell people every vote counts, but the plaintiffs in Whitford maintain a lot of votes are wasted under the Wisconsin legislative map.

    A vote, in their argument, is wasted if it is cast for a candidate who lost the election or cast for the winning candidate in excess of what the candidate needed to win.

    The efficiency gap, when applied to an election, measures the difference between the parties’ total wasted votes among all of the districts, divided by the total number of votes cast.

    And the gap, the plaintiffs maintain, reveals the extent to which voters of a party are “packed” and “cracked.” Packing is concentrating one party’s supporters in a few districts, so they win by overwhelming margins. Cracking is dividing a party’s supporters among multiple districts so they fall short ofa majority in each one.

    Chheda pointed to the assembly results in recent elections.

    In 2010, before redistricting, Republicans won a decisive victory and converted that win into seats.

    Two years later, when Wisconsin elected Democrat Tammy Baldwin to the U.S. Senate and re-elected Barack Obama, voters went Democratic in legislative races as well.

    “The Democrats won a smashing victory,” Chheda said. And yet, he said, the Republicans kept their seats because of the new map.

    The map’s challengers argue a high level of packing and cracking, and thus a large efficiency gap, demonstrates discrimination. “The plaintiffs have a very good intellectual argument,” said Schultz. “This is about watering down the value of the vote, about wasting a vote.”

    The court has said that if the plaintiffs can prove discriminatory intent and effect during the trial, then the state must prove the map’s “severe asymmetry” was unavoidable because of the “state’s legitimate political geography and legitimate redistricting objectives.”

    After trial

    Whichever party loses at trial likely will appeal, making the U.S. Supreme Court the body that will decide whether the map stays or goes.

    The map’s challengers have said similar cases could be filed in other states, and they’ve stressed that both major political parties have engaged in partisan gerrymandering.

    Beyond the courthouse, fair-election proponents and good-government forces are working to change the redistricting process in Wisconsin.

    “The lawsuit doesn’t address the process,” said Chheda. “It addresses the standard. Other folks, including our co-chairs, are advocating reforms to the redistricting process.”

    “People ought to be empowered to choose their representative,” said Schultz, who said partisan redistricting, among other efforts to minimize voter influence, is one reason for intense public anger and animosity in 2016.

    “People aren’t dumb,” he said. “They have figured out they have been disenfranchised.”

    For more information

    To learn more about fair elections and the lawsuit, go to fairelectionsproject.org and campaignlegalcenter.org.

  • Wise words: Commencement season to begin

    Students may be shaking spring-break sand from their flip-flops, but commencement celebrations are just weeks away for colleges and universities.

    Many Wisconsin colleges and universities — public and private — plan commencement ceremonies in May and are lining up speakers.

    NFL quarterback Russell Wilson will deliver the spring commencement address on May 14 at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

    “It’s an honor to be asked to speak at any commencement ceremony, but I’m particularly excited to return to a place where I have so many great memories,” said the Super Bowl-winning Seahawk, who attended UW-Madison.

    Also in Madison, former Attorney General Eric Holder will give the keynote at the University of Wisconsin Law School hooding ceremony on May 13. “I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to talk to these graduates about the road ahead,” Holder said in a news release. “And I hope by sharing some of my own experiences, they see that it’s a big world just waiting for them to make a positive impact.”

    On May 22, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., will address the graduating class at Carthage College in Kenosha, while alumna Judith Mayotte, a TV producer and humanitarian, will deliver the keynote the same day at Marquette University.

    At Ripon College on May 15, the class of 2016 will hear from soccer coach Pia Sundhage, who led the U.S. women’s team to two Olympic gold medals.

    Elsewhere, graduates of 2016 will hear from Vice President Joe Biden, who will deliver commencement addresses at the U.S. Military Academy, Delaware State University and Syracuse University’s College of Law.

    First lady Michele Obama will address graduating seniors at Jackson State University in Mississippi, as well as City College of New York and the Santa Fe Indian School in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

    Other speakers scheduled for commencements this spring include Kareem Abdul-Jabbar at Drew University, Oliver Stone at the University of Connecticut, Ryan Seacrest at the University of Georgia, Hoda Kotb at Tulane, Spike Lee at John Hopkins, Hank Azaria at Tufts, Steven Spielberg at Harvard, Matt Damon at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, James Franco at Cornell, Bill Moyers at Rutgers, Ken Burns at Stanford and Seth Meyers at Northwestern.

    WiG ushers in the commencement season with a look at wise words delivered to previous graduating classes.

    Some favorites:

    • Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s address at Harrow School in 1941: “Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never — in nothing, great or small, large or petty — never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense.”

    • President John F. Kennedy’s address at American University in 1963: “No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable.”

    • Tennis legend Billie Jean King’s address at the University of Massachusetts in 2000: “The most important words that have helped me in life when things have gone right or when things have gone wrong are ‘accept responsibility.’”

    • Apple founder Steve Jobs’ address at Stanford in 2005: “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.”

    • Actor and politician Arnold Schwarzenegger’s address at the University of Southern California in 2009: “You can’t climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.”

    • Country singer Dolly Parton’s commencement address at the University of Tennessee in 2009: “Now I usually try not to give advice. Information, yes, advice no. But what has worked for me may not work for you. Well, take for instance what has worked for me. Wigs. Tight clothes. Pushup bras.”

    • President Barack Obama’s address at Arizona State University in 2009: “A relentless focus on the outward markers of success can lead to complacency. It can make you lazy.”

    Commence career search

    College graduates from the class of 2016 face sunnier prospects in the job market than those who graduated a year ago, according to a new report from the National Association of Colleges and Employers.

    The report shows employers expect to hire 5.2 percent more new graduates than they hired in 2015.

    Another report, released by an institute at Michigan State University, estimated national employers would hire 15 percent more graduates with bachelor’s degrees in 2016 than in 2015.

    Additionally, about 80 percent of the employers that answered the MSU survey described the U.S. labor market for college graduates as “good” to “excellent.”

    — L.N.

  • Birding for bigger budgets: Wisconsin birdathon benefits conservation programs

    Those who venture into the woods on a weekend in May might spot an “Old Coot” or a “Lower Chippewa River Titmouseketeer.” These are not new species to add to the Sibley Guide to Birds, but rather team players in the Great Wisconsin Birdathon, an annual event that brings hundreds of birders outdoors for spring scoping and raises money for conservation programs in the state.

    The slogan: see a bird, save a bird.

    The goal is to raise $70,000, according to the Natural Resources Foundation of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Bird Conservation Initiative.

    Birders — there are no restrictions on experience levels — join a team or create a team online and then find sponsors to pledge to donate for each species a team sees during 24 hours.

    “It’s like a walkathon but with birds instead of miles,” says Diane Packett, whose role as birdathon coordinator is to manage the website, recruit participants and help as many as 100 teams get set up to raise money and count birds.

    Some teams got out as early as April 15, but the event continues through June 15.

    Among the participants are eight teams of hotshot birders to raise $30,000:

    • Lake Superior eBirders in Ashland and Bayfield counties, who last year counted 161 species.
    • Madison Green Team of Dane County, who travel by bike, foot and kayak in search of birds at the UW Arboretum, Dunn’s Marsh, along the Capital City Bike Trail, in the Nine-Springs Wetlands and elsewhere.
    • Cutright’s Old Coots, whose territory includes Ozaukee, Sheboygan, Fond du Lac and Dodge counties and who participate in honor of Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame member Noel Cutright.

    Other celebrated teams include Curlew & Screech representing Columbia, Dane, Iowa, Sauk, Richland, Grant and Crawford counties; Secretary Birds of Door County and Green Bay; WSO Tessen Team of the Green Lake region; MotMotley Crew of Dodge County and the Titmouseketeers of Eau Claire, Dunn and Buffalo counties.

    “The signature teams include the state’s most serious birders, but the Great Wisconsin Birdathon can be great fun for everyone, no matter what skill level,” says Ruth Oppedahl, executive director of the NRFW. “Birding in your backyard for just a few hours is a wonderful way to learn about Wisconsin’s birds, while also taking action to help conserve them.”

    Packett says, “You can make the birdathon whatever you want. We have someone who does the birdathon from his backyard. Some people spend half a day. Some people start at midnight and drive around the state.”

    Students also get involved, including a grade-school class that identifies species on a neighborhood walk.

    “A lot of people think it is a great big species competition,” said Packett. “It can be. But it doesn’t have to be.”

    The birdathon benefits the Bird Protection Fund, which supports the Wisconsin Breeding Bird Atlas II, Osa Conservation and the recovery of whooping cranes and the Kirtland’s warbler.

    Get involved

    The Great Wisconsin Birdathon continues through June 15, a partnership between the Natural Resources Foundation of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Bird Conservation Initiative. To create or join a team or pledge to a team, visit wibirdathon.org.

  • Growing hemp, seeding a market for farmers and consumers

    “Hemp for victory” once was a rallying cry in the United States, back when Wisconsin dominated the hemp industry.

    The market for the 12-foot-tall plants was strong a century ago and reached its height during World War II, when Wisconsin led the nation in producing hemp for rope and twine. Growers in Fond du Lac, Green Lake, Dodge and Racine counties supplied the crop, and a mill owner in Waupon held the title of “America’s Hemp King.”

    What’s left of the glory?

    The cultivation of hemp in Wisconsin slowed dramatically with the development of synthetic fiber, but its death knell came in 1970. That’s when the federal government classified any amount of THC — a chemical compound found in both hemp and pot — as an illegal substance, thus killing the hemp industry. But hemp may soon make a comeback.

    FEDERAL FARM BILL

    The Agricultural Act of 2014, which President Barack Obama signed Feb. 7, 2014, contained a so-called “Hemp Amendment,” which allows states to work with higher-education research institutions to create programs for the growth, cultivation and marketing of industrial hemp. With the amendment, the federal government created a definition of industrial hemp so that it would not be confused with its cousin, marijuana.

    To capitalize on the Hemp Amendment, a state’s statutes must allow for hemp farming.

    Kentucky has become a leader on that front. Also, some farmers in Colorado started harvesting hemp in 2013, followed a year later by farmers in Vermont and then farmers in Oregon last winter.

    North Carolina is one of the most recent states to join the movement, enacting a law in October that says, “It is in the best interest of the citizens … to promote and encourage the development of an industrial hemp industry in the state in order to expand employment, promote economic activity and provide opportunities to small farmers for an environmentally sustainable and profitable use of crop lands that might otherwise be lost to agricultural production.”

    However, Wisconsin is not a hemp player.

    Not yet, anyway.

    MOVEMENT IN WISCONSIN

    It’s unlikely the state will produce another hemp king or queen, but Wisconsin could become a significant grower of the potentially big-money crop.

    “The 2014 Farm Bill gave states the authority to begin the process of legalizing industrial hemp,” said Wisconsin Rep. Dave Considine, a Democrat from Baraboo. “Now we’re looking to get something passed and get something going. … We’re vastly behind other states in the Midwest.”

    In the 2015–16 session, Considine introduced a bill to create a research-based hemp farming program in Wisconsin. The bill died in committee, but he plans to reintroduce the legislation in the next session.

    “A lot of people know of industrial hemp as a source of fiber, but that is not all by any means,” Considine said. “For one, it is an extremely popular source of Omega-3. It’s an amazing source of really good fatty acids that we need in our diet.”

    Considine’s bill would create a licensing program under the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection and in partnership with research institutions. The license holders would plant, cultivate, grow, harvest, process, possess and deliver industrial hemp — Cannabis sativa with no more than 0.3 percent THC.

    “What the bill does is allow a university to come up with research. The first step is to make sure we have the right team to grow industrial hemp,” said the Democrat, who represents the 81st Assembly District in western Sauk County.

    “I have a very strong agricultural district,” Considine said. “Really productive land and people doing a lot of good things.”

    He noted the district has many farmers interested in “alternative cropping” and emphasized Wisconsin once was the “No. 1 producer of hemp.”

    The bill didn’t get a hearing in the session that ended in March, yet the proposal would seem to have wide appeal. National polls show support for such measures among Republicans and Democrats, farmers and hippies, conservationists and corporations, Libertarians and Greens, city dwellers and country folk.

    Considine said when he reworks the bill for re-introduction, he plans to build grassroots support, as well as line up organizational backing.

    “I’m committed to bringing it back,” he said. “I’m really hoping for the good of our state and the good of our economy that we can get moving.”

    Key to the drive is securing support from the state Farm Bureau Federation.

    Already, Considine has the backing of the Wisconsin Farmers Union, which has a policy stating the organization “joins all major agricultural associations in Wisconsin in supporting legislation to permit research and test plots in Wisconsin.”

    FEDERAL MOVES

    Meanwhile, pending in Congress is comprehensive legislation to legalize industrial hemp farming in the United States by amending the definition of marijuana in the Controlled Substances Act so that it will not include industrial hemp.

    Democrats Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Republicans Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky introduced the bill in the Senate, while Republican Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Democrat Jared Polis of Colorado introduced the House measure.

    Polis has said he’s hopeful Congress will build on the Hemp Amendment and pass the Industrial Hemp Farming Act “to allow this historical American crop to once again thrive on our farmlands.”

    Without passage, farmers still risk being targeted by federal authorities.

    Last October, the Drug Enforcement Administration entered the sovereign lands of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin and destroyed a crop of about 30,000 plants. The tribe had legalized the growing of low-THC non-psychotropic hemp in May 2015, as provided for under the 2014 Farm Bill, and maintains that the DEA improperly destroyed the crop in the raid.

    The U.S. Attorney’s office said the DEA executed federal search warrants on “a large marijuana growing operation on tribal land,” according to a report published by the Associated Press last October.

    Since then, the Menominee Nation has filed a lawsuit asking a federal judge in Milwaukee to uphold the tribe’s right to grow industrial hemp. In February, the tribe filed a motion for summary judgment.

    “This is a straightforward legal question regarding the interpretation of federal law and we believe the court will decide this matter expediently,” Joan Delabreau, the tribe’s chairwoman, stated in a news release. “We are confident that the Farm Bill provisions require the federal government to recognize the Menominee Nation’s rights to cultivate industrial hemp.”

    In another case, a federal judge in late March lifted an injunction prohibiting a South Dakota tribal member from producing industrial hemp. U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Viken observed a “shifting legal landscape” on industrial hemp since the injunction was filed more than a decade ago.

    However, Viken’s order was a narrow ruling and did not resolve the question of whether the Farm Bill allows for growing hemp on Pine Ridge Indian land.

    As legislative and law enforcement actions multiply, here are some key facts about hemp:

    • Hemp and marijuana are of the same plant species — Cannabis sativa — but the two plants are not bred and cultivated in the same way. The level of THC is much, much lower in hemp than in pot. Hemp can’t produce a high, but it can be used to make a handsome shirt or provide nutrition.

    • Hemp stalks produce two types of fiber, according to Vote Hemp, a nonprofit advocacy organization. The outer bast fiber can be processed into long strands and the inner woody core can be processed into chips.

    • The fiber is durable and makes for comfortable and colorfast textiles. It is used in composites or can replace plastics or fiberglass in molded products. The fiber also can be used to make building insulation or paper, while the inner core can be used to make animal bedding or nitrogen-absorbent fertilizer. The stalk even holds promise as an alternative fuel.

    • The hemp seed — a tiny nut that consists of a meaty inner core and a hull — has uses as birdseed and, toasted, as a human snack. But broader uses involve dehulling the seed or crushing the seed for oil, because the inner core contains two essential fatty acids — Omega-3 and Omega-6 — as well as proteins.

    Advocates tout the benefits of hemp seed oil supplements, the culinary value of hemp oil and the cosmetic applications. Even the protein-rich leftover hemp meal has value and is used for animal feed as well as high-protein powders and flours for human consumption.

    The U.S. market for hemp is about $450 million to $600 million a year. But with few exceptions, U.S. growers are not profiting. There is no large-scale industrial hemp production in the U.S. and the U.S. market is dependent on imports for finished hemp products and hemp ingredients. About two dozen other countries export hemp to the United States, including Britain, France, Germany, Spain — and especially Canada. But the U.S. production lag may be about to change.

    Marching in Milwaukee, 420ing in Madison

    Plant the date: The sixth annual Milwaukee Marijuana March assembles at 2 p.m. May 7 at Kilbourn Park, 2300 N. Bremen St.

    A Facebook event page indicated nearly 700 marchers plan to attend the event hosted by Legalize Wisconsin and the Wisconsin chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

    Participants plan to gather in the park at 2 p.m. and march at 4 p.m. Before the march, state Rep. Melissa Sargent, a legislative leader in the effort to decriminalize and legalize marijuana, will address the crowd. Medical marijuana patient Trevor James Sand and his daughter Erica also are set to make comments.

    The event commemorates Global Marijuana March Day.

    Action comes earlier in Madison, where the fourth annual Madison 420 Festival takes place at 4:20 p.m. on April 22 at the Brinklounge, 701 E. Washington Ave.

    Madison NORML and Madison Hempfest present the celebration, featuring The Grasshoppers jamrock band, The Northern Pines Band, Nuggernaut, The Material Boys, Mudroom, Bathtub Spring, The Lower 5th, Gin Mill Hollow, The Woods, Gary David and the Enthusiasts, Deteourious, Flowpoetry and Mission, a Jerry Garcia tribute band.

    The event is a benefit for the Madison chapter of NORML.

    Both events have at least a bit to celebrate. For instance, Democratic lawmakers in Wisconsin pitched multiple reform bills in the 2015–16 session, including a legalization measure authored by Sargent and decriminalization legislation introduced by state Rep. Mandela Barnes and Sen. Chris Larson — all Democrats.

    To date, marijuana reform in Wisconsin has taken place mostly at the local level, with cities such as Madison and Milwaukee relaxing penalties for people found in possession of small amounts of pot.

    Twenty states have enacted laws to stop jailing people for possession of small amounts of marijuana.

    Also, voters in the District of Columbia and four states — Alaska, Colorado, Oregon and Washington — have approved taking marijuana production and sales off the criminal market and instead regulating and taxing the production and retailing of pot. However, marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

    A national Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released March 25 found about 61 percent of those surveyed support legalizing marijuana. Most said they wanted to limit legalization to medical use or place restrictions on the amounts that can be purchased for recreational use.

    — Lisa Neff

  • WiG Endorsement: Hillary Clinton for president

    Without question, Bernie Sanders is mad as hell.

    And so are we angry as we struggle with wages that remain unchanged while living expenses rise and the American Dream seems to fade.

    We bemoan the billions thrown at campaigns to manipulate our minds and lament the popularity of billionaire bigots hurling insults and blame at some of the most vulnerable in our population.

    We’re furious about assaults on reproductive freedom, rising gun violence in our neighborhoods, police brutality on our streets, deportation of colleagues and family, wrongdoing on Wall Street and the continued plundering of our natural resources to fill the pockets of the Koch brothers and their brethren.

    Yes, there’s good reason for Bernie Sanders to be mad as hell. And for us to be mad as hell.

    So we wholeheartedly thank the U.S. senator from Vermont for lighting a fire in our party, inspiring younger people to register and reminding older people of the good old days raising a ruckus. With his demands for economic and environmental justice, Sanders transformed the Occupy Wall Street movement into a campaign to occupy the White House.

    We know we have readers — many readers — who passionately support Sanders and “feel the Bern.” We, too, respect Sanders and we respect your commitment to his campaign.

    We also have readers — many readers — who passionately support Hillary Clinton.

    We respect your commitment to her campaign.

    And we, at WiG, endorse her for president.

    The best candidate

    We believe Hillary Clinton is the best candidate to lead the Democratic Party to victory in a general election contest and she is the only major party candidate who will shatter that glass ceiling over the Oval Office.

    We will not pull back from this historic opportunity — the best candidate for the White House would be the first woman elected to the White House.

    Eight years ago, when Clinton conceded the primary fight to Barack Obama, she said, “As we gather here today in this historic, magnificent building, the 50th woman to leave this Earth is orbiting overhead. If we can blast 50 women into space, we will someday launch a woman into the White House.

    “Although we weren’t able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it’s got about 18 million cracks in it, and the light is shining through like never before, filling us all with the hope and the sure knowledge that the path will be a little easier next time.”

    OK, the path may not be easier, but Clinton has stayed this course and we are with her.

    Bernie Sanders repeatedly has told voters to compare records — that’s records, not messages. We’ve done that and we keep coming around to Clinton — former secretary of state, twice-elected U.S. senator and former first lady of the United States and the state of Arkansas.

    With decades of experience, she knows the problems we face — foreign and domestic — and she offers real solutions, practical policies, workable fixes to progress after this long paralysis in Washington.

    At a time when the Republican Party is doing its most to put forward the candidate with the least experience governing, the Democratic Party must put forward its most experienced and tested candidate.

    To anyone in the party who thinks Clinton isn’t addressing their issues and on a progressive’s side, we direct you to hillaryclinton.com and click on “issues” — the proposals go from treatment and prevention ideas for Alzheimer’s disease to growing workforce opportunities. She’s proposed effective ideas for addressing gun violence and her financial reform proposals show a deep understanding of the crisis. And, as this primary race unfolded, she’s listened and learned, improving her position on trade agreements and taking a stand on Keystone XL.

    Clinton, a master of policy and a devotee of details, knows how to build bipartisanship and move legislation in the Senate. She won approval of more legislation in eight years in the Senate than Sanders did in nearly a decade in that chamber and 16 years in the House.

    These are reasons why Clinton trumps Sanders in endorsements. Dozens of U.S. senators and former senators and more than 100 U.S. representatives. Some might see this as a negative — the spin this election cycle has turned “establishment” into a curse word, like “left” and “liberal” were for so many years. Yet, a presidential candidate is going to need these allies, these establishment folks, to win in November and to govern come January 2017.

    We look also to Clinton’s endorsements from some of our most trusted and valued progressive groups — leading labor, women’s, choice, civil rights, LGBT, immigrant rights and environmental groups have backed her bid.

    And we look to Clinton’s bold, broad community of voters — North and South, young and old, women and men, white and black and Hispanic. We see how she can unite us in what’s certain to be a big and bruising battle for freedom, justice and democracy. The Democratic coalition that grew and blossomed around Barack Obama’s promise of hope still exists — with Hillary Clinton.

    For more on Hillary Clinton, go to hillaryclintoncom.

    For more on Bernie Sanders, go to berniesanders.com.

  • U.S. hunters import 126,000 wildlife ‘trophies’ annually

    U.S. hunters import about 126,000 “wildlife trophies” annually and killed about 1.26 million animals between 2005 and 2014, according to the Humane Society International and The Humane Society of the United States.

    Trophy hunting is the killing of animals for body parts, such as the head and hide, for display or decor rather than for food and sustenance. A recent study examining the motivation for such hunts found that U.S. hunters glamorize the killing of an animal to demonstrate virility, prowess and dominance.

    A report from Humane Society International/Humane Society of the United States titled Trophy Hunting by the Numbers: the United States’ Role in Global Trophy Hunting, uses an analysis of hunting trophy import data obtained from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

    Some findings:

    • Trophies are primarily imported from Canada and South Africa, followed by Namibia, Mexico, Zimbabwe, New Zealand, Tanzania, Argentina, Zambia and Botswana.

    • Trophy hunters most want to kill American black bears, impalas, common wildebeests, greater kudus, gemsboks, springboks and bonteboks.

    • Trophy hunters highly covet the so-called “African big five” — lions, elephants, leopards, white rhinos and buffalo. All of these species, except the African buffalo, are classified as near threatened or vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

    • The U.S. ports of entry that received the most wildlife trophies in the past decade were New York City; Pembina, North Dakota; Chicago; Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas; and Portal, North Dakota.

    “This report clearly shows the dire impact American trophy hunters are having on wildlife in other countries,” said Teresa M. Telecky, director of the wildlife department at HSI.

    She continued, “It’s outrageous that every year hunters take the lives of thousands of animals, many threatened with extinction, just to win a prize and show off. These animals need protection, not to be mounted on a wall. The fact that rare, majestic species are entering the U.S. in large and small ports of entry should alarm lawmakers and the public concerned about trophy hunting.”

    Hunting groups promote the hunts, offering accolades and awards to club members. The largest of these groups, Safari Club International, recently concluded its convention in Las Vegas, where more than 300 mammal hunts for more than 600 animals were auctioned off, and other hunts were arranged privately on the exhibit floor. An African lion trophy hunt can cost $13,500–$49,000. An African elephant hunt can cost $11,000–$70,000.

    SCI often uses the revenue from hunt sales to lobby against wildlife protection measures.

    For certain species, including lions, elephants, leopards and rhinos, the U.S. is the largest trophy-importing country.

    HSI and The HSUS, in a statement on the report, pledged to continue to seek new protection under the U.S. Endangered Species Act for species that meet the criteria for listing.

    The African lion is the latest species to receive ESA protection, after a multi-year effort by animal protection organizations, including HSI and The HSUS.

    The groups are seeking increased ESA protections for species currently listed in a lower category of protection, as was recently done for the African elephant. HSI and The HSUS are also urging corporations — such as Swarovski Optik  — to end sponsorship of trophy-hunting advocacy organizations.

  • Civil liberties groups challenge StingRay surveillance

    Civil liberties groups challenge StingRay surveillance

    A StingRay or cell-site simulator is a surveillance device about the size of a suitcase that acts like a cellphone tower, sending out signals and tricking cellphones in the area into transmitting their locations and other identifying information.

    The device can round up data, collecting information from a suspect’s cellphone and also the phones of others in the area.

    The devices were developed for military use but have been purchased at about $100,000 each and deployed by federal, state and law enforcement agencies.

    The AP recently reported that police records show the technology — used by warrant squads, robbery divisions, and homicide units — has helped catch suspects in kidnappings, rapes, robberies, assaults and murders. The technology has also aided in locating missing persons.

    The ACLU has identified at least 60 agencies in 23 states and the District of Columbia using StingRays. They claim the use of StingRays to track individuals violates the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches.

    LAYERS OF SECRECY

    Much of what is known about StingRays is the result of freedom-of-information requests and lawsuits. The secrecy surrounding the use of StingRays for domestic surveillance is partly due to nondisclosure agreements signed by law enforcement agencies in exchange for the technology from Harris Corporation, the U.S. distributor of the European-developed device.

    One such agreement, signed on Aug. 13, 2013, by the Milwaukee Police Department, details the process and requirements for acquiring “wireless collection equipment.” The agreement reads, “Consistent with the conditions on the equipment authorization to Harris Corporation by the FCC, state and local law enforcement agencies must coordinate with the FBI to complete this nondisclosure agreement prior to acquisition.”

    The agreement maintains that revealing details about StingRays could adversely impact criminal and national security investigations, so “use shall be protected from potential compromise by precluding disclosure … in press releases, in court documents, during judicial hearings or during other public forums or proceedings.”

    In other words: Don’t tell, even if asked.

    In practice, the agreement could prohibit police departments from requesting warrants prior to conducting surveillance.

    The ACLU, the ACLU of Wisconsin and the Electronic Frontier Foundation argue that law enforcement must obtain a warrant from a judge based on probable cause before using real-time cellphone location tracking.

    MILWAUKEE INCIDENT

    A Milwaukee case provides an excellent example of alleged misuse of the technology.

    Damian Patrick was arrested midday on Oct. 28, 2013, after two Milwaukee police officers found him in the passenger seat of a car with a gun at his feet.

    But did the officers locate him legally?

    That question is key to U.S. v. Patrick. The case before the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago involves law enforcement’s alleged use of StingRay tracking technology to follow Patrick and the dispute over whether police need a probable-cause warrant to use such devices.

    “Law enforcement must be required to get a warrant before accessing the vast amount of private information generated by cellphone location records,” said EFF senior attorney Adam Schwartz.

    The ACLU/EFF brief says it appears that MPD used a StingRay to track Patrick’s phone, but concealed that use from Patrick’s defense and the courts.

    Prior to his arrest, Patrick had been under surveillance by MPD and the FBI, according to court documents.  He’d been sitting in the passenger seat of a Chevy Malibu when he was located and then stopped by two MPD officers. They ordered Patrick and a driver out of the vehicle and recovered a semi-automatic gun from the area where Patrick had been seated.

    Patrick was arrested on an outstanding warrant for violating probation and, soon after, was facing a federal charge for possessing a gun.

    Police reports indicated the officers arrested Patrick because of an “unknown source,” but months later, one arresting officer revealed that law enforcement was tracking Patrick’s phone.

    A list of 579 MPD investigations involving the use of StingRays, which was obtained in a public records request, appears to include the Patrick case.

    Authorities, part of a task force working to find probation violators, had secured a judge’s order — but not a warrant —to get Patrick’s cellphone records from Sprint. Defense attorney Chris Donovan, in his appeal, said the order was not sufficient and Patrick’s arrest should be overturned, because the “fruits of this illegal search must be ordered suppressed, specifically the gun that was found lying at his feet when he was arrested.”

    “This is the first time this federal appeals court, whose rulings affect Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, is considering whether citizens have an expectation of privacy in real-time cellphone location records,” said Jennifer Lynch, senior staff attorney with the EFF. “This case comes as we are seeing a groundswell of recognition that this information is private.”

    Lynch said the Wisconsin and Indiana legislatures have prohibited warrantless real-time cell tracking, as do at least nine other states.

    However, federal courts have issued conflicting rulings, which means the Patrick case or another federal dispute may take the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    WHO’S TRACKING AND WHY

    The implications of law enforcement using military-grade surveillance technology are broad. Consider all that a cellphone reveals about a person’s whereabouts and routines: When a person leaves home. Where he goes. Who she meets. Using StingRays, the location data a cellphone sends can be collected by police.

    In mid-February, the New York Civil Liberties Union secured documents through a freedom-of-information request revealing the New York Police Department used StingRays at least 1,016 times between 2008 and May 2015. NYPD used the technology without a written policy on procedure and followed a practice of obtaining lower-court orders rather than warrants.

    “Considering the NYPD’s troubling history of surveilling innocent people, it must at the very least establish strict privacy policies and obtain warrants prior to using intrusive equipment like StingRays,” said Donna Lieberman, NYCLU’s executive director.

    ColorOfChange, a national civil rights group, has condemned police use of StingRay surveillance, maintaining the devices have been used to monitor protesters, especially activists in the Black Lives Matter movement.

    ColorOfChange alleged the use of StingRays to monitor organizers of protests against the police killing of Eric Garner in New York City, as well as the movement of organizers in Ferguson, Missouri, after the police killing of Michael Brown. COC also charges that the devices were used in Baltimore to monitor protesters after the death of Freddie Gray in police custody.

    “We know all too well that unrestricted surveillance power gets disproportionately used against black communities,” said COC executive director Rashad Robinson.

    Robinson said the FCC should use its authority “over StingRay devices to suspend the warrantless use of these devices and require all law enforcement agencies to certify their devices to provide detailed and public policies for their use.”

    Reach Lisa Neff at lmneff@wisconsingazette.com.

  • Eyes in the sky: Drone growth elevates fun, raises privacy concerns

    Eyes in the sky: Drone growth elevates fun, raises privacy concerns

    As many as a million kids and kids-at-heart had their wishes take flight when they unwrapped a drone during the holidays.

    Consumer technology took a turn in 2015 and propelled domestic drones to new heights in popularity in late 2015 and early 2016.

    But policymakers and privacy advocates see gray areas as more and more pilots send their small unmanned aircraft into blue skies.

    More drone pilots than planes

    Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Michael Huerta announced in mid-January that there were more registered drone operators than registered planes in the United States. The FAA reports 320,000 registered manned aircraft and more than 325,000 registered drone owners.

    The number of drones in the United States likely is higher — because operators might own more than one small unmanned aircraft and other operators might not be registered, according to Huerta.

    The FAA launched a Web-based drone registration campaign just before Christmas, anticipating drone sales to skyrocket to a million during the holidays. The agency requires registration by operators of drones weighing more than 0.55 pounds and less than 55 pounds if they plan to fly outdoors for hobby or recreation. Registered drone operators receive a number that must be affixed to their aircraft.

    An FAA exemption program exists for operators of drones for commercial activities — including bridge inspections, movie and television filming, aerial photography, mapping and surveying work, pipeline inspections and first-responder investigation and surveillance activity.

    “The future is really here with drones,” said recreational pilot Kevin Fontaine of Green Bay. “They can be adapted for all kinds of fun and games and also used in all kinds of work. I first heard of them from a photographer friend. He was using a drone outfitted with a camera to make a zombie movie.”

    The zombie flick, Horror in Mount Horeb, hasn’t reached a movie-going audience, but many films and TV programs featuring scenes filmed using drones have shown up on large and small screens.

    “Drones have been instrumental in capturing some of the most iconic cinematography in recent memory,” said Randy Scott Slavin, founder and director of the New York City Drone Film Festival.

    “Drones are the most important cinematic tool since the tripod,” said Slavin, who referenced drone footage for the Oscar-winning opening sequence of Skyfall, the infamous Hamptons party scene in The Wolf of Wall Street and the many landscape images in the Netflix series Narcos.

    This year’s festival — the first such event dedicated to movies filmed using drones — is March 4–6. The final day features “Day of Drones,” with screenings and demonstrations by drone builders and pilots. One activity, “Drone Vision,” provides an opportunity for the curious to strap on a pair of goggles to see what a drone camera sees as it zips around New York City’s Liberty State Park.

    Fontaine said he’d like to refine his drone flying skills to take aerial landscape photographs this spring.

    “I’m still learning how to use it and there’s a lot of potential,” he said. “But for now, it’s a toy.”

    In the toy chest

    Drones can be purchased for less than $50 and more than $500, but most cost $120–$200. They’re wowing consumers and retailers at toy fairs and trade shows.

    At 2016 toy fairs, Odyssey Toys is showcasing the Pocket Drone, a collapsing video drone that’s about the size of an iPhone 6 — light enough and small enough to fit into a pocket. The built-in high-definition camera captures images to a 4GB SD card and the drone, which can be operated indoors or outdoors, features LEDs for night flying.

    Another “wow” at fairs is a toy built for pilots as young as 10 — Spin Master’s Air Hogs Connect: Mission Drone, which combines drone-flying and smartphone gaming.

    “It will be interesting to watch what happens as consumer unmanned aerial vehicle technology continues to evolve,” said Phil Solis, research director at ABI Research. The company monitors the tech market and predicts that consumer drone shipments will exceed 90 million units and generate $4.6 billion in revenues by 2025.

    It also will be interesting to watch what happens with the regulation of drones as consumer, commercial and government use prompts concerns about criminal applications and security breaches, and raises questions about privacy rights.

    Rules and regulations

    In December, the Center for Democracy and Technology proposed a set of voluntary best practices for drone operators, intending to protect privacy rights and support the industry.

    The nonprofit, which advocates civil liberties and a free Internet, recommended:

    • Commercial drone operators establish a privacy policy that describes the purposes for which the drone is used and the types of data the drone collects.

    • Private drone operators should not intentionally use a drone to enter private property without the landowner’s consent.

    • Private drone operators should not use drones to collect personal data without consent where an individual has an expectation of privacy; for persistent monitoring of individuals; or for employment, credit or health-care eligibility.

    • Private drone operators should try to avoid collecting, retaining or disclosing unnecessary personal data without consent. When possible, unnecessary data should be destroyed or de-identified.

    • Commercial drone operators should take basic steps to secure the personal data they collect.

    Federal guidelines established by Congress require that recreational drone operators keep unmanned aircraft in their sight and below 400 feet, stay clear of manned aircraft, remain at least 25 feet away from individuals and vulnerable property, avoid flying and using drugs or alcohol, and avoid photographing people in areas where there is an expectation of privacy.

    Drone pilots also must respect the no-fly zones established by the FAA and, increasingly, under state and local law.

    A focus this legislative season in Wisconsin and elsewhere was on drone use near prisons.

    Drones were deployed to deliver contraband — drugs, pornography, cellphones and weapons — to prisons in Maryland, Ohio and Oklahoma in 2015. In Wisconsin, a pilot lost contact with a drone that landed on the grounds of the Waupun Correctional Institution.

    The incidents prompted lawmakers to take up bills creating no-fly zones.

    Simple steps to directing with a drone

    Randy Scott Slavin, founder and director of the New York City Drone Film Festival, offers five steps to movie-making with a small unmanned aircraft:

    1. Read. Read the operating manual for the drone and read federal regulations and any local and state rules on piloting a drone.

    2. Practice. Drones are unique and have different flight characteristics. The only way to improve as a pilot is to practice.

    3. Shoot. Slavin says “shoot constantly” with drone cameras.

    4. Imagine. Drones put cameras in new places and can use cameras in new ways to re-invent how stories are told on film.

    5. Share. Edit and share footage online and at festivals. It’s too late to enter the 2016 New York festival — nycdronefilmfestival.com — but not too late to prepare for 2017.

    — Lisa Neff

    Reach Lisa Neff at lmneff@wisconsingazette.com.

  • Big gulp: GOP advances water privatization

    “Aqua America” sounds like a water park on the shore of a great lake.

    Rather, Aqua America is the second-largest publicly traded water utility company in the United States, and someday the company — or Veolia or Suez — could take control of municipal water systems in Wisconsin.

    Republican lawmakers fast-tracked AB 554/SB 432, legislation that would diminish public influence and make it easier to privatize local water supplies.

    Environmentalists in the state call the measure the “Water Privatization Bill.” The Assembly approved AB 554 on Jan. 12. A Senate floor vote had not been held as WiG went to press on Feb. 10.

    Current state law allows for the privatization of systems, provided citizens have a say.

    The process currently works like this: A municipality must adopt an ordinance authorizing privatization, then secure approval from the state Public Service Commission and then put the proposal to the voters in a referendum.

    In 2008 and 2009, Milwaukee officials considered privatizing the city’s water. A coalition of community leaders, environmental groups and unions — KPOW/Keep Public Our Water — fought the plan, which would have privatized Milwaukee’s water system for up to a century.

    The new privatization bill puts the burden of bringing a referendum on citizens. A municipality would adopt an ordinance, but a referendum wouldn’t be held unless citizens wage a successful petition drive. And, with no referendum, the PSC would approve privatization.

    Democratic lawmakers worked through January to counter the measure and try to improve the bill. In a Senate committee vote in January, Sens. Chris Larson and Julie Lassa offered several unsuccessful amendments that would have reserved some control for local citizens.

    Larson, in early February, also was working with Reps. Amanda Stuck, D-Appleton, and Jonathan Brostoff, D-Milwaukee, to advance a measure — LRB 4602/1 — intended to keep water and sewer utilities under local control.

    “I am appalled that my colleagues across the aisle are trying to take Wisconsin down the dangerous path of privatizing water,” Brostoff said. “A one-time privatization scheme payoff pales in comparison to risking our public safety.”

    Pushing privatization

    Most Americans get their household water from publicly owned and operated services.

    The polls show most Americans want to keep these services. In Wisconsin, there’s been no public outcry from city and county officials for legislative change.

    “As a member of the Assembly Committee on Energy Utilities, I did not hear testimony from any municipal leader asking for expanding the ability of corporations to take over their water,” Stuck said. “Instead, what we heard was a desire to keep control of these vital utilities local, so that decisions about how to keep a cost-effective and safe water supply are made by the local community and not by the profit-seeking shareholders of private companies.”

    So, what’s driving a legislative push for privatization?

    The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign reported in late January that AB 554, authored by Rep. Tyler August, R-Lake Geneva, and SB 432, written by Sen. Frank Lasee, R-De Pere, is akin to draft legislation — the Water/Wastewater Utility Public-Private Partnership Act — circulated by the American Legislative Exchange Council.

    ALEC is a special interest group of businesses and politicians that has advanced a series of anti-immigrant, anti-voter, anti-choice and anti-environment measures. Much of ALEC’s funding comes from trade groups, corporations such as Exxon Mobil and right-wing organizations like the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation.

    Proponents argue privatization is a solution for municipalities burdened by capital improvements to systems that have been underfunded due to years of deflated rates.

    They also maintain that water utilities are businesses and companies can serve consumers better than gthe overnment.

    Some proponents of privatization illustrate their arguments by pointing to the water crisis in Michigan, where officials at nearly every level of government failed the people of Flint.

    Those arguments, however, unleash a flood of opposing positions from those who see the cost-cutting profit motive as the underlying cause of the Flint crisis.

    “The residents of Flint were stripped of their democratically elected authority and, in the name of saving a few dollars, have been forced to sacrifice their health in the process,” said the Rev. Allen Overton of Concerned Pastors for Social Action, part of a coalition seeking federal court intervention to secure safe water in Flint. “The community deserves accountability, transparency and justice, in addition to water that is safe to drink.”

    Opposing privatization

    “Government has a level of accountability to citizens that private companies do not,” stated Kerry Schumann, executive director of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters.

    She continued, “Think about when you have a problem with your phone service. You typically spend hours being passed from faceless person to computer system and back to another faceless person who could be anywhere in the world. Sometimes it takes days, weeks or more to solve the problem.

    “Now imagine that water starts coming out of your tap brown, your family starts getting sick and you have to attempt to get help from a faceless, out-of-state private corporation that has no accountability to you or other voters living in the community. It’s bad enough running into this lack of responsiveness when you’re talking about a phone plan. The health of your family is certainly more important than phone service, and we should treat it that way.”

    The league is on record as opposing the privatization bill, as are other leading environmental, consumer and good-government groups in the state. Opponents include the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, Clean Wisconsin, the state Sierra Club, Midwest Environmental Advocates and Milwaukee Riverkeeper.

    “Not just across the country, but across the entire globe, water privatization has failed to increase the access to or quality of water supplies for communities time and time again,” read a statement from Milwaukee Riverkeeper intended to motivate members to urge their senators to reject the privatization bill.

    These groups take the position that access to water is a right and water should not be a source of windfall profits. They, and national watchdog organizations, such as Food and Water Watch and Public Citizen, offer these arguments against privatization:

    • Privatization leads to rate increases because corporations seek to maximize profits for investors.

    Investor-owned utilities typically charge 33 percent more for water, according to Food and Water Watch.

    After privatization, water rates increase at about three times the rate of inflation, with an average increase of 18 percent every other year.

    • Privatization undermines water quality, because the motivation for companies is profit, not the public good. Aqua America, headquartered in Pennsylvania, took in $769 million in revenues in 2013 for a $221 million profit. The company’s CEO received $3.2 million in compensation that year.

    • Privatization reduces public rights and allows the local government to abdicate control over a public resource.

    • Private financing costs more than public financing.

    • Privatization leads to job losses as companies minimize costs to increase profits. Food and Water Watch, which opposes any commodification of water, said privatization typically leads to a loss of one in three water jobs.

    • Privatization contributes to corruption because companies can restrict public access to information.

    • Privatization can contribute to sprawl because companies are motivated to expand infrastructure and extend services.

    • Privatization could lead to bulk water exports or changes in water use, including sales to the oil and gas industry for hydraulic fracturing.

    • Privatization is difficult to reverse.

    The crisis in Flint prompted people across the nation to focus on the quality of the water that comes out of their tap and the management of their utility.

    There’s also a global big picture to consider: The World Bank predicts that by 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population will run short of fresh drinking water.

    Wisconsin will not run short of drinking water by 2025, but who or what will control how much water costs — or where it goes?

  • Proposed hog farm prompts Bayfield County to tighten regs

    UPDATED: With a proposed factory farm threatening to foul Wisconsin’s “Crown Jewel,” the citizens of Bayfield County are not turning away from the stink or running from the fight.

    State law prohibits the local jurisdiction from saying “no” to the proposed “concentrated animal feeding operation” in the town of Eileen, but the county on Jan. 26 adopted ordinances intended to tighten regulations and protect the health and safety of the area’s residents and the environment.

    Bayfield County supervisors voted unanimously for an ordinance to create an operations permit for large-scale CAFOs and also for an ordinance to create an animal manure permit. The approach, creating local regulations on operations, is like the strategy local jurisdictions employed to control frac sand mines.

    The grassroots Farms Not Factories encouraged people to attend the meeting to show their support for stricter control and their opposition to the siting of the factory farm. The votes brought a standing ovation from opponents of the project, who are concerned with air emissions, odor impacts, water pollution, the release of pathogens and inadequate regulatory oversight.

    The proposal

    About a year ago, Reicks View Farms filed an application with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources seeking a permit to discharge annually about 6.8 million gallons of liquid manure, to be produced by 26,000 hogs at a planned breeding and feeding operation in Bayfield County. The manure would be stored in pits under covered barns and then injected into soil on about 1,300 acres in the Lake Superior watershed. Reicks wants to move the operation from Iowa because of the porcine epidemic diarrhea virus that’s so devastating to suckling pigs. Animals would be raised at the Wisconsin Badgerwood CAFO and then shipped to Iowa.

    An application filed with the state indicated the operation would create 27 new jobs, but didn’t say whether the positions would be permanent or what salaries they might pay.

    Farms Not Factories says a document provided to county officials and prepared by Reicks stated the business selected Eileen because of “its natural seclusion” — referring to the area’s isolation from hog farms in Iowa, Illinois and other parts of Wisconsin.

    The response

    Wisconsinites who care about the state’s outdoors know about a different type of “natural seclusion” in the region, which is home to the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, Iron River National Fish Hatchery, North Country National Scenic Trail, St. Croix National Scenic Riverway and Whittlesey Creek National Wildlife Refuge.

    Wisconsinites familiar with the state’s geography also know that Eileen is in the Fish Creek Watershed and less than 8 miles from the Chequamegon Bay and Lake Superior. One of Farms Not Factories’ slogans is “10 percent of the world’s fresh water is more valuable to this planet than cheap bacon and pork tenderloin.”

    Wisconsin already is home to about 270 large-scale CAFOs. The number has skyrocketed from about 50 in 2006, when Gov. Jim Doyle signed legislation setting basic state standards for CAFOs and removing local control over siting the farms. “That legislation was put in place to provide regulatory certainty for Big Ag,” said Mary Dougherty of Farms Not Factories.

    The Badgerwood CAFO would be the first such operation in Lake Superior basin and the largest hog farm in the state. Farms Not Factories said the hogs at Badgerwood would produce as much waste as a city of 50,000 people.

    A moratorium on the development of large-scale farms was enacted in both Bayfield after plans for Badgerwood emerged.

    Since then, the project and possible responses have been under review.

    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has said it is looking at the project, in part because of concerns about pollution raised by the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe, whose reservation is east of Ashland on the Lake Superior shore, and the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe, whose reservation is north of Bayfield.

    The DNR agreed to do an environmental-impact statement and has collected a lot of public input — hundreds of suggestions and statements from citizens, scientists and advocacy groups. A draft of the EIS is yet to be released. Public comment would follow, then any revisions before the publication of a final EIS, which may or may not influence the state’s decision on the application for Badgerwood.

    Meanwhile, the reviews seem complete in Bayfield and Ashland counties.

    A committee established by the Bayfield County Board of Supervisors studied the issue, guided by the dual goals of “having a thriving agricultural community and maintaining the public’s health and safety and a healthy environment,” according to its final report.

    The committee studied issues relating to groundwater, surface water, microbiology and air quality and recommended the adoption of the Large-Scale Confined Animal Feeding Operations Ordinance to require new or expanding livestock operations of 1,000 animals or more to obtain a county operations permit and meet any conditions attached to the permit.

    The committee made some other recommendations, including the adoption of the Bayfield County Animal Waste Storage and Management Ordinance requiring new or expanding CAFOs to obtain a permit for storing and managing manure.

    “We can’t legally say ‘no,’” said Dougherty, “So, as a result, we came up with this — because we have to do something.”

    A poll recently released by Northland College’s Center for Rural Communities shows 63.3 percent of residents oppose the farm and there’s strong support for the county ordinances.

    Nearly three-quarters — 72.5 percent — of households support the tighter local regulations at the county level.

    Residents’ top five concerns for factory farms are water quality, smell, divisions in the community, air quality and health risks.

    These concerns are shared elsewhere in Wisconsin, which is why activists are developing a statewide coalition.

    “We have to have this as a mass movement and say this type of agriculture is not Wisconsin,” said Dougherty.

  • Wisconsin Republicans declare open season against environment

    Republicans took target practice in early January after declaring open season on Wisconsin’s environmental resources.

    The new year began with a bang, bang in the Capitol, where in just two days Republicans presided over a series of hearings on bills aimed at rolling back protections for air, land and water and at the same time curtailing the authority of local governments to protect natural resources.

    “From developing on lake beds to filling in wetlands to taking away local governments’ authority to protect the health of their communities, the Legislature is starting 2016 off with a pretty loud message to Wisconsinites,” said Kerry Schumann, executive director of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters. The message, Schumann said, is lawmakers “are putting the wishes of big developers, factory farms, frac sand mining companies and other polluting interests above the needs of their constituents.”

    WLCV and the Sierra Club-John Muir Chapter, both nonprofit environmental advocacy groups, identified two measures of special concern — AB 600/SB 459, aka the “polluter grab bag,” and AB 582/SB 464, aka the “developer grab bag.”

    Supporters of the measures say they protect and advance “property rights.”

    Opponents say they further erode protections for Wisconsin’s natural resources.

    ‘Polluter grab bag’

    AB 600/SB 459 would allow developers to build on lake beds, provide incentives for developing a million acres of wetlands that lack federal protections and allow lakefront property owners to dredge up to three dump-truck loads of lakebed sediment every year.

    The Assembly Committee on Environment and Forestry held a hearing Jan. 5 on the bill, which is backed by Americans for Prosperity, League of Wisconsin Municipalities, Waste Management, Wisconsin Builders Association, Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation, Wisconsin Potato and Vegetable Growers Association and Wisconsin Realtors Association.

    Registered opponents include WLCV, Clean Lakes Alliance, Clean Wisconsin, League of Women Voters, River Alliance, Sierra Club, Nature Conservancy, Wisconsin Association of Lakes, Wisconsin Land and Water Conservation Association and Wisconsin Wetlands Association.

    “AB 600 undermines the public trust doctrine, allowing property owners on Wisconsin lakes, including the Great Lakes, to dredge material without any oversight and in most cases without even testing to make sure the dredged material is not contaminated,” said Bill Davis, director of the Sierra Club-John Muir Chapter. “And the bill gives away the public lake bed.”

    ‘Developer grab bag’

    AB 582/SB 464 would prohibit counties from placing moratoriums on new development. It also would prevent local governments from creating zoning requirements in response to a developer expressing an interest in locating there, according to the WLCV.

    The measure would provide financial incentives to develop land that is held in conservation easements and allow developers to shop around for a judge if there is a challenge to a permit.

    The Senate Committee on Insurance, Housing and Trade held a hearing on Jan. 5 on SB 464, which has the support of WEC Energy Group, Wisconsin Builders Association and Wisconsin Realtors Association.

    Opponents include Clean Wisconsin, League of Women Voters, River Alliance, Sierra Club, the town of Saratoga and WLCV.

    “The polluter and developer grab bags open the floodgates for developers, frac sand mining companies, factory farms and other special interests to make our water dirtier, fill in our wetlands and run roughshod over local communities and private citizens,” Schumann said.

    Elizabeth Ward, conservation programs coordinator with the Sierra Club, added, “This bill provides more giveaways to major corporations, like frac sand and oil pipeline companies, and removes the rights of landowners across Wisconsin to enjoy their land.”

    Also on the watch list this session …

    • SB 479 was the subject of a Jan. 5 hearing held by the Senate Committee on Insurance, Housing and Trade. Backers include a union local — the Madison Area Builders Association.

    Opponents maintain the measure would undermine Dane County’s authority on zoning and thus threaten local protections for wildlife and habitat.

    “This is another example of the state legislators attacking local control and making decisions that should be made at the local level,” said Dave Blouin, chair of Sierra’s Four Lakes Group.

    • SB 434 would open up more state forests to timber production. The bill also would prohibit the state Department of Natural Resources from offering guidance to property owners on wildlife action plans or requiring property owners to take action to protect species at risk.

    The state’s lobbying records show the Sierra Club joining WLCV in opposing the measure, which has support from Great Lakes Timber Professionals Association, Wisconsin Alliance of Forest Owners, Wisconsin Counties Association, Wisconsin County Forests Association, Wisconsin Land and Water Conservation Association, Wisconsin Towns Association and Wisconsin Wildlife Federation.

    The Senate Committee on Sporting Heritage, Mining and Forestry held a hearing on the bill on Jan. 5.

    • SB 432 would promote privatizing Wisconsin’s water by allowing communities to sell water utilities to private out-of-state companies. The Senate Committee on Workforce Development, Public Works and Military Affairs held a Jan. 5 hearing on the measure, which is backed by some labor groups and opposed by environmental groups.

    • AB 603 would prohibit counties from enacting stronger protections for waters if local authorities determined state minimum standards were insufficient.

    The Assembly Committee on Natural Resources and Sporting Heritage held a hearing on Jan. 6 on the bill, which is opposed by WLCV, Clean Lakes Alliance, Clean Wisconsin, River Alliance and Wisconsin Association of Lakes.

    • SB 288 would remove the nuclear moratorium, lifting barriers to constructing new nuclear power plants in the state. It includes the requirement that new plants have a plan of action for dealing with hazardous waste.

    Additionally, the bill would put nuclear energy on the list of preferred energy options in the state, despite high costs associated with production and major concerns about the disposal of waste and the dismantling of outdated facilities.

    The Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Energy held a hearing Jan. 5 on the measure, which has overwhelming support from energy companies, labor unions and trade associations.

    Opponents include the Citizens Utility Board, League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, and environmental groups.

    Action alert

    Track Wisconsin environmental issues at conservationvoters.org, the website for the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters.

    Track legislation at notify.legis.wisconsin.gov.

  • Calling Ms. Candidate

    Calling Ms. Candidate

    Emerge Wisconsin is training runners – female runners who will sprint to a seat on the school board, dash to city hall, finish the marathon to the Capitol.

    EW is an affiliate of Emerge America, which is dedicated to encouraging and preparing Democratic women to run for elected office and, in the course of that work, helping to close the gender gap in U.S. politics.

    “We need all women’s voices, all women represented,” said Wendy Strout, executive director of Emerge Wisconsin, which is headquartered in Madison but has a presence in Milwaukee and throughout the state. “We need you, and Emerge Wisconsin wants to train you.”

    On May 30, the Wisconsin group planned a celebration at the Milwaukee County War Memorial Center to honor U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin with its first Woman of the Year award. “She inspired so many of our women to run,” said Strout, who has been involved in Democratic politics since 1992. “They see Sen. Baldwin and say, ‘I’m going to step up.’”

    Later this year, EW will hold a graduation for its class of 2013.

    Then the cycle begins again: Enrolling women, training women, graduating women.

    The cycle likely will be repeated year after year in Wisconsin and beyond, because encouraging women to run is a long-distance effort. Consider: At the current pace of change, it will take until 2085 for women to reach parity with men in leadership roles in government/politics, business, entrepreneurship and nonprofits, according to the Women’s Media Center, a nonprofit founded by Jane Fonda, Robin Morgan and Gloria Steinem.

    Picking up the pace

    “We can’t create change until people make time for and commit to championing women as leaders,” stated Jennifer Siebel Newsom, founder of MissRepresentation.org, the nonprofit behind a documentary exposing how media contributes to the under-representation of women in positions of power and influence in America. “Our political leadership should reflect the goals and aspirations of 100 percent of the population – not just a select few – and that’s what we’re working to ensure.”

    Last year, MissRepresenation.org partnered with the Rutgers Center for American Women and Politics, a research and education organization that also trains women to run for office, on “Elect Women 2012: Vote. Support. Run.” Organizers saw opportunity in the number of offices up for election in the United States, as well as open seats created by redistricting.

    On Election Day in November 2012, a record number of women were elected to Congress.

    However, in 2013, women, who are about 51 percent of the population, still hold only 18 percent of the seats in Congress. Women hold 78 of the 435 seats in the U.S. House and 20 of the 100 seats in the Senate.

    Some other stats from the CAWP and elsewhere:

    • Seventy-five women hold statewide office in the U.S. – that’s about 23 percent of 320 offices.

    • Of the 7,383 state legislators in the U.S., 1,781, or 24 percent, are women.

    • The United States is 90th in the world in terms of women in national legislatures and is behind Mexico, China and Pakistan.

    • The percentage of women in Congress has climbed from 3 percent in 1979 to 18 percent in 2013, but the percentage has stayed in the range of 16-18 percent since 2007. The most significant jump was 20 years ago, after the 1992 elections. Female candidates were inspired to run that year after watching the Senate confirmation hearings for conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. In 1991, there were two women senators. In 1993, there were five. And the Senate Judiciary Committee has not been all-male since then.

    • In Wisconsin in 2010, women held 322 of the 1,455 city council seats, 308 of the 1,680 county board seats, 1,069 of the 2,827 school board seats. Also, 74 percent of town boards and 24 percent of village boards had no women representatives, according to Women’s Council at womenscouncil.wi.gov.

    The statistics are significant.

    But assuming the numbers prove voters won’t elect women candidates or that women lack access to ballot positions would be a mistake, based on studies from think tanks on the left and right and in the political middle.

    Studies show that when women run for office, they perform just as well as men. They can raise the money, get the votes and take the oaths of office.

    Not in the race

    The “fundamental reason for women’s under-representation is that they do not run for office,” wrote the researchers in “Girls Just Wanna Not Run” from the School of Public Affairs at American University.

    “For the last few decades, researchers have provided compelling evidence that when women run for office – regardless of the position they seek – they are just as likely as men to win their races,” said study authors Jennifer Lawless, a member of the Emerge America advisory board, and Richard Fox. “The large gender disparities in U.S. political institutions, therefore, do not result from systematic discrimination against female candidates. Rather … there is a substantial and persistent gender gap in political ambition.”

    Women, according to the Lawless/Fox study, are more likely to perceive the electoral environment as biased against female candidates. The study shows that women also are twice as likely as men to think they are not qualified to run for office and to react more negatively to many aspects of modern campaigns.

    The way that women candidates – Democrats and Republicans – are portrayed and treated by the media also leaves some women reluctant to run and leaves girls confused about politics.

    “In mainstream news, you might read in a policy article an aside regarding what Hillary Clinton was wearing or how Sarah Palin is doing up her hair,” said media expert Kathy Frank. “You aren’t going to read in The Washington Post what John McCain is wearing unless it’s a dress. And in the left or right media circles, you will see it get more cruel than ‘Project Runway.’ You will see images and read copy that treats some of the most influential politicians in the country as sexual jokes.”

    Organizations such as MissRepresentation.org and the Women’s Media Center are working to address this concern, while groups such as Emerge Wisconsin are working to increase the number of women seeking elected office. “Emerge gives women the confidence to run,” as well as the tools, Strout said.

    In training

    Emerge Wisconsin conducts an intensive seven-month training for Democratic women. The national Emerge network also includes organizations in Arizona, California, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon.

    In Wisconsin, the expertise in the program comes in large part from the group’s advisory board, which includes Baldwin, U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, former Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton, former state Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager, former state Superintendent Elizabeth Burmaster, former gubernatorial candidate Kathleen Falk, and others.

    Support and advice also comes from Emerge Sisters – women who already have graduated from the program.

    Emerge is seeing success.

    The program launched in the U.S. in 2002 and nationally has trained about 900 Democratic women. Forty-three percent of the graduates have run for office or been appointed to a post – and 60 percent of Emerge candidates have won.

    Since 2007, Emerge Wisconsin has trained 126 women from throughout the state. In 2012, nearly 40 Emerge Wisconsin graduates ran for office.

    Strout said this year’s class had two more sessions before graduation, when trainees receive a certificate and a pin. They emerge ready to run.

    The students attend one training session a month for the seven months. Strout described a typical training – arrival on Friday night, dinner and a workshop, then regrouping on Saturday for a full day of workshops.

    Admission involves filing an application and completing an interview. There’s tuition for the program, but Strout stressed there are scholarships. “Money should not be a factor,” she said. “We make sure this is accessible for everyone.”

    Trainees may have an idea what office they’ll seek when they apply and, through the course of the program, they connect with the people who can help the runners take their marks.

  • Pregnant women shackled, jailed for alleged substance use

    Pregnant women shackled, jailed for alleged substance use

    A pregnant woman tumbles down a flight of stairs and is arrested for attempted feticide. A pregnant woman about to be released from prison is re-incarcerated when the judge learns she is pregnant and HIV-positive. A pregnant woman informs health care workers that she previously used drugs but has kicked her habit and is clean. She’s handcuffed, shackled, taken to court and ordered into detention at a drug treatment facility.

    All of these incidents happened.

    The last one occurred in Wisconsin last summer, leading to the filing of a federal civil rights lawsuit in Milwaukee and helping to inspire two state legislators to offer a trio of bills aimed at protecting the rights of pregnant women.

    In mid-March, Democratic state Reps. Chris Taylor and Terese Berceau of Madison introduced the Pregnancy Protection Package, which was not passed in the 2014 session but will be reintroduced next session.

    In the headlines when Taylor and Berceau offered the bills was a battle in Texas, where hospital officials had refused to remove 33-year-old Marlise Muñoz from life support because of her pregnancy, even though the woman had been declared brain dead and had previously indicated to her family that she did not want to be kept alive artificially.

    One bill, authored by Berceau, would ensure pregnant women’s advanced medical directives are respected.

    “Pregnant women are not second-class citizens and deserve the same rights as everyone one else,” Berceau stated. “Major medical decisions, as outlined in advanced directives, are very personal decisions that should be left up to individuals and their families, not politicians.”

    A second measure, introduced as Assembly Joint Resolution 111, would affirm “that pregnant women be afforded all the rights of non-pregnant people.”

    And the third bill, written by Taylor, would ensure pregnant women who are alleged to have used drugs have the right to counsel before being detained.

    This last measure is a response to the forced detention last summer of Alicia Beltran of Jackson. Beltran, seeking prenatal care, told a health-care provider that she had previously used drugs but was clean. Several days later, Beltran was handcuffed in her home, shackled and taken to a holding cell. She was then brought before a judge, where she found her fetus had a court-ordered attorney, but she had no counsel.

    At the hearing, without testimony from any medical expert, Beltran was ordered to spend 78 days in a drug rehab facility, where, she maintains, she went without adequate health care or prenatal care.

    The federal civil rights complaint is pending in the U.S. District Court in Milwaukee.

    Beltran is represented by attorney Linda Vanden Heuvel, who has said locking up the woman was not in the interest of a future child and “most certainly tramples the rights of Ms. Beltran, a woman who was not in fact using any controlled substances at the time of her arrest.”

    The complaint challenges a 1997 Wisconsin law that “takes away from a pregnant woman virtually every right associated with constitutional personhood — from the most basic right to physical liberty to the right to refuse bad medical advice,” stated Lynn Paltrow, executive director of the National Advocates for Pregnant Women and a co-counsel in the case. “This kind of dangerous, authoritarian state action is exactly what happens when laws give police officers and other state actors the authority to treat fertilized eggs, embryos and fetuses as if they are already completely separate from pregnant women.

    The complaint lists a series of violations, including the rights to:

    • Physical liberty

    • Due-process notice

    • Privacy in medical decision-making

    • Carry a pregnancy to term

    • Abortion

    • Privacy in medical and personal information

    • Freedom from illegal searches and cruel and unusual punishment

    • Equal treatment under the law.

    Four states — Wisconsin, Minnesota, Oklahoma and South Dakota — have laws that explicitly permit detaining pregnant women alleged to have used alcohol or drugs, according to NAPW.

    On April 29, Republican Gov. Bill Haslam made Tennessee the first state to enact a criminal law explicitly permitting the prosecution of women for their pregnancy outcomes.

    “This law is bad medicine for Tennessee families,” said Cherisse Scott, CEO of SisterReach. “It was promoted by prosecutors against the recommendations of medical professionals, (it) permits arrest and incarceration of women who cannot guarantee that their newborn is in perfect health and (it) creates a separate and unequal law for women, allowing their arrest if they are pregnant and struggling with addiction.”

    Thousands had called on the governor to veto the legislation, which conflicts with the more progressive safe harbor law that was enacted to lessen the threat of punishment and encourage pregnant women to seek treatment if needed.

    The Tennessee measure is a new breed of law, but since 1973 and the Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade, advocates for pregnant women have documented the use of other measures to arrest, detain and force medical procedures in hundreds of cases involving pregnant women.

    On April 18, the Alabama Supreme Court upheld the conviction of Sara Hicks, who gave birth to a healthy baby who tested positive for cocaine in 2008. The court, in an 8-1 decision, affirmed its prior ruling that “child” in Alabama law includes fertilized eggs and that women can be arrested for using a controlled substance while pregnant.

    The legislation used to prosecute Hicks, the chemical endangerment law, was passed in 2006 and intended to deter people from bringing children to places where controlled substances are distributed or produced, like meth labs.

    Since 2006, more than 100 women have been arrested.

    Research shows that policies that deter women from seeking prenatal care are contrary to the welfare of the mother and fetus and that incarceration or the threat of detention are ineffective in reducing drug or alcohol abuse.

    There is a long list of medical and mental health organizations that oppose punishing and prosecuting pregnant women for alleged risky behavior. The list includes:

    • The American Medical Association

    • American Academy of Pediatrics

    • American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

    • American Public Health Association

    • American Nurses Association

    • American Society of Addiction Medicine

    • March of Dimes

    • American Psychiatric Association

    • American Psychological Association

    • National Perinatal Association

    • Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs

    • Center for the Future of Children.

    Many of the organizations have opposed laws such as those in Wisconsin and Tennessee for more than two decades, arguing that such measures not only infringe on women’s rights but also scare women away from medical care, treat addiction as a moral failing and lead women who want to give birth to instead undergo abortion procedures.

    “Criminalizing pregnancy outcomes scares women away from prenatal care and drug treatment,” said Farah Diaz-Tello, a staff attorney with National Advocates for Women. “Women who cannot afford private treatment for their addiction and who fear arrest and separation from children they already have feel as though abortion is the only way to keep their current families together.”

    Jennifer Roth was among those who campaigned against the Tennessee Pregnancy Criminalization Law. She is the president of All Our Lives, which she described as a “pro-woman, pro-life organization.”

    In a letter urging Haslam to veto the measure, Roth wrote, “We fear that the effect of this law will be to discourage vulnerable women from seeking care that would benefit themselves and their babies, and even to provide an incentive for abortion. That doesn’t foster life.”

  • Climate change imperils major U.S. landmarks

    The president marked the centennial of Harriet Tubman’s death a year ago by designating 25,000 acres on Maryland’s Eastern Shore as a new national monument. By 2050, if sea levels in the Chesapeake Bay continue to rise at twice the global rate because of climate change, the monument to the legendary abolitionist could be largely underwater.

    A report from the Union of Concerned Scientists, released on May 20, lists 30 at-risk national landmarks and details the effects of rising sea levels, worsening wildfires and more frequent and severe floods.

    “You can almost trace the history of the United States through these sites,” said Adam Markham, the report’s co-author and the director of climate impacts at UCS. “The imminent risks to these sites and the artifacts they contain threaten to pull apart the quilt that tells the story of the nation’s heritage and history.”

    Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in the Americas, is likely to be submerged by rising seas by the end of the century, according to UCS.

    Other sites may become inaccessible.

    “Fort Monroe in Virginia, which played a crucial role in the fall of slavery, will become an island unto itself within 70 years,” said Markham. “Castillo de San Marcos, in St. Augustine, Florida, also is extremely vulnerable.”

    The fort faces increasing risks from flooding and projections from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration show that, without major engineering feats, the grounds surrounding the fort will become permanently inundated with three feet of sea level rise by the end of the century.

    Rising seas and the threat of worsening storm surges also are endangering historic districts in Annapolis, Maryland, and Charleston, South Carolina, as well as native Hawaiian structures on the Big Island and archaeological remains in Florida.

    “Early Floridians constructed highly elaborate structures out of oyster and clam shells in the Ten Thousand Islands, dating back to 1,000 B.C.,” said Markham. These sites in the Everglades face an imminent threat from climate impacts.”

    Across the peninsula in the northern part of Canaveral National Seashore, a more than 1,200-year-old shell mound thought to be the highest in North America, is endangered. The National Park Service and the University of Central Florida have created a “living shoreline” of oyster mats, Spartina grass and mangroves to try to protect the mound from erosion.

    In the West, climate change is increasing the risk of large wildfires in the Sierra Nevada mountains by driving up temperatures, reducing winter snowpack and drying out forests for longer periods. USC said that it threatens historically significant structures in former Gold Rush country.

    Up north, in Alaska, melting sea ice and thawing permafrost allowed winter storms to erode the coastlines of Cape Krusenstern National Monument and the Bering Land Bridge National Preserve in Kotzebue Sound. The report said the damage is occurring at an unprecedented rate. “Irreplaceable prehistoric artifacts are actually crumbling out of the shorelines in these Alaskan sites and washing out to sea,” said Markham.

    Meanwhile, in the Southwest, there have been intense fires followed by heavy rains during the past 15 years.

    “Massive fires have swept through Mesa Verde National Park and Bandelier National Monument and other southwestern sites, damaging ancient pueblo masonry, petroglyphs and pottery,” said Markham. “Heavy rains and the extraordinary floods that have followed some of these fires have caused even more damage, destroying trails, damaging adobe buildings and washing away vital archaeological resources.”

    The report, said UCS press secretary Lisa Nurnberger, is meant to be illustrative rather than exhaustive, “since we know it doesn’t capture every important at-risk historic and cultural site. If it had, it would be far, far longer than it is.”

    The researchers came across other sites where climate change is taking a toll, she said. “One of those places is the Apostle Islands,” a group of 22 islands in Lake Superior, off the Bayfield Peninsula in far northern Wisconsin. The National Park Service refers to the Apostle Islands as the “jewels of Lake Superior.”

    The Society for American Archaeology, a nonprofit dedicated to protecting archaeological heritage, stated, in conjunction with the report’s release, that more attention should be paid to preserving endangered archaeological sites. It’s the first time the group has sought to draw attention to the damage caused by climate change.

    To slow the rate of change and give archaeologists, historic preservationists and land managers time to protect the sites, scientists say carbon emissions must be reduced, said Angela Anderson, director of the Climate and Energy Program at UCS. “Cutting carbon emissions significantly and quickly can slow the pace of sea level rise … and slow the expansion of the wildfire season.”

  • From protest to preservation: | Federal government identifies historic LGBT sites and events

    On a warm night in June 1969, outside the Stonewall Inn, rioters rebelled against the continued persecution and harassment by government officials.

    On a sunny day in late May, government officers — the highest-ranking among them a member of the U.S. cabinet — gathered outside the unobtrusive brick building that stands as the symbolic birthplace of the modern gay civil rights movement to usher in LGBT Pride Month with a new initiative — a historic campaign to preserve and celebrate LGBT history.

    As part of the National Park Service Heritage Initiative, a task force will spend the next 12-18 months identifying places and events associated with the story of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans for inclusion in the parks programs.

    The study is part of a broader initiative under the Obama administration to ensure that the National Park Service tells a more complete story of the people and events responsible for building the nation.

    Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said she chose the Stonewall in New York’s Greenwich Village because it is the only LGBT-associated site designated a national historic landmark by the National Park Service as a property having extraordinary significance in American history.

    “We know that there are other sites, like Stonewall Inn, that have played important roles in our nation’s ongoing struggle for civil rights,” she said.

    The study will be a public-private partnership, with funding from the Gill Foundation through the National Park Foundation.

    “LGBT history is American history,” said Gill Foundation founder Tim Gill. “The contributions of LGBT people are part of the great American journey toward full equality, freedom and liberty for all our citizens.”

    The first meeting of scholars involved in the research took place in Washington, D.C., on June 10. Other meetings will take place over the next year.

    “The National Park Service has a responsibility to protect, preserve and tell the stories of some of our nation’s most iconic places, and as part of that responsibility, it is our job to be sure that Americans never forget where we’ve been, where we are and what we aspire to be as a nation,” said Jon B. Jarvis, director of the National Park Service. “I am excited to see how the outcomes of the LGBT Heritage Initiative and theme study will allow us to share a more inclusive version of our uniquely American experience.”

    With praise for the initiative, Clark Bunting of the National Parks Conservation Association said, “Our national parks belong to all of us — a fact that is particularly important as we look toward the Park Service’s centennial in 2016 and its next 100 years. As America’s storyteller, it is commendable and appropriate for the National Park Service to examine themes that incorporate the history and significant events of our diverse population.”

    Eliza Byard, the executive director of the nation’s largest LGBT education group, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, also applauded the announcement. She observed that laws banning schools from teaching anything positive about homosexuality remain on the books in eight states.

    “Symbolically, it’s hugely important that now LGBT history is officially part of the national narrative,” she said. “This is part of what our federal government will identify, preserve and single out.”

    In keeping with tradition, there was a demonstration at Stonewall the day of the announcement.

    Activists with the grassroots group GetEqual protested on Christopher Street under the banner “Don’t Stop at Our History — Full Federal Equality Now!”

    GetEqual has led the push for a presidential executive order banning federal contractors from discriminating based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

    “Across this country, in every single state, LGBTQ people suffer from the uncertainty created by the lack of legal protections,” said Felipe Sousa-Rodriguez, GetEQUAL co-director. “A study will bring light to what we already know — that discrimination against LGBTQ people has plagued our history since its inception. We have resisted inequality and oppression for hundreds of years to be able to live as our full, authentic selves. We need President Obama to create a clear vision and a clear roadmap to full LGBTQ equality under the law under his administration, and our time is running out.”

    On the register

    The National Register of Historic Places is the nation’s inventory of properties deemed central to its history and worthy of preservation. It includes more than 89,000 entries, more than 1.7 million individual buildings and sites representing local, state or nationally significant people, places and events.

    Just over 2,500 of these properties are national historic landmarks, designated by the secretary as representing the highest level of national significance.

    But relatively few of these properties can be identified as representing the stories associated with African-American, American Latinos, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, American Indians, Native Alaskans, Native Hawaiians or women. Currently, only four LGBT history-related properties are included in the National Register of Historic Places — the Dr. Franklin E. Kameny residence in Washington, D.C.; the Cherry Grove Community House and Theater on Fire Island in New York; the James Merrill House in Stonington, Connecticut, and the Carrington House on Fire Island.

  • Legal limbo

    Legal limbo

    As gay couples in Wisconsin waited in legal limbo in mid-June, equality foes continued working to defend anti-gay amendments in the courts and marched on Washington.

    But those foes are caught in a losing streak. The march on Washington on June 19 fell flat, and there have been 21 consecutive court rulings for marriage equality since last summer, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a key provision in the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act.

    On June 25, a federal judge struck down Indiana’s same-sex marriage ban as unconstitutional. The court clerk in Marion County, home to Indianapolis, began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples about an hour after the decision was announced.

    On the same day, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver upheld a lower-court ruling that found Utah’s prohibition of same-sex marriage unconstitutional. The 3-2 ruling affects all states in the 10th Circuit: Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah and Wyoming.

    But the appeals court immediately put a stay on marriages in those states pending a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

    Just weeks before the June 25 rulings,  U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb on June 6 found that Wisconsin’s constitutional amendment barring gay couples from marrying violates the 14th Amendment’s Due Process and Equal Protection clauses. Crabb didn’t issue a stay — requested before her ruling by Republican Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen — until June 13. So for six days in early June, same-sex couples applied for and obtained marriage licenses in 60 of the state’s 72 counties. At least 550 gay couples were married in Wisconsin.

    While the case is pending appeal with the 7th Circuit in Chicago, there’s uncertainty: For those with licenses who didn’t marry, should they wed? For those caught in the five-day waiting period, can they marry in another state? For those who married, what benefits, responsibilities or protections do they have?

    “I think the harder questions are like adoptions, the really hard issues,” said Carl Tobias, a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law. That’s why these stays are so gut-wrenching for people.”

    On June 16, Wisconsin’s congressional Democrats asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to confirm, as he has done in similar situations in Utah and Michigan, that the federal government will recognize the marriages of Wisconsin gay couples and guarantee them:

    • The ability to sponsor a foreign spouse for legal residency.

    • Health, workers’ compensation, retirement and other benefits for the spouse of a federal employee.

    • Health benefits, spousal ID cards, housing allowances and on-base support services for the spouse of a military servicemember.

    • Joint income tax filings, as well as spousal exemptions of gifts, inheritances and the value of employer-provided spousal health coverage.

    • Unpaid family and medical leave to care for an ill spouse.

    • Spousal Social Security benefits.

    “Earlier this year, you made clear that couples who married in Utah and Michigan after federal judges struck down those states’ bans are entitled to full federal recognition,” the lawmakers wrote. “We are grateful for this tremendous leadership on behalf of fairness and equality. We ask that you similarly declare that those same-sex couples who married in Wisconsin since the June 6 decision are equally entitled to the federal benefits they deserve.”

    Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Wisconsin, which filed the equality case on behalf of eight same-sex couples, was assessing the situation — preparing for the appeal and looking into whether additional lawsuits should be filed on behalf of couples left in limbo.

    In addition to the June 25 rulings, another marriage equality case was set for June 26 in Louisiana and a hearing was set for July 2 in a Florida case.

    And the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear five cases from four states — Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee — in a single session in Cincinnati on Aug. 6.

    The Cincinnati court is the third federal appeals court to weigh recent challenges to state bans. The 4th Circuit in Virginia heard arguments in another case in May.

    Any one of them, or all, could reach the U.S. Supreme Court and bring a conclusive ruling on marriage equality.

    ‘A hateful handful’

    Leaders on the equality side fully expect the nine-member Court to eventually overturn the amendments and anti-gay marriage laws.

    And so do many leaders in conservative circles — from Newt Gingrich, who was House speaker when DOMA was enacted, to seven-term U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah. In May, Hatch told a radio interviewer, “Let’s face it: Anybody who does not believe that gay marriage is going to be the law of the land just hasn’t been observing what’s going on.”

    Yet groups such as the National Organization for Marriage and the Family Research Council pledge to fight on for years against gay marriage the way the anti-choice movement has fought Roe v. Wade.

    NOM promoted the June 19 march as a “road to victory.”

    Co-sponsors of the event included FRC, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia, the Washington Times newspaper, the Alliance Defending Freedom, Concerned Women for America and the Heritage Foundation.

    Speakers included what the Human Rights Campaign described as a “parade of horribles” — former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Catholic Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, NOM president Brian Brown, Capital Tea Party Patriots co-founder Doug Mainwaring, a gay man who says gay marriage is “objective evil,” and ADF counsel Austin Nimocks.

    NOM also brought to the microphone Bishop Harry Jackson Jr., who has compared gay marriage to a satanic plot; Dr. Him Garlow, who has said gay marriage will lead to enslavement of those opposed to the unions; Heritage Foundation fellow Ryan Anderson, who has compared gays and lesbians to pedophiles; and the Rev. Bill Owens Sr., who has likened gay marriage to bestiality.

    Brown, in a statement to supporters before the march, claimed the Supreme Court “will be watching.”

    He also said, “A competition is won by those who take the field, not by those who sit on the sidelines. Friends, we need to take the field for marriage — and fight to win.”

    NOM’s critics, however, maintain the organization is now faking a movement — national polls show that strong opposition to marriage equality has dropped to 28 percent and only 40 percent of opponents of marriage equality would pay anything to stop its progress.

    The march proponents “are the proud leaders of a hateful handful, the last gasp of a reactionary rump,” said HRC’s Fred Sainz.

  • We can be heroes: In pursuit of equality in the courts

    Eight same-sex couples — with a team of lawyers — committed earlier this year to overturn Wisconsin’s constitutional amendment barring gays and lesbians from the freedom to marry in the state. Their fight continues, but already their pursuit of equality has resulted in the marriages of at least 555 same-sex couples in Wisconsin.

    “These families simply want the security and recognition that only marriage provides,” Larry Dupuis, legal director of the ACLU of Wisconsin, had said when he filed the equality case in Madison in February. “They have built their lives and raised children here. It is wrong for the state to treat these loving and committed couples as second-class citizens, and it is cruel to place them in a catch-22 where they can’t even travel elsewhere to obtain federal protections without their marriage being labeled a crime.”

    The couples’ attorneys, the state’s equal rights leaders and the gays and lesbians who hope to take marriage vows have heralded the couples — Charvonne Kemp and Marie Carlson, Judith Trampf and Katharina Heyning, Roy Badger and Garth Wangemann, Johannes Wallmann and Keith Borden, Salud Garcia and Pam Kleiss, Kami Young and Karina Willes, Bill Hurtubise and Dean Palmer — as heroes.

    “To be a plaintiff in a case like this, you have to put yourself out there and vow to see the fight through, maybe all the way to the Supreme Court,” said April Goodmann, a Waukesha resident who, when the case is settled for good, hopes to marry her longtime girlfriend. “These people are heroes, plain and simple. They are my heroes.”

    There are now hundreds of heroes serving as plaintiffs in more than 70 marriage equality cases pending in 31 states.

    And there’s a long history of heroes who, with the support of groups such as the ACLU and Lambda Legal, challenged laws and regulations, changing the lives of LGBT people in housing and schools, in the Armed Forces and on the job, at the marriage license bureau and in the privacy of their own bedrooms. Most of them have been plaintiffs, but some have been defendants.

    A look at just a handful of the many LGBT civil rights cases fought over the years and the legal activists involved in them:

    • Jamie Nabozny. For four years, Nabozny was subjected to anti-gay verbal and physical abuse by students at his school in Ashland, Wisconsin. Students urinated on him, pretended to rape him during class and, in one assault, kicked him so many times in the stomach that he required surgery. Nabozny sued the school district and won in a federal appeals court in Chicago, which said in 1996 that public schools are obligated to protect students from anti-gay abuse. Nabozny, represented by Lambda, also won back in Wisconsin, where a jury in 1996 also found school officials liable.

    • Richard G. Evans. Evans, an administrator in Denver, was the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking to overturn Colorado’s Amendment 2, enacted by voters in 1992. The amendment barred governments in the state from enacting non-discrimination ordinances or policies that would protect gays. The state argued that Amendment 2 simply prohibited creating “special rights” for gays, but Evans et al., represented by the ACLU and Lambda Legal, argued the measure denied gays the right to participate in the political process. The U.S. Supreme Court, ruling in 1996, said the amendment did not satisfy the Equal Protection Clause. The majority opinion said, “The resulting disqualification of a class of persons from the right to seek specific protection from the law is unprecedented in our jurisprudence.”

    • John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner. On Sept. 17, 1998, deputies in Harris County, Texas, were dispatched to an apartment expecting to deal with a “black male going crazy with a gun.” It was a false claim, called in to the police by a jealous man. At the apartment, two deputies said they saw Lawrence and Garner engaged in sexual activity. They arrested the men for “deviate sex.” The two pleaded no contest before a justice of the peace, then appealed in Texas Criminal Court. Their case, managed by Lambda Legal, reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in 2003 that sexual relationships between consenting adults are protected by the 14th Amendment.

    • Ninia Baerhr and Genora Dancel. The women became the lead plaintiffs in Baehr v. Miike, the landmark lawsuit seeking the freedom to marry in Hawaii in the 1990s. Though state lawmakers and voters erected barriers to the plaintiffs securing that right in the 1990s, their case launched the marriage equality movement and resulted, way back in 1993, in the first high court ruling for gay marriage. Today, Hawaii is an equality state.

    • Edith Windsor. Windsor is the widow of Thea Clary Spyer and the executor of Spyer’s estate. The women married in Canada in 2007, two years before Spyer’s death, and their marriage was legal in the state of New York. But until last summer, the marriage was not recognized by the federal government, which imposed $363,000 in taxes on the estate left to Windsor. Windsor’s lawsuit, brought by the ACLU, resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court overturning Section 3 in the Defense of Marriage Act and the full federal recognition of gay marriages.

    • Miguel Brashi. Braschi and Leslie Blanchard lived together for 10 years in a rent-controlled apartment in New York City, beginning in 1975. When Blanchard died in September 1986, the landlord threatened to evict Braschi, maintaining that he had no right to stay because Blanchard was the tenant of record. The 1989 case, Braschi v. Stahl, led the court to expand the definition of family in the city’s rent control regulations. The majority opinion said that protection against eviction “should not rest on fictitious legal distinctions or genetic history, but instead should find its foundation in the reality of family life.”