After – and only after – the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel broke the story of repeated sexual harassment claims against Pete Hill – appointed to a public role as ‘associate of the chancellor’ (and chancellor Beverly Kopper’s husband) – did Kopper herself make a public statement of the matter. Kopper’s statement is notable for its utter lack…
University
Assault Awareness & Prevention, Misconduct, University, UW System
A fifth woman publicly accuses UW-Whitewater chancellor’s husband of sexual harassment
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
In a story from the Chronicle for Higher Education, a fifth woman, Hailey Miller, reveals her own experience with harassment from Pete Hill, who held the position of associate to the chancellor (while also UW-Whitewater Chancellor Beverly Kopper’s husband). Miller’s account to the Chronicle, backed by contemporaneous notes she shared with that publication, is similar in…
Assault Awareness & Prevention, Misconduct, University, UW System
Chancellor Kopper Should Resign
by JOHN ADAMS • • 3 Comments
A few hours ago, the Janesville Gazette published portions of an open letter from Whitewater City Councilwoman Stephanie Vander Pas describing harassment that she experienced from Pete Hill, husband of UW-Whitewater Chancellor Beverly Kopper, while Kopper was nearby. See Whitewater council member: UW-Whitewater chancellor should resign after her husband’s sexual harassment. Reading her remarks, along…
Assault Awareness & Prevention, Misconduct, University, UW System
Questions Concerning a Ban on the UW-Whitewater Chancellor’s Husband After a Sexual Harassment Investigation
by JOHN ADAMS • • 5 Comments
On Friday, this site linked to a published article in the Journal Sentinel about a campus ban against UW-Whitewater Chancellor Beverly Kopper’s husband after a UW System investigation found that he had committed acts of sexual harassment against campus employees. See Journal Sentinel: UW-Whitewater chancellor’s husband banned from campus after sexual harassment investigation and the original story. …
Assault Awareness & Prevention, Harassment, Misconduct, University
Journal Sentinel: UW-Whitewater chancellor’s husband banned from campus after sexual harassment investigation
by JOHN ADAMS • • 3 Comments
Updated 9.14.18 @ 3:25 PM with public records now available as provided to the Journal Sentinel – see embedded documents below. Karen Herzog of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports UW-Whitewater chancellor’s husband banned from campus after sexual harassment investigation: The husband of University of Wisconsin-Whitewater Chancellor Beverly Kopper has been banned from campus and stripped of…
Assault Awareness & Prevention, Babbittry, Bad Ideas, City, Development, Economy, Local Government, Public Relations, State Government, Taxes/Taxation, University
On New Market Tax Credits for a Fairfield Inn and ‘Community Engagement’
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
The use of government-issued New Market Tax Credits will bring Whitewater a Fairfield Inn and a building for the existing local campus to lease. Proponents of an ordinary hotel and a lease agreement for the university cannot offer any evidence that these projects will boost local individual or household incomes. What one can show –…
City, University, UW System
The UW System & Whitewater
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
It’s simply stating the obvious to report that Shrinking tuition revenue, growing expenses put UW campuses in potentially precarious position: A gap is growing between how much money University of Wisconsin System campuses collect in tuition and how much they budget for costs directly tied to educating students, such as faculty pay and advising. That raises serious questions about what…
City, Laws/Regulations, University
The Limits of Messaging
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
UW-Whitewater quadruples parking without a permit fine Whitewater, like many small towns, is marketing mad: claims, professions, insistence, publicizing, and declarations exceed actual conditions. Newly-increased fines over Whitewater’s available parking spaces on campus illustrate this problem. The local campus is large, relative to the non-campus parts of the city, and that places pressure on both…
Government Spending, University, UW System
Subsidies for Subsidies
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
In Wisconsin, UW System schools typically rely on private foundations to offset the costs of some university expenses. This make sense – alumni and other donors can support activities at their schools. What happens, though, when private foundations designed to supplement public programs wind up depending, themselves, on public money? One finds that even subsidies,…
City, Law, Laws/Regulations, Local Government, Open Government, Public Records, School District, University
Daylight (Part 3 in a Series)
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
One finds oneself with a question, when there are gaps in a public record, when there are easily-avoidable deficiencies of open government: What will one do about it? A good method in this matter is deliberate, dispassionate, and diligent. A few thoughts: 1. Foundation. One looks at state and local provisions for public records and…
City, Law, Laws/Regulations, Local Government, Open Government, Public Records, School District, University
Midnight (Part 2 in a Series)
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
Open government is right both in itself and in consequence: a free society confers political power only for limited & enumerated purposes. Those who confer this power have a right of oversight and a sensible obligation to assure that power’s exercise remains limited & enumerated. The right derives both naturally and by positive law. In…
America, City, Culture, Local Government, Politics, Religion, School District, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, University
Rabbi Sharon Brous’s Advice for Small Towns (and Everywhere, Really)
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Over at The Atlantic, there’s an interview with Rabbi Sharon Brous, the senior rabbi at IKAR, a non-denominational synagogue in California. See ‘I’ve Spent My Life Studying These Books That Say Decency Actually Matters.’ Rabbi Brous describes religious belief among progressives in contemporary America, and two of her observations are particularly suited even to Whitewater…
Culture, Education, University
UW-Whitewater’s Org Chart, 2017 Verison
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
UW-Whitewater has a 2017 organization chart, one I’ve embedded at the end of this post. 1. Big for Small. It’s not a big institution, but it is a big institution for a small town like Whitewater. There’s no institutional or organizational hierarchy in Whitewater half so large. 2. The key issues aren’t structural. Without question,…
City, Culture, Local Government, School District, University
Old Whitewater and Populism
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
Most of the figures who represented an Old Whitewater outlook have faded from the scene. Their high water mark was several years ago; they’re receding now. Their like won’t be seen again. Their decline, however, comes in the immediate conditions of an impatient populism. That populism doesn’t represent a New Whitewater, but replaces Old Whitewater’s…