Good morning.
Friday in Whitewater will be cloudy with intermittent thunderstorms and a high of 73. Sunrise is 5:34 AM and sunset 8:08 PM for 14h 33m 39s of daytime. The moon is in its third quarter with 49.9% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1949, the Soviet Union lifts its blockade of Berlin.
By Henry Ries / USAF – United States Air Force Historical Research Agency via Cees Steijger (1991), “A History of USAFE”, Voyageur, ISBN: 1853100757; USAF photo 070119-F-0000R-101 [1], Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4559179
Shawn Johnson reports Negotiations continue at Wisconsin Capitol over local government funding plan (‘Republicans say the full Assembly will pass a bill next week that would revamp the state’s shared revenue program’):
Under the GOP bill, every community would see at least a 10 percent increase in state funding, but larger cities like Green Bay and Racine receive millions less than they would under the governor’s plan. Some small towns would see increases of several hundred percent, though the total dollars they’d receive would be relatively modest.
“I’m not hearing anything about a big change in the formula,” Novak said of the ongoing negotiations. “But that may change.”
The Republican bill also attaches far more strings for local governments to receive the money. They include:
- A provision that would require local approval of projects funded through the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program north of Highway 8, which runs east to west across the northern tier of the state.
- Requirements that local governments either maintain the number of police on staff or maintain the number of tickets they write and people they arrest.
- A ban on local advisory referendums on issues ranging from whether the state should legalize marijuana to whether all-terrain vehicles should be allowed on local roads.
- New restrictions on the power of local health officers that would prevent them from unilaterally closing businesses for more than 14 days to control an outbreak or epidemic.
- A variety of new restrictions specific to Milwaukee, including a ban on using state funding for the city’s streetcar and a requirement to bring armed police officers back to its public schools.
Whitewater’s concerns, however, exceed what this shared revenue plan, or any other, would meet. We’ll need a different approach to address those needs. See What Ails, What Heals, Waiting for Whitewater’s Dorothy Day, Something Transcendent, and in the Meantime, An Oasis Strategy, and The Community Space.
This is how a conservationist restores a centuries-old painting: