Wednesday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 87. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:37 PM for 15h 20m 15s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 34.7% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Tech Park Board meets at 8 AM, and the Park Board meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1944, President Roosevelt signs into law the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill.
Whitewater will be looking for a new city manager and a new police chief. A few remarks:
These are not sudden developments. The city manager previously interviewed for a job in Fort Atkinson; the same consulting firm has now found him a position in Dodge County. The police chief has been on administrative leave for about half a year; the common council had a closed-session agenda item about his employment on May 3rd (‘Consideration of the terms of a Release and Employment Disposition Agreement between the City of Whitewater and the City of Whitewater Police Chief’). None of this is sudden, and consideration of the release pre-dates recent press coverage about the Whitewater Police Department. If residents are surprised, it’s because their local government has not informed them properly.
It’s easy to say ‘we can’t talk under the advice of counsel.’It’s so easy that it’s become a trope. No one needs a lawyer to say he can’t talk — laypeople can keep quiet on their own (although they sometimes need reminding). The value of good representation comes when clients don’t talk but their lawyers craft careful statements with the news that can be said. It’s only all or nothing for those who don’t see there are informative middle positions.
Whitewater worries about who, but she would do better to think about what and how. Find the right principles, with a leader who knows how to achieve them, and then government will function more smoothly. It’s not the person, it’s the policy.
For public roles: Whitewater does not need a surrogate brother, she needs a city manager. Whitewater does not need a surrogate uncle, she needs a police chief. Whitewater does not need a surrogate sister, she needs a superintendent. Whitewater does not need a surrogate grandparent, she needs a chancellor.
In all cases, government should be responsible and limited, so that private life may flourish most fully.
As it is, in a country with serious debates and conflicts over fundamental rights, as would have been true other times in our past, local government has both (1) a general obligation to run well and also (2) a particular obligation in these times to run well so that it does not add to ideological or economic burdens now gripping residents.
It’s not a personal role, but officials fulfilling their public roles with expressed policies of what and how that the community now needs.
Tuesday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 97. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:37 PM for 15h 20m 21s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 46.5% of its visible disk illuminated.
The Whitewater School District’s Policy Review Committee meets at 9 AM, and the Whitewater Common Council at 6:30 PM.
On this day in 1942, a Japanese submarine surfaces near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by Japan against the United States mainland.
In Madison, parents are removing students from St. Maria Goretti, a prekindergarten through eighth-grade school, over changes in curriculum. Although the departures are over changes in Catholic teaching, the enrollment declines show the willingness of parents (whether religious or secular) to leave a program they don’t like. Where fifty years ago one might have expected parents to endure changes they didn’t abide by, that’s not true now. In either Catholic or public schools, families will walk if they don’t like what’s happening and they can find an alternative.
Exact figures are hard to come by, but enrollment for the 2022-23 year is projected to be between 100 and 120, down from more than 400 during the 2020-21 year and about 330 at the beginning of 2021-22, according to parish or former parish members. [Principal Bob] Schell said enrollment last school year was about 300 but declined to speculate about what it would be next year, saying “much can happen during the summer months.”
The school had 40 staffers most recently, Schell said, and next year there were will be somewhere around 14, to align with reduced enrollment.
The pandemic pushed some Whitewater families and students to become more vocal (on both sides of the debate about masks), but parents, generally, were becoming more assertive long before the pandemic.
Madison has many alternatives, but also in Whitewater, parents (especially those living on the edges of the district) have choices elsewhere for their children. Open enrollment for public school students is a good policy, as it gives families some choices they would not otherwise have if bound only to their home community’s schools. That good policy means that public schools have to try harder to retain students.
One would prefer to retain as many students as possible, but retaining students because those families have no choices for their children harms both families and the schools from which they cannot leave.
Trapped in a bad arrangement is bad educational policy.
Monday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 92. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:36 PM for 15h 20m 24s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 56.9% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Urban Forestry Commission meets at 4:30 PM and the Library Board at 6:30 PM.
On this day in 1893, Lizzie Borden is acquitted of the murders of her father and stepmother.
In communities big & small, most residents have similar standards for their towns: good schools, good roads, safe streets, clean air & water. There’s much more to life, but that’s a foundation on which large and small places together hold agreement. It would be better for society if residents could and would privately measure the conditions of their towns, but into the gaps where better does not dwell, regulation steps.
Wisconsin will likely see its first standards for so-called forever chemicals known as PFAS now that Wisconsin Republicans have posed no objections to the rules.
An aide for Republican Sen. Steve Nass, who chairs the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules, told the Associated Press Monday that the committee would allow the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources to implement the proposed standards.
PFAS, or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of thousands of synthetic chemicals found in firefighting foam and everyday products like nonstick cookware and stain-resistant clothing. Research has shown links to serious health effects that include increased risk of kidney and testicular cancers, thyroid disease and fertility issues. The chemicals have also been tied to reduced response to vaccines.
Elected officials, environmental groups, residents, industry and water associations have been at odds over how to regulate the chemicals and at what level. As state standards move forward, they will bring new testing requirements while federal regulators are updating their health advisories for the chemicals.
….
The DNR has said sampling for PFAS is required for community water systems, as well as non-transient non-community systems. They include systems that serve cities, mobile home parks, apartment complexes, businesses and schools.
Father’s Day in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 84. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:36 PM for 15h 20m 22s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 67.1% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1865, enslaved people in Galveston, Texas are officially informed of their freedom. The anniversary, now a federal holiday, was celebrated in Texas and other states as Juneteenth.
Michael Gableman’s role as a legislatively-appointed special counsel has been a political embarrassment, but it should not continue as an embarrassment to the legal profession. Gableman (a lawyer and former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice) should receive discipline from Wisconsin’s Office of Lawyer Regulation for recent courtroom insults against a sitting judge and an attorney in a civil action. The Associated Press and Rich Kremer report Dane County Judge calls for disciplining Michael Gableman over ‘misogynistic comments’ (Special counsel probing 2020 election also to be fined $2K per day for not following open records law):
A Dane County judge said former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman should face disciplinary action for disrupting a hearing and making “misogynistic comments” about a fellow lawyer.
The recommendations were contained in a ruling that comes nearly a week after Gableman’s Office of Special Counsel probing 2020 election results was found in contempt for not following the state’s open records laws.
In a scathing written ruling, Dane County Circuit Court Judge Frank Remington said Gableman’s conduct during a June 10 contempt hearing and court recess was “an affront to the judicial process” and an insult to Attorney Christa Westerberg.
Westerberg is representing liberal watchdog American Oversight in its lawsuit demanding records from the special counsel’s 2020 election investigation.
During a June 10 court hearing in which Gableman was to answer questions about his office’s refusal to provide records to American Oversight, he refused to testify.
Gableman then accused Remington of abandoning “his role as a neutral magistrate” and “acting as an advocate” during the hearing. Gableman was caught on a live courtroom microphone during a subsequent court recess insinuating that Westerberg could not do her job without consulting on strategy with the judge in his chambers.
“The Court will ignore the personal insult,” Remington wrote. “However, the Court cannot ignore Gableman’s disruptive conduct and misogynistic comments about a fellow lawyer.”
See Gableman’s remarks on audio and video. Gableman (1) complains childishly about adverse rulings from the judge, (2) baselessly implies illicit conduct between judge and counsel as the cause of those adverse rulings, and (3) claims that he, Gableman, never acted improperly as a judge when, as anyone can see, he’s acting improperly as an attorney and as special counsel when he’s knowingly speaking this way on an open microphone in court.
Gableman is bound by the rules of a profession that has a duty to review and, if he is found culpable, punish him for his misconduct. The Legislature may be stuck with Gableman for eons yet to come, but the legal profession should no longer endure his breaches of professional duty.
Six adorable baby beavers were born at the Minnesota Zoo. The zoo says everyone is doing well and the beaver kits are expected to emerge from their enclosure in July.
Wednesday, June 22nd at 1:30 PM, there will be a showing of Roma @ Seniors in the Park, in the Starin Community Building:
Drama
Rated R (language/nudity), 2 hours, 15 minutes (2018), Spanish/Mexican language, with English subtitles. (Rescheduled from February 22: a snow day!)
A year in the life of a middle-class family and their maid in Mexico City in the early 1970s. A slice-of -life film that you won’t soon forget. Filmed in black and white. Three awards, 2019: Best Foreign Film, Best Cinematography, Best Director.
Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 74. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:36 PM for 15h 20m 17s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 77.2% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1815, the Duke of Wellington and Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher defeat Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo, forcing him to abdicate the throne of France for the second and last time.
Before his testimony to the January 6th Congressional committee (statement, testimony), conservative former federal judge J. Michael Luttig spoke to Frontline. His interview with Frontline describes his thinking about the 2016 election, the Trump presidency, the 2020 presidential campaign, and the effort to prevent certification of the 2020 presidential results.
The interview offers a lengthy and detailed account of Luttig’s views.
The former federal judge J. Michael Luttig, who counseled then-Vice President Mike Pence’s team in the days before the 2021 U.S. Capitol attack, spoke to FRONTLINE ahead of his anticipated House Jan. 6 committee appearance.
“The plan was to overturn the election through the exploitation of what I’ve called the institutions of democracy and the instruments and instrumentalities of our democracy,” Luttig told FRONTLINE in a May 25, 2022, interview — his first for television.
Luttig served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 1991 to 2006. Prior to his time on the bench, Luttig was assistant counsel to the president under Ronald Reagan and clerked for then-judge Antonin Scalia and for Supreme Court Justice Warren Burger. He also served as assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice under George H.W. Bush.
After leaving government service in 2006, he entered the private sector, where he has worked for both Boeing and Coca-Cola. He is currently retired.
Friday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 82. Sunrise is 5:15 AM and sunset 8:36 PM for 15h 20m 07s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 86.9% of its visible disk illuminated.
“Here we are, then, on this so renowned river, all of whose peculiar features I have endeavored to note carefully.” It’s important to recall that Marquette and Joliet did not discover the Mississippi: Indians had been using it for 10,000 years, Spanish conquistador Hernan De Soto had crossed it in 1541, and fur traders Groseilliers and Radisson may have reached it in the 1650s. But Marquette and Joliet left the first detailed reports and proved that the Mississippi flowed into the Gulf of Mexico, which opened the heart of the continent to French traders, missionaries, and soldiers. View a Map of Marquette & Joliet’s route.
Why don’t communities move from government solutions to private ones? (A point about Whitewater that is key to understanding both private initiative and the city: there is no one private path. Business people talk endlessly about business uplift, as though there were a choice merely between government programs and business growth. That’s a myopic view of private life. Many private activities are cultural or charitable, and are significant parts of a thriving community.)
For now, back to the question as applied to Whitewater: why doesn’t Whitewater move past fixation on government activity (of the city government and school district)?
An answer: community leaders either (1) falsely tout local government’s ability to uplift the city (and so draw attention to supposed public solutions) or (2) make a hash of projects and proposals (and so attract attention to public mishaps).
The first is boosterism, the second is bungling, and they both keep the focus on public, not private, actions. Private activity struggles to take hold in a place where government takes up so much social space in a small town.
Appointed public officials who promise too much or deliver too little make themselves a burden on residents. Whitewater is a low-income community; many residents have enough to address without public officials’ commotions. Appointees should be afforded ample coaching, but they should not be coddled. (I am convinced that, however uncomfortable it may seem at first, willing and sincere people can be coached to handle all sorts of intense encounters.) If they’re receptive to good advice, and follow it, then so much the better for everyone.
The libertarian concern, so to speak, is that government should be limited, responsive, and humble so that a myriad of private accomplishments and associations become possible. Well-ordered public institutions should do only so much as to allow for a private, spontaneous order, an order that forms and grows to meet human needs and desires.
And until public institutions are limited & humble, there’s a need for a critique, so that they might not be millstones around the community’s neck.
Whitewater does not have a margin for empty public promises, hollow public achievements, or chronic public controversies.
There are many questions for which, after careful consideration, there is no certain answer. There are others, like the question raised in the tragedy below, in which there is greater moral certitude. Consider a talefrom Reddit in which a cat owner’s girlfriend mistreated his cat, leading him to evict the girlfriend from his house:
So I have a cat named Raven who’s 3 years old.
My girlfriend of 2 years moved in with me a few weeks ago and it was clear she didn’t like my cat. I didn’t think it was really a big deal until one day I got home and he was just gone.
He’s not an outdoor cat and he never goes outside.
He was gone for hours and I was worried sick until my buddy came to my house and returned him, saying he found him 2 blocks from my house.
I asked my girlfriend how my cat, who has never tried to go out before, ended up that far from my house and she admitted to kicking him out.
I was furious, saying she had no right to kick him out and told her that since she thought she had the power to kick my cat out, I wanted her out of my house by the end of the month.
She cried that she had nowhere to go and that she would have to live on the streets. I said I didn’t care and told her to leave by the end of the month.
My friends think I’m being too harsh, but my cat could have died because of her and I don’t want her trying anything else.
One always hopes for a fair outcome and, happily, a fair outcome unfolded in this case: the cat was restored to safety, the boyfriend will be able to find a new, more considerate girlfriend, and the miscreant former girlfriend will now have the needed solitary reflection, one hopes, to turn from the dark and sinister path she was on.
Thursday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 88. Sunrise is 5:15 AM and sunset 8:35 PM for 15h 19m 53s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 94% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Community Development Authority meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1911, IBM is founded as the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company in Endicott, New York.
Matt Levine, author of the Money Stuff column at Bloomberg Opinion, writes that Crypto Debt Can Be Trouble. In seeing the decline of crypto currencies’ value this way, Levine reminds that big events have multiple effects:
Crypto winter
One thing that has happened is that the prices of risky cryptocurrencies have gone down. Bitcoin traded above $40,000 two months ago; today it got close to $20,000. Ethereum went from $3,000ish to $1,100ish. The total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies, “which topped $3 trillion in November, dropped below $1 trillion.”
In the abstract, this is just fine. Extremely speculative people had extremely speculative positions in extremely speculative assets, and the prices went up a lot, and then they went down a lot. Some gamblers made some money and then they lost some money; that’s how gambling works. People who put their life savings into Bitcoin should be told, very firmly, that they should not have done that; that was wrong, and now they know. Also though they still have like half of their life savings. If you put your life savings in the S&P 500 you haven’t had a great year either.
The deeper problem, always, is when you add leverage. Someone who gambled $40,000 on Bitcoin now has $20,000, fine. But someone who bought a Bitcoin with $20,000 of their own money and $20,000 borrowed from someone else now has roughly nothing, which is worse. Much worse, though, is that the person who loaned them the money — and who thought that money was safe — is now at risk of not getting paid back. Lots of people all around the ecosystem made overcollateralized loans against risky cryptocurrencies, lending speculators $100 against $200 or $300 or whatever worth of Bitcoin or Ethereum or Dogecoin or whatever. When the prices of those risky cryptocurrencies fall far enough fast enough, the lenders will ask for their money back. But the leveraged speculators won’t necessarily have the money: They were in the business of leveraged speculation on cryptocurrencies, which is a very bad business to be in right now, and all their money might be gone. A $100 loan overcollateralized by $200 worth of Ethereum two months ago is now undercollateralized, backed by about $70 worth of Ethereum. And this is happening to every leveraged crypto speculator and every crypto lender in every cryptocurrency all at once.
Levine, who’s insightful (he is!), shows that foresight requires looking at more than a single possibility. There are multiple effects from this crypto winter.
Levine’s training might suggest that he would be skilled at spotting these effects, as he was formerly “an editor of Dealbreaker, an investment banker at Goldman Sachs, a mergers and acquisitions lawyer at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, and a clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit.” But Levine was also a classics major who taught high school Latin after he was graduated from college. That earlier experience likely shaped his analytical skills, too.
There’s no one training or background that has a monopoly on thinking about causes and (as it often turns out) multiple effects. One can come to that useful outlook through many paths, and benefit from having done so. Communities, all communities, have scores upon scores of people who show foresight however acquired and sharpened.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 95. Sunrise is 5:15 AM and sunset 8:35 PM for 15h 19m 35s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 98.4% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1878, Eadweard Muybridge takes a series of photographs to prove that all four feet of a horse leave the ground when it runs; the study becomes the basis of motion pictures.
Eadweard Muybridge – The sequence is set to motion using these frames, originally taken from Eadweard Muybridge’s Human and Animal Locomotion series, (plate 626, thoroughbred bay mare “Annie G.” galloping) published 1887 by the University of Pennsylvania
A soft landing refers to the way that the Fed is attempting to slow inflation – and therefore economic growth – without causing a recession.
In order to stabilize prices while not hurting employment, the Fed is expected to increase interest rates rapidly in the coming months – and it currently forecasts rates to be at least 1 percentage point higher by 2023. It has already lifted its benchmark rate twice this year by a total of 0.75 percentage point.
Historically, when the Fed has had to raise rates quickly, economic downturns have been difficult to avoid. Can it manage a soft landing this time? Powell has insisted that its policy tools have become more effective since its last inflation fight in the 1980s, making it possible this time to stick the landing. Many economists and other observers remain uncertain. And a recent survey of economists notes that many anticipate a recession beginning next year.
Tuesday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 97. Sunrise is 5:15 AM and sunset 8:34 PM for 15h 19m 13s of daytime. The moon is full with 100% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Public Works Committee meets at 6 PM.
On this day in 1775, the Continental Army is established by the Continental Congress, marking the birth of the United States Armed Forces.
Many of Whitewater’s current challenges have no partisan or ideological cause. It’s not a matter of Republicans, Democrats, independents, etc. These problems are not a matter of left, center, or right. They are, instead, a matter of becoming inured to poor performance and poor results. Government delivers less, while either pretending that it is delivering more, or blaming residents for mistakes and controversies, for which those residents are not responsible.
Troubled communities remain troubled when they give up discussing, debating, and demanding better. These unfortunate places — victims of their own sloth and malaise — descend still lower. They become inured to failure and disappointment.
A story about Whitewater’s police department is about more than one set of allegations, or different sets of allegations. It’s not normal for a small town to go so long without a permanent police chief. It’s not normal for the public to know nothing about a supposed public investigation that’s carried on for seven months. That’s treating abnormal as normal, and expecting residents to accept that sad situation. (Key point: I don’t ‘dislike’ policing. Defunding the police, for example, has always seemed a clumsy idea to me. Rather, the city government needs a well-ordered department within a community that’s well-informed about news both good and bad. When a community hears both good and bad, residents will not overreact to either.)
It’s not normal for a school district to come through the controversies of a once-in-a-century pandemic only to have worse commotions after the pandemic. These aren’t complaints about national ideological topics, they are chronic local complaints, month after month, about a local administration. It was not normal to respond to those complaints with a seven-minute, prepared board statement before public comment even began. There is both arrogance and ignorance in thinking that approach would work. (It did not: the 5.24.22 board statement only brought more concerns at the 6.7.22 board meeting.)
It’s not normal to have a small city government that underestimates the cost of a dredging project by millions, the cost of a lift station by a million, while remaining silent on the status of its police department, and explaining little about its plans for its fire department.
It’s not normal for a small public university to have so many complaints over so many years about sexual harassment and assault (indeed, to be named as one of only 100 universities like this in the nation).
These are local problems of local administration. Whitewater’s residents are not less capable than the residents of other places. They deserve public institutions and officials that do not treat abnormal as normal.
Monday in Whitewater will see afternoon thundershowers with a high of 87. Sunrise is 5:15 AM and sunset 8:34 PM for 15h 18m 47s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 98.5% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1777, Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette lands near Charleston, South Carolina, in order to help the Continental Congress to train its army.
This morning, the Wisconsin Examiner has a story entitled Complaints mount over conduct of Whitewater PD (‘Reports of racial profiling and excessive force under suspended chief’). Isiah Holmes’s story has three main topics: (1) the experiences of D’Angelo Lux, a former UW-Whitewater student who has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the department and some of its officers, (2) the department’s record on managing complaints generally, and (3) Chief Aaron Raap’s career record in Milwaukee before he became Whitewater’s chief. (The story includes an embedded copy of Raap’s complaint case file while he was an employee of the Milwaukee Police Department.)
Update, Monday afternoon: I’ve received emails asking what I think of the details in the Examiner story. A quick reply, before a more detailed one tomorrow: it’s not typical for a town to go this long with a police chief on leave. Litigation is important both to a litigant, defendants, and the community, but there’s more than that at issue here. (That’s why, after all, I wrote the paragraph immediately following this one.) Whitewater’s local government has a closed and broken process in more places than one. The excerpts from the story were chosen with care, along with a recommendation to read the whole story.
While the story is about policing, it also implicates subjects of local government’s transparency and competency, and the lack of serious news reporting on myriad topics in Whitewater. Readers would do best to read the story in full; excerpts appear immediately below:
Since December, the department’s police chief Aaron Raap, has been on administrative leave pending an ongoing internal investigation. Raap, who was hired as chief in 2018, was taken into custody following an alleged Thanksgiving fight with a family member. Though the Waukesha County District Attorney’s Office declined to issue charges, other controversies have also emerged during Raap’s time in Whitewater.
No one on the city’s common council offered comment either, even after a council meeting was held regarding Raap’s continued employment by the city on May 3. Deputy Chief of Police Daniel Meyer, who has served as acting chief since Raap was placed on paid administrative leave, said no action was taken by the council that day. Meyer also provided data and reports on citizen complaints against officers since 2018, when Raap arrived at the department.
“Since Chief Raap has been employed by the WPD,” Meyer emailed Wisconsin Examiner, “two officers have been disciplined pursuant to internal investigations regarding use of force, however, neither investigation was complaint-driven.” A complaint of excessive force against a WPD officer was made on Feb. 5, 2022. There were 10 complaints in 2019. The number dropped to just three in 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic set in. The following year in 2021, however, the number rose to 8 complaints against WPD personnel.
….
Every complaint filed in 2018 was classified as “exonerated,” meaning an investigation confirmed that an incident occurred but that it was justified. The 10 complaints the following year followed a similar pattern, from accusations of unreasonable searches with dogs to reports of excessive force and harassment.
In 2021 the trend continued. A complaint by a driver that an officer allowed another car to leave the scene of a hit and run was ultimately sustained by the department, and the driver who was at fault was later cited. Another complaint came from a person who reported having “almost died in custody, was transported with no seat belt, had an asthma attack, was fearful for their life, and that an officer had a vendetta against them,” police records state. The investigation found the complaint was without merit and unfounded. Other complaints involved officers who rang a citizen’s doorbell multiple times and refused to leave when asked. There were also reports of officers not fully investigating incidents, including one of an officer allegedly not taking a child’s complaint of abuse seriously enough. Unwarranted traffic stops also made a reappearance. Even during the 2020 slowdown, reports of race-based harassment continued.
….
Decades ago, Raap served as a police officer for the city of Milwaukee, where he was hired in 1990 and left the department at the rank of captain. While serving in the Milwaukee Police Department, Raap accumulated a lengthy disciplinary record. According to Milwaukee PD records obtained through open records requests, 22 internal investigations involving Raap were initiated from August 1995-December 2003. The accusations included battery of citizens, refusing to give his name and badge number, improper searches and seizures, entering the homes of residents without just cause, and issues with the filing of reports. Some of the complaints involved incidents where several officers responded, including Raap. In these complaints, Raap defended the actions of fellow officers.
Just one of those complaints, related to the filing of reports, was sustained by internal affairs in 1996. The last 2003 complaint involving misconduct in public office is listed as “warrant refused.” In such cases, a criminal allegation is presented to the district attorney’s office but no charges are issued. These decisions were made under former Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann, who served as district attorney from 1969 to 2007 .
….
A complaint against Raap in the year 2000 related to battery accusations was also listed as “warrant refused”. Most of Raap’s complaints during his time in Milwaukee were listed as unfounded or baseless. Many of those decades-old complaints echo reports of misconduct by Whitewater officers under Raap’s leadership today. Raap’s future as head of WPD remains in limbo, and he continues to be on paid administrative leave. WPD did not provide details on the timeline for the investigation.
