The Durand-Arkansaw School District is meeting tonight. Items on the agenda include two public hearings on a Waiver of Educator Effectiveness requirements for the 2020-21 school year, discussion and possible action on re-opening in January, and discussion and possible action on the 2021-2022 school calendar. Tonight's meeting begins at 6pm and will be available on the district's zoom site.
Menomonie Police are warning businesses to be on the lookout for counterfeit bills. Police say an unknown male passed a counterfeit $50 bill at Kwik Trip. The bill was actually a washed $5 bill and then changed to look like at $50. The suspect was driving a Chevrolet HHR with Wisconsin License plate 149-WVV, and was later identified as Kevin Gilbertson from Black River Falls. If anyone has had a similar case with Gilbertson you are to call the Menomonie Police Department.
The City of Durand is nearing completion of updating the boundary lines of the city around Forest Hills Cemetary. Durand Mayor Patrick Milliren says he would now like to update all the burial plot information in the cemetery. While the update doesn't need to happen right away, Millren presented his idea to the city council at last week's meeting.
New public health guidelines in Wisconsin make it possible for some people to shorten their quarantine after being exposed to COVID-19. The new guidelines went into effect earlier this month. The Eau Claire City-County Health Department says it still supports a full 14-day quarantine as the safest length. A ten-day quarantine with no test or a seven-day quarantine with a negative test can also be possible based on a few considerations. The department says not everyone can choose a shorter quarantine.
The United Way of the Greater Chippewa Valley has announced it has awarded over $141000 in grants to eight different non-profits to help with Covid-19 relief. The organizations splitting the money include Big Brothers Big Sisters of NW WI, Western Dairyland, Feed My People and Hope Gospel Mission. This is the third round of grants the United Way has awarded totaling $500,000.
Time is growing short for Wisconsin residents who want to sign up for Obamacare. Open enrollment for health coverage under the federal government ends today. There are some exceptions. The enrollment is taking place at the same time the U-S Supreme Court considers the future of the health reform law. The Trump administration and a group of Republican state attorneys general are working to invalidate the Affordable Care Act. They argue the individual mandate is unconstitutional after Congress eliminated the penalty for not having health insurance. More information can be found online at HealthCare-dot-gov.
The first group of Wisconsin frontline workers was vaccinated against COVID-19 Monday afternoon. The shots were administered just after 2:30 p-m, a few hours after the delivery was received at U-W Health in Madison. Doctor Matt Anderson says the recipients will be monitored for a brief time to make sure there aren’t any bad reactions, then they will get a follow-up shot in about three weeks. The senior medical director of primary care says the hospital has a plan to vaccinate all employees who want the shot. S-S-M Health expects to get its delivery of doses possibly today (Tuesday) and Unity Point Health is expecting its shipment later this week.
Struggling businesses will get help and unemployment benefits will be extended after the Minnesota Legislature gave its approval to a COVID-19 relief package. Grants will go directly to bars, restaurants, and entertainment venues the governor ordered to close for four weeks starting last month. Governor Tim Walz has said he supports the aid package, so he is expected to sign the bill. Local governments will be able to direct some of the money to businesses that have been damaged the most by the coronavirus pandemic. The unemployment benefits have been extended by 13 weeks. Almost 125-thousand people had faced the end of the unemployment checks by the day after Christmas.
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A group of students and parents has voiced its frustration with the Green Bay Area Public School Board of Education over in-person classes. The students say remote learning is to blame for them falling behind. W-B-A-Y Television has reported 27-percent of the grades for students in middle and high school in the district were failing in the first six weeks of the school year. The group gathered in front of the district’s main office Saturday. The school board is set to discuss the situation at a meeting. It will also talk about the possibility of loosening the credit requirements for graduation.
The F-B-I says a 17-year-old was recruiting people for a white supremacy plot targeting the nation’s power grids. Details of the terror plot were revealed when a warrant was unsealed in Wisconsin’s Eastern U-S District Court last week. The young recruiter was among three people listed in a federal warrant, but no names have been released. As many as 10 people may have been involved in an operation called “Lights Out.” The teen wanted the group to be ready to go by 2024, but it was going to accelerate the timeline if President Trump lost the November election.
Wisconsin’s Dane and Milwaukee counties will have to wait a little while before they are reimbursed for the costs of recounting votes from the November election. The Wisconsin Legislature’s budget committee is withholding the money. President Trump’s campaign paid three-million dollars for those recounts. Republicans said Friday they are holding back the money, but they didn’t say why. Milwaukee County Clerk George Christenson accused lawmakers of “playing politics with money that isn’t theirs.” Wisconsin statutes say losing candidates can request a recount, but they have to pay the costs upfront if they lost by more than one-quarter percent.
The State Supreme court has dismissed a Trump Campaign lawsuit against the November presidential election. In a 4 to 3 decision on Monday, the liberal justices of the court, backed up by Justice Brian Hagedorn, told the Trump Campaign that it waited too long to file a lawsuit against the election based on the challenges they offered. Hagedorn likened the effort to trying to legislate the rules of football after the season was over and your team lost. The court's conservative justices wanted to discuss the merits of the case, but were outnumbered in the decision.
There is no post-Thanksgiving jump in coronavirus cases in Wisconsin. The state's Department of Health Services yesterday reported 27-hundred positives and 15 new deaths. But DHS also reported a large drop in the state's positivity rate. Wisconsin's seven-day positivity rate Sunday dipped under 11-percent. That number was 13-percent last week, and 18-percent at the beginning of November.
More than 100 restaurants are set to defy Governor Walz's orders if a ban on indoor dining continues. One-hundred-50 restaurants and bars are a part of the Reopen Minnesota Coalition. After being shut down since last month, one business owner is saying she will reopen her restaurant regardless of the consequence. Lisa Monet Zarza owns Alibili Drinkery and says she is not just reopening for herself but for her staff who is struggling to provide for their families.
Officials in Winona County held a public forum on Zoom Monday to discuss building a new jail. Community members will be able to ask questions through Zoom’s virtual chat feature. Members of the county commission are said to be thinking about changing some plans for the jail after hearing from the public last week. The cost of a new jail has been estimated at 25-million dollars. Smaller options will be considered at a December 22nd board meeting, but that could be affected by public input tonight.
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