Hey, Sen. Sunspots. What's the plan?

RoJo said climate change was due to sunspots, not human activity. 

Trump said it was a hoax invented by the Chinese. 

So what's the plan, gentlemen, given that last month 11,000 scientists said we were in a climate emergency, and now there's today's news?

Climate Change is Ravaging the Arctic, Report Finds

But what happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic. Permafrost sequesters twice as much heat-trapping carbon dioxide as is currently in the atmosphere. As that ground thaws it releases that carbon into the atmosphere, exacerbating climate change. Researchers say that if too much permafrost thaws it will create a self-reinforcing cycle wherein thawing permafrost will lead to still more thawing permafrost, which in turn will make climate change worse. 

Recent observations of carbon flows in Alaskan permafrost have found that more carbon is being released than stored. 

Walker tried to kill DNR magazine. He failed, and is still an informative bargain.

Remember when the anti-science and environment tag team of Walker and Stepp tried to kill the DNR's magazine because they hated science, the environment, the Wisconsin Idea and the people's right to know?

So happy their scheme failed, and I can't wait for the issue I know is the mail, given how it's pitched by the DNR on its website this week. 

And subscribe if you haven't. It's a bargain.

(Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine is published four times a year and is available via subscription for $8.97. Call 1-800-678-9472, or find stories and subscribe online at wnrmag.com.)

Learn How Plants and Animals Weather Winter in The DNR's Latest Issue of Wisconsin Natural Resources Magazine

In cold weather, most of the water in deciduous trees such as oaks is stored as sap in the root system to avoid freezing. It's just one way plants and animals outwit winter, Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine notes.Photo credit: Contributed by Len Harris

MADISON, Wis. - Winter will not officially begin until Dec. 21, but coping with the season has commenced. How do Wisconsin's plants and animals endure the often harsh conditions? Find out in "Masters of Mother Nature", the cover story in the latest issue of Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine, featuring some of the more interesting adaptations species employ to weather winter.

Other stories in the Winter issue include a look at the Department of Natural Resource's Wisconsin Wetland Conservation Trust, which has several projects underway to restore vital wetlands; details on how DNR is working to ensure clean drinking water around the state in this Year of Clean Drinking Water; and a feature on a longtime wildlife rehabilitation program -- and the dedicated 83-year-old woman who runs it.

Winter Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine

"Preventive measures" tells how conservation efforts are aiding at-risk species. Those efforts include the work of the DNR Natural Heritage Conservation Program, which also shares its 2019 Field Notes in this issue. The report highlights success stories around the state, from whooping cranes to wood turtles, and spotlights just a few of the DNR staff and volunteers behind the NHC's important conservation actions.

Secretary-designee Preston Cole offers his input on this issue, including opening remarks and a message on climate change and clean energy. In regular features, "Back in the day" recalls the history of the American Birkebeiner ski race, set for Feb. 22 in northern Wisconsin. Additionally, "Outside in Wisconsin" heads to the beach. That is, Big Foot Beach State Park in Lake Geneva, where ice fishing and sledding are among the winter activities.

Also, in this issue, find the Friends of Wisconsin State Parks 2020 Calendar pullout. Winning photos from the annual FWSP contest are included, highlighting beautiful scenes from state parks, forests, trails and recreation areas.

Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine is published four times a year and is available via subscription for $8.97. Call 1-800-678-9472, or find stories and subscribe online at wnrmag.com.

MN strengthens climate change focus. WI needs different legislature to get there.

Minnesota is bringing more state resources to the climate change battle. 

Gov. Tim Walz Monday tapped the heads of multiple Minnesota government agencies to be part of a new collaboration aimed at getting the state back on track with its climate change goals.  

Walz said he’ll look to the new climate change subcabinet to suggest policy changes and coordinate responses to reduce harmful emissions and to provide more resiliency as the state experiences heavier rains and warming temperatures. 

I was surprised to see that despite its broad investments in wind power, Minnesota was not meeting its green energy targets, but heartened to see that the state is getting more serious about getting there. 

Gov. Evers is moving Wisconsin out of the anti-science, climate change-denying, policy backwater where Walker buried it - - 

Man with sign has it right. Walker put Wisconsin in a deep, anti-science climate change hole and a GOP-controlled legislature will do everything it can to keep us there. Judith Davidoff photo.

- - is specifically organizing agencies around changing climate conditions, and found more funding for electric vehicle charging stations.

But the GOP-led Walkerite Legislature continues to throw up obstacles to a broad range of environmental matters, from preventing rural groundwater pollution to remediating urban lead piping to undermining Evers' appointment prerogatives.

Wisconsin’s ag secretary designee fired after Senate Republicans reject confirmation

Note also that the GOP-controlled, special interest-focused and spitefully-driven State Senate has yet to approve Evers' nomination of Preston Cole as Secretary of the DNR. 

Cole has a university degree in forestry and a background in forestry and environmental program management in St. Louis, MO, and in Milwaukee - - credentials (details, here), which Walker's longtime DNR Secretary Cathy Stepp - -  high school graduate and former McDonald's manager - - did not bring to the position.

Without all that GOP legislative opposition, Evers faces an uphill fight bringing effective environmental programming into the government at the very time all public agencies need to elevate science to combat resource degradation, air pollution, water contamination and climate change.

Paid family leave, dangerous to whom? Oh, Ron Johnson. Of course.

Millionaire and Donald Trump apologist Ron Johnson 

thinks food, housing, clothing and health care are privileges, not rights, so of course he'd oppose 12 weeks of parental paid leave for Federal workers:

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the committee that oversees government affairs, said he opposed the expansion of the federal benefit but does not expect to be able to stop it... “I think it’s unfortunate. I think it sets a very dangerous precedent.”

But 'dangerous?'

He must be scared to understand that some day soon, private-sector businesses like the one he married into are going to have to join the rest of the world and help stabilize the very families and communities which supply the labor that keeps his businesses humming.

Trump's real message to Foxconn: 'Don't cost me votes in Wisconsin.'

Trump knows very well that Foxconn is not panning out as The Eighth Wonder of the World - - 

 

WI GOP, Foxconn officials digging their own hole

- - and his message to the former Foxconn CEO delivered in our 2020 swing state this week was really 'don't cost me votes in Wisconsin come November.'

Foxconn's Terry Gou visits Milwaukee after Trump tells him to 'bring more jobs to Wisconsin'

Don't be surprised if Foxconn for the second year in a row - - in 2018, it missed a target of a mere 260 hires by scores - - soon reports so few hires in 2019 that no state cash-for-hiring is to be paid out. 

Remember, Trump and Walker were repeatedly breathless when touting an eventual 13,000 Foxconn jobs averaging $54,000 annual salaries, while it's widely acknowledged that the state does not have the professional engineering capacity to produce whatever it is that Foxconn may eventually manufacture in Wisconsin.

Not to mention an avalanche of bad media about the whole deal choking off development statewide, for years.

Trump may appear distracted this week by clogged toilets, but he knows that Foxconn wasn't the slam-dunk Walker and state Republicans hoped for in 2018 and doesn't want to see Wisconsin's electoral votes in 2020 swirl down the drain.

A complete archive of Foxconn news and commentary on this blog the last 30 months is posted, here.

A Foxconn Fever primer

Sensenbrenner voted against solidifying voting rights, because...

While he'd long been a leading voting rights supporter - - and, seriously, shouldn't every lawmaker be its champion? - - Sensenbrenner and every GOP House member except one didn't like the way Democrats wanted to help make American ballot box access a real thing.

On Friday, Republicans accused the Voting Rights Advancement Act of doing more than just reinstating [protections overturned by the US Supreme Court], contending the bill constituted broad federal overreach of states’ rights.

GOP lawmakers also complained the bill prohibited states from implementing voter ID laws and would require states to get permission before putting in place very specific election procedures that have a history of being used for discriminatory practices — even if the procedures weren’t intended to be discriminatory.

And that's how you wrap up 22 terms in Congress before making way for Scott Fitzgerald, another booster of voter ID, blatant gerrymandering and various other Republican special-interest orthodoxies.

On, Wisconsin.

Dane County: don't flub chance to rebrand Beltline as 'peppy' or 'zippy'

Forget the quaint old days in Madison when you'd tell the boss you got in late because traffic on the Beltline was congested. 

And, no, you're not about to be more reliably on time because modern transit has finally arrived: something more dynamic is about to change the way you roll.

A Dane County transportation body is recommending rebranding those generic strips of Beltline property between the outside lanes and the guardrails for "dynamic part-time shoulder use."

WisDOT photo accompanying Beltline web history

I have said I don't think this is a good idea, and I'm further fascinated by the  bureaucratic buzz wordiness - "dynamic part-time shoulder use" - - which jazzes up the way we think of those strips of pavement or gravel or dirt where we used to pull over and wait for a tow.

Besides "dynamic shoulder use" sounding like bad elevator etiquette or a 15-yard penalty on defensive backs, I'm wondering why the rebranding brigade didn't go with any of the other A-Z synonyms, from aggressive to zippy, to dress up this bad idea even more:

Synonyms for dynamic

• aggressive
• changing
• charismatic
• compelling
• effective
• energetic
• forceful
• influential
• lively
• potent
• powerful
• productive
• progressive
• vigorous
• activating
• driving
• electric
• energizing
• go-ahead
• go-getter
• coming on strong
• enterprising
• forcible
• go-getting
• highpowered
• hyped-up
• intense
• lusty
• magnetic
• peppy
• play for keeps
• play hard ball
• red-blooded
• strenuous
• vehement
• vitalizing
• zippy

During Walker years, WI led nation cutting environmental protections

More documentation of the lasting damage Walker did to the land, water and public health in state of John Muir, Aldo Leopold and Gaylord Nelson.

Adjusting for inflation, the Department of Natural Resources spending on programs designed to protect public health and the environment from pollutants was cut 36% between 2008 and 2018, according to findings of the Environmental Integrity Project.

And to think he said this week he's thinking of running for office in Wisconsin again.

You know what they say: pollute me once, shame on you. Pollute me forever,  shame on me.

Here is a more complete archive from this blog which has documented and explained 

Walker's toxic legacy. 

Walker's eight-year war on Wisconsin's environment. In 21 parts, one post, full story.

Begin with what I wrote in December 30, 2010, in this blog's third year but only hours before Walker's first-term swearing-in:

For the environment in Wisconsin, this is the day the music died.

With anti-DNR zealot Cathy Stepp's preposterous (read: management by the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce and the home builders organizations) nomination as Secretary of the Department of Natural Resources, Walker's legacy as the environmental destroyer of the land of Gaylord Nelson, John Muir and Aldo Leopold has begun.

In Great Lakes states, progress and setbacks on the water front

Updated from 12/4. But a collection of Indiana and Illinois officials seem determined to drag the Great Lakes Compact into an already muddled water sourcing municipal mess.
--------------------------------------

Gov. Evers declared 2019 as the Year of Clean Drinking Water in Wisconsin

Inside the DNR's State Fair building this year

with initiatives aimed at lead abatement (trimmed $40 million by GOP legislators) and 'forever chemicals' contamination despite the typical support from some (Republicans) in Wisconsin for more brown, dirty, unhealthy or privatized water.

And it's great to see similar efforts in other Great Lakes states to protect the region's critical water supplies, including: 

* In Michigan:

Nestle's Ice Mountain bottled water operation in northern Lower Michigan is not an essential public service, its bottled water is not a public water supply, and Osceola Township was within its rights to deny the company zoning approval for a new booster pump station to move its water, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday. 

Nestle Waters North America pursued the pump station in anticipation of receiving final approval on a plan to increase water withdrawals from its White Pine Springs well in Osceola Township from 250 gallons per minute to 400 gallons per minute.

* And also in Michigan:

LANSING, MI — Michigan regulators want to revise how the environmental risk from spreading livestock waste on farms is evaluated as part of a new draft general permit for industrial scale agriculture businesses that would, among other things, prohibit the application of manure on farm fields during three winter months.

* In Ohio:  

COLUMBUS  — The nearly 1,500 public drinking water systems in Ohio will be tested for “forever chemicals” that can harm health, according to a plan announced Monday by the DeWine administration.

* And this one in particular with a WI and MN hook:

Three AGs sue to block Enbridge pipeline

I'm not saying this is revolutionary. It may be more a series of coincidences, and not even a trend. And there are still hurdles to climb posed by the Back 40 mine along the Menominee River, the Kohler golf course along the Lake Michigan shoreline, and Trump's move to allow toxic minion close to the pristine Boundary Waters, and the troubling approval by Evers of a bill to turn pipeline protesters into felons.

But let's treat the good news as building blocks her and regionally that sure look better than headlines like these:

Wisconsin Senate fires Ag Secretary

Is Central Sands or Kewaunee County, WI the next Flint?

More fecal matter found in more SW WI wells

Arresting reporters is no solution to crap in the water

Walker added food removal to his Wisconsin Idea. Trump is running with it.

The removal of food from low-income or otherwise disadvantaged people can be traced from Walker to Trump and back again to Wisconsin.

Who ever thought that taking food away from people could become part of a New Wisconsin Idea?

New and tightened 2020 food assistance eligibility rules are being rolled out by the Trump administration were presaged by Walker's earlier, but noble-paternalistic-cuts.

Laurel Patrick, a spokeswoman for Walker, said the “entitlement reforms” in the 2013-15 budget “help childless adults transition into the workforce.”

Patrick said the rules are “part of our continued focus on moving people from government dependence to true independence and ensuring they are workforce ready.”

How that $7.25 minimum wage Walker refused to boost fits into transitioning into the workforce isn't quite clear. 

Meanwhile, those Walker 'entitlement reforms' were credited in October, 2018 with inspiring the new Trump rules:

Wisconsin - with its work requirement set to expand next year and its focus on employment and training - is a role model for the Trump administration's vision of food aid for poor Americans who could go hungry, ratcheting up what many of them are expected to do to get government help.

The new calculus: food aid may disappear for another Wisconsin 27,000 families and 100,000 recipients, on top of the earlier Walker limitations, according to the earlier Walker limitations which removed about the same number of recipients:

Wisconsin Republicans under former Gov. Scott Walker passed a number of changes to the program, including requiring able-bodied adults to work or be looking for jobs in order to receive benefits and to be tested for drug use. 

The work rule has resulted in 100,471 people losing benefits after not meeting the requirement for three months in a row, according to DHS data. 

The New York Times estimates the national figure is about 700,000. 

More fecal matter confirmed in more WI wells

Another day, another report and story about fecal contamination in rural Wisconsin wells. 

Tests show more southwestern Wisconsin wells contaminated with fecal matter

The test results include wells in Lafayette County, where local officials decided before the predictable backlash that the best plan of action to keep fecal matter out of the drinking water was to punish public employees who spoke about it and arrest journalists whose reporting deviated from what the county put out in news releases.

The hard truth about this situation: it's a long-standing problem also occurring in other parts of Wisconsin - - 

This manure runoff was photographed in Kewaunee County, in NE Wisconsin

- - from the Northeast to the Central Sands.

While state and federal officials either look the other way.

Or encourage the expansion of industrial-scale animal feeding operations that has contributed to ruinous oversupply, either through weak oversight or publicly-funded programs that boost various big operators - - 

In 2012, for example, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker announced an incentive plan to produce, as a state, 30 billion pounds of milk a year by 2020 — a 15% increase. The state offered farmers grants for updating their business and required them to put up their own money as well. 

Dairy farmers reached 30 billion pounds in 2016 — four years ahead of schedule.

In fact, the power dynamics are are so lopsided in favor of special interests that entrenched water-carriers feel free to put their biases in writing, regardless of public health concerns.

Fitzgerald, Vos go to bat for bigger CAFOs

And so the persistent problems are matched by elected officials' inertia, making this July 30, 2018 blog headline a continuing scandal that underscore the SW Wisconsin well contamination and puts it into a bigger context:

WI Central Sands the next Flint? Kewaunee County already soaks up that honor

Kewaunee County clean water activist Nancy Utesch has said it often, and no doubt people statewide are repeating it:

We have waited long enough.

Vindictive GOP aimed budget cuts at Madison, where WI job growth is centered

Only vindictive partisan ideologues like Walker and his GOP know-nothing caucus would slash funds, and discourage recruitment and retention at the state's largest job-generating academic institution in Madison - - where people by the thousands have chosen to add jobs and expand high-wage payrolls, a new study finds:

Between 2008 and 2018, Madison added 54,000 jobs overall, or about 16% growth, according to the nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum. 

The report reflects a shift in Madison and across the state toward jobs with higher wages and underscores the effect Madison’s highly educated workforce has on attracting job growth.

Of course, 'vindictive ideologues' is the Wisconsin GOP go-to-bumper sticker these days:

GOP Senators leave Wisconsin homeless vets, kids out in the cold

A year after GOP loses statewide, its legislative leaders enjoy out-sized powers

Vos can't fix his insult to disabled colleague without fresh insult

GOP leader spent mere seconds killing gun safety measures

WI GOP legislators blocking Evers' lead abatement plan

WI GOP leaders lose lawsuit, stick taxpayers with $200,000 tab

WI GOP Senators leave homeless kids, vets out in the cold

Yes, it's cold outside.

If the nasty weather on your doorstep or TV doesn't register with you, just remember what Milwaukee looked like last winter.

And, yes, Republican State Senators voted against releasing funds to combat homelessness, even though, a) they know it's cold outside. 

And, b) the funding had been approved in bi-partisan votes in the GOP-controlled Joint Finance Committee and State Assembly.

But c) the funding died in the GOP-controlled State Senate, even with a "no" vote from an original sponsor, River Hill's long-time Sen. Alberta Darling.

Of the 4,907 homeless in January 2018, 660 were family households, 332 were veterans and 527 were experiencing chronic homelessness, according to the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.

Here is more Wisconsin data. Every person enumerated here has a name.

As of January 2018, Wisconsin had an estimated 4,907 experiencing homelessness on any given day, as reported by Continuums of Care to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Of that Total, 660 were family households, 332 were Veterans, 246 were unaccompanied young adults (aged 18-24), and 527 were individuals experiencing chronic homelessness. 

Public school data reported to the U.S. Department of Education during the 2016-2017 school year shows that an estimated  18,592 public school students experienced homelessness over the course of the year. Of that total, 274students were unsheltered, 2,675 were in shelters, 1,305 were inhotels/motels, and 14,338 were doubled up.

And why are these Wisconsinites left even more exposed by politicians we taxpayers pay about $50,000 a year, plus cellphone, food, gas and per diem hotel money when they feel they need it, as the weather turns:

To maintain Republican purity on 'welfare' - -a/k/a/ keeping people alive - - and specifically so GOP Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald could maintain an appropriate, politically-functionally distance from social services funding which might have cost him exactly zero votes in the special US Congressional election he is going to win, handily.

In a safely gerrymandered GOP district.

And, no, I don't know how these GOP pols sleep at night, though I am sure they're toasty warm.

New Foxconn study demands Walker get in-depth scrutiny by 12/3 media panel

Given a stunning, independently-compiled expose about his crashing Foxconn  debacle - - 

- - what great timing by Wis Politics and the Milwaukee Press Club:

Former Governor Scott Walker to Speak at Newsmaker Luncheon

Walker will take questions from a panel of journalists and from the audience at the luncheon, set for 11:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the Newsroom Pub, 137 E. Wells St. 

Questioners should pierce Walker's talking points and default to deflection and force him to explain why he put his re-election campaign above the public treasuries by routing unjustifiable and unsustainable subsidies and privileges to Foxconn, as a new, independent study lays out dispassionately:

The [George Mason University] Mercatus Center’s study, “The Economics of a Targeted Economic Development Subsidy,” looks at the economic case for and against economic development subsidies, focusing on Wisconsin’s pledge of $3.6 billion in incentives to Taiwan-based electronics manufacturer Foxconn Technology Group.

“The weight of economic theory suggests that these subsidies do not work and may even depress economic activity,” according to the study. “We show that under realistic scenarios the subsidy may depress state economic activity by tens of billions of dollars over the next 15 years.”

I have been following this story for 30 months and maintain a running archive about it all, here.

A Foxconn Fever primer

The new study is full of hared economic science and amazing/depressing tidbits which should be run past Walker. 

He'll never read it because he's free of accountability and prefers now to fly around the country making speeches and sampling airport food, but I urge the public and the luncheon's media guests and panelists to read it in full before the question period begins:

Some memorable excerpts from the study:

 A footnote in a chart shows the full cost of the $252.3 million in I-94 system highway expansion near Foxconn, and fast-tracked by Assembly Speaker Vos (my commentary on that, here) for the company's benefit actually exceeds $408 million, given interest added through years of borrowing: 

*Page 9:"...to pay off $252.4 million in general obligation bonds for roadway construction. This committment will cost $408.3 million over 20 years; $306.225 million is 15 years’ worth of payments."

*Page 21:"...from 2018 to 2032, Wisconsin GDP will total $6.3 trillion. The higher taxes to fund a Generation 10.5 plant subsidy will be associated with economic losses in the range of $5.7 billion to $34.3 billion over that time period. Higher taxes to fund the subsidy for a Generation 6 plant will be associated with economic losses in the range of $1.8 billion to $10.6 billion." 

*Page 27: In a discussion of "X-inefficiency," or 'slack.' "In the case of Foxconn, X-inefficiency sug-gests that Wisconsin’s subsidy will allow the com-pany to waste up to $231 million annually (on aver-age) in unnecessarily high production costs, as this is the size of the annual subsidy (see table 1)." 

*Page 32: "Targeted economic development subsidies follow a pattern that is common to many government transfers: those who benefit from these subsidies are few in number, whereas those who pay for them are numerous. Foxconn is again illustrative: just one firm stands to receive a $3.6 billion subsidy while some 16,000 other Wisconsin businesses must pay a corporate income tax that could be reduced by 22 percent in the absence of that subsidy."  

[From *Page 19] Similarly, the state's flat fuel tax of $0.309 per gallon could be lowered by 18.92 percent down to $0.25 per gallon. Or, more broadly, overall tax revenue could be reduced by 1.07 percent.

And by the by - -

* Page 8:"...a recent state audit has found that, on average, firms receiving Wisconsin subsidies create only about 34 percent of promised jobs.