News 06.13.18
13 June 2018 News
The 77th annual Badger Boys State is underway in Ripon. The annual week-long program of The American Legion Department of Wisconsin will bring together hundreds of high school seniors from across Wisconsin to create a 51st state known as Badger Boys State. Badger Boys State participants will develop their own party platforms, pass local ordinances and utilize a judicial system to enforce the laws and constitution of the 51st state. Additionally, citizens choose from a series of schools of instruction, including law, peace officer, leadership, public finance, public speaking, parliamentary procedure, and public persuasion and campaign strategies. Badger Boys State citizens also have an opportunity to participate in a variety of team sports that compete throughout the week, a band and choir, and write for the official newspaper of Badger Boys State, the Badger Bugle Citizen. Planned highlights of this year’s session include guest speakers, Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Ann Walsh Bradley and Charles Wiley of the National Press Corps, among others.
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A Wisconsin mother is charged in the death of her 13-year-old daughter who was unable to walk, talk or care for herself. Thirty-seven-year-old Nicole Gussert, of Appleton, faces one count of child neglect resulting in the death of Brianna Gussert. A criminal complaint says Brianna had infections caused by unsanitary conditions and died primarily of sepsis after her mother left her alone for days during Memorial Day weekend last year. In court Monday, Outagamie County District Attorney Melinda Tempelis says Gussert couldn’t remember the last time she had fed her daughter or changed her diaper. Public defender Robert Welygan says the charge is simply an allegation and that criminal behavior has not been proven by the state. Gussert is being held on $300,000 cash bond.
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An entire herd of whitetail deer on a farm in southwest Wisconsin has been euthanized because of chronic wasting disease, state agriculture officials said. More than 100 deer in Iowa County were euthanized last month after about 20 tested positive for the disease. Veterinarians and animal health technicians from the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection and the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service sedated the animals before euthanizing them. The deer had been quarantined since October, when the DATCP confirmed a deer shot on a Waupaca County hunting ranch tested positive for the disease. The deer was traced back to the Iowa County farm. Nearly 80 deer in the county that were 16 months old or older were tested for the disease. Chronic wasting disease is a neurological disorder found in deer, elk and moose. It’s caused by an infectious protein that affects the animal’s brain. State and federal indemnity programs will compensate the deer farm, though an amount has yet to be determined.
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A new study shows that Wisconsin’s poverty rate increased in 2016 and children were especially impacted despite the state’s job growth during that span. The 10th annual Wisconsin Poverty Report released Friday shows that the state’s poverty rate rose to 10.8 percent in 2016 from 9.7 percent in 2015. That measure also found child poverty up in the state to 12 percent in 2016, from 10 percent in 2015.
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