Posts Tagged ‘Environment’

Tracking Return on Investment in the “Green Economy”

MacIver News Service | January 16, 2012

ZBB Energy, a Menomonee Falls based green energy company, is in a race to bring new green technologies to market as it finds itself in the center of the debate over whether government financial assistance can launch and sustain a green economy here in the United States.

President Obama visited ZBB Energy back in August of 2010 to promote the green economy and why the federal government should step in to get this sector of the economy off the ground.

“At this plant you’re doing more than making high-tech batteries.  You’re pointing the country towards a brighter economic future,” Obama said.

During his visit, President Obama vowed to create 800,000 green energy jobs by 2012.

ZBB Energy makes batteries specifically designed to store electricity from renewable sources. At least, that’s the plan.  ZBB Energy is in the middle of a major overhaul and currently does not have any products on the market. It plans to launch a new line within weeks.

“The product we’re developing will be the only storage device like it in the world,” Will Hogoboom, CFO, told MacIver News. “We’ve already closed orders for the new product even though it’s not in production.”

Investors and the stock market have not always appeared to share in the President’s optimism.  ZBB Energy stock ended the year at 71 cents a share. The day of Obama’s visit, the stock closed at $.70. Some believe investors are generally weary of green energy companies, especially startups, because these companies have high risk: they incur high overhead and generate low revenue while they attempt to develop new technologies that may or may not be profitable.

That’s where federal and state governments step in, providing those companies with massive tax breaks and loans. Many companies state in their SEC filings they could not survive without this preferred treatment. However, as we’ve seen, government favoritism is not a guarantee of success.

Solyndra, a solar panel manufacturer in California, received a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy in 2009. Two years later the company was out of business.

ZBB Energy has received significantly less help from the federal government than Solyndra. In June, the IRS awarded it a $14.7 million Clean Energy Tax Credit.  In 2009 it received a $1.3 million stimulus loan.

The stock market has been a consistent challenge for ZBB Energy. In December 2010, AMEX notified ZBB its shareholders’ equity was below the minimum $4 million required to continue being listed. This December, the company announced its shareholders equity was at $4.1 million and it was back in compliance.

However, ZBB’s stock still trends downward. It closed at $5.80 on June 18, 2007, three days after the company executed a 1:17 reverse split. Since then, it’s been downhill. On December 20, 2011 it closed at 74 cents a share and has not broken $1/share since September.

Courtesy of NASDAQ.com

ZBB’s market trouble is reflected in its SEC reports. Its Q3 revenue was at $1.637 million. ZBB’s payroll alone was $60,000 more than that. The total operating loss was $1.696 million.

The company hopes to turn all this around with the release of a new line of batteries, which are in the final stage of testing.

“Once we start actually producing and shipping, it will mean the world to us,” Hogoboom said.

The company has also added a number of new employees. At the time of its overhaul two years ago, ZBB employed 25 people. Today it employs about 60 people and has 7 open positions.

Over the past few months, while developing its new product, the company has also been forging new partnerships. In fact ZBB is opening a new factory in China in the next few weeks.

On December 15th, ZBB announced a new joint venture partnership with an unnamed “global technology company,” to help in product development. That partner is investing $800,000 in the project, and bought $700,000 of ZBB stock.

Company insiders appear to be confident. Hogoboom bought 14,000 shares on December 13. Buoyed by the government investment in the firm, investors purchased 1,307,860 shares over the last six months, all at market value.

To achieve President Obama’s goal to create 800,000 green energy jobs by 2012, the federal government has invested heavily in companies like ZBB. Yet, there is presently no official way to verify the success of such job creation efforts since the Labor Department does not track green jobs. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is in the process of conducting a survey to find out exactly how many green jobs there are in the country and hopes to have that complete by the middle of this year.

Meanwhile, announced expansion projects, a new product line, and large stock purchases have not been enough to give non governmental investors in the market confidence in this green energy “startup.” ZBB’s stock opened at 78 cents a share on December 15, 2011 and closed at 81 cents a share on Jan. 13, 2012.

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Posted in News, mi investigations, mi reports | January 16, 2012 | | 2 Comments

Examining a Federally Funded $6 Million ‘Green Jobs’ Boondoggle in Wisconsin

Less than Two Dozen Jobs Created

MacIver News Service | January 4, 2012

[Madison, Wisc...] The problems with ‘green job’ creation and the incompetence of the federal government are both evident when analyzing how a “Stimulus” program failed to produce jobs in Wisconsin.

Other than a couple government administrators and about a dozen tech college instructors, the Recovery Act’s Green Jobs Program has not created any jobs in Wisconsin.

Wisconsin received a $6 million award for its version of the green jobs program called Sector Alliance for the Green Economy (SAGE). The stated goal is the “greening” of Wisconsin’s workforce. On paper, the US Labor Department expected the money to help place 2,120 Wisconsinites into permanent jobs.

Wisconsin shouldn’t have too much trouble accomplishing that goal because the only people allowed into SAGE already have jobs. The program works exclusively with the apprenticeship program, and in order to be an apprentice, you need to have a job.

So, at best, this ‘green jobs’ program was about turning regular old non environmentally-friendly jobs green. At worst, it was merely seen as ‘free’ money from the feds.

Interestingly, Wisconsin’s grant application for this money stated SAGE would provide the existing workforce necessary training to fit into the allegedly emerging green economy, “including many who lost their jobs due to Wisconsin’s decline in manufacturing jobs, such as auto industry losses in Rock and Kenosha counties.”

That would have fit in with the intent of the Recovery Act. In his first State of the Union Address, President Obama stated “Over the next two years, this plan will save or create 3.5 million jobs. More than 90% of these jobs will be in the private sector – jobs rebuilding our roads and bridges; constructing wind turbines and solar panels; laying broadband and expanding mass transit.”

The Labor Department’s Inspector General recently completed an audit of the program and stated “The purpose and principle of the Recovery Act was ‘to assist those most impacted by the recession,’ and to expend funds ‘as quickly as possible consistent with prudent management.’”

Yet, the Inspector General also noted the purpose of the Green Jobs Program was to provide green jobs training and collect green jobs labor data. Therefore its not surprising that nationally, the $500 million program has only resulted in 1,336 people being placed in permanent jobs out of the 69,717 goal. See: What the heck is a green job anyway?

Wisconsin’s $6 million share of the program is being spent exclusively in coordination with the Bureau of Apprenticeships. The funds are being spent on green job training expenses among the trades and the tech colleges for the apprentices.

Some of the items the money is being spent on include a virtual paint booth ($65,000), a wind tower mock up ($20,000), and various laboratory equipment ($58,000). However, only $247,000 of the grant was marked for equipment.

Most of the funds were to be spent on instructors. A weatherization technician was budgeted at $400,000 over three years.

An energy auditor was planned to cost $150,000 for one year.

A wastewater treatment operator would make $120,000 for the first year.

In all $1.7 million was spent on 15 instructors, most of whom would only work for one year. It would cost another $450,000 to train the instructors.

Regardless of how one judges the merits of paying the instructors that much money, one thing is certain. These “stimulus” funds did not create the thousands of jobs that were promised, green or otherwise.

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Posted in News | January 4, 2012 | | Comments Off

Democrats Push Pedal Power as Solution to Budget Woes

By James Wigderson
Special Guest Perspective for the MacIver Institute

State Representative Brett Hulsey has found a way to solve all of our state budget problems. Everyone, get out of your cars. No really, get out of your cars and ride a bicycle.

In his press release, Hulsey cites a new study that says, “replacing short driving trips with biking would benefit the upper Midwest, including Wisconsin, by saving at least $3.8 billion, saving 1,000 lives, and cutting traffic by one-fifth or 20%.”  Good to know someone on Hulsey’s staff knows 20% is the same as one-fifth. Probably homeschooled.

If only Governor Jim Doyle had known about bicycles. He, and Representative Hulsey, might never have had to raise taxes in Doyle’s last budget.

There is, of course, one small catch. When the study says, “replacing short driving trips with biking” they mean 50% of the trips less than or equal to eight kilometers. In American English, that’s almost five miles on your SUV’s odometer.

My wife’s trips today to the grocery store, Menards hardware store and for take out pizza all should have been on her bicycle. But of course that wouldn’t work. It’s hard to carry the latest Christmas outdoor decorations from the hardware store on the back of a Schwinn, even with a basket. Two gallons of milk, cereal for a week, bacon, eggs, bread, and light bulbs weren’t going to fit on the back of the bike, either. As for the carry out pizza, that might have worked. Just leave the two-liter of soda and the breadsticks behind.

So we were 0-3. Actually we were 0-4 if you throw in the trip to the corner gas station to fill the car’s tank for the week.

That sounds like a lot of trips and that’s the point. Even if she had been able to make those trips by bicycle, she would not have been able to make all the trips because of how long it would have taken her.

That means somebody else would have needed to make 4 trips today by bicycle to make up for the Wigderson family. I’m sure the elderly couple next door could have taken bicycles to church today.

It sure as heck wasn’t going to be me. If I took a bicycle everywhere I went, I wouldn’t be able to use my cell phone. The gasping for air would get me arrested for making obscene phone calls.

If my wife’s trips today were impossible to make by bicycle, imagine what they would be like a month from now. Do Trek bicycles come with a snowplow accessory?

Of course, somebody on Hulsey’s staff should have pointed out the absurdity of ever hoping that Wisconsinites would abandon their cars for 50% of their trips less than five miles.

The authors of the study don’t offer policy prescriptions that would make Wisconsinites and others in the Midwest suddenly get on their bikes and ride 50% of the time for short trips. They only point it is out that it’s possible if we become more like the Netherlands. No wonder Democrats are in love with windmills.

They do let the cat out of the bag by letting us know that converting car lanes to bicycle lanes can cost as much as $50,000 per city block. Portland, OR, spent $10,000 per block on a ten-block stretch of city streets to close a lane to cars and open it to two-way bicycle traffic. The city of Chicago, in the fiscally unsound state of Illinois, just spent $140,000 to make a bike lane on four city blocks, including a bridge.

But the authors are hopeful that cities in the Midwest can become more like their Dutch counterparts because some cities are already “bicycle friendly,” including Milwaukee. Part of being bicycle friendly is making the roadways safer for bicyclists, measured in the mortality rate of bicyclists. If Milwaukee builds a lane across the Hoan Bridge that “friendly” rating might go down.

Milwaukee recently committed to a plan to become even more bicycle friendly. They are going to spend $11.3 million over the next ten years to create more bicycle lanes, and that does not even include land acquisition. The city’s goal is for a bicycle to be used for 5% of all trips less than five miles by 2020.

That’s a long way from Holland’s bicycle use, and certainly nowhere near the 50% that the study’s authors hoped for. Perhaps the Milwaukee Common Council should pass a law requiring residents to wear wooden shoes and plant tulips.

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Posted in mi perspectives | November 7, 2011 | | 7 Comments

Western Wisc. Could See Tourism Boost from Minn. Government Shutdown

MacIver News Service | July 1, 2011

[Hudson, Wisc…] Just before the Fourth of July weekend kicked off, a time when people head to the outdoors in droves, the Minnesota Government shutdown and closed many of its public outdoors venues. Now, Wisconsin communities are looking forward to picking up the slack.

Minnesota closed its state parks and campgrounds on Friday, when its Democrat governor and Republican legislature failed to reach a budget deal. Right now, Minnesota faces a $5 billion deficit and there is a $1.4 billion difference between the two sides’ plans.

“It will be interesting,” said Kim Heinemann, Hudson Area Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Bureau. “I think in general, I think we’ll have a busy weekend.  I’m positive it will help our economy.”

Heinemann told the MacIver News Service she’s been contacted by Minnesota TV stations that are interested in doing stories about Hudson, and that help could spur interest among twin city residents looking to get out this weekend.  Heinemann hopes even after the shutdown is over, Minnesotans will already be hooked on the Wisconsin hospitality.

“Hopefully we’ll attract some new folks that haven’t experienced our area before,” Heinemann said.

The boost in Minnesotan business might extend well beyond the Fourth of July weekend, since summer, in general, is the busiest time for Wisconsin’s tourism industry.

“For people looking to enjoy the outdoors, we’ll be seeing some more traffic, definitely,” Heinemann said.  “We’re open for business so come on over!”

Despite facing a $3.6 billion deficit, the Republican-controlled Wisconsin legislature passed their two-year budget last month and Governor Scott Walker (R) signed the budget on the earliest date in more than 40 years.

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Posted in News | July 1, 2011 | | Comments Off

Ten Ways the Budget Could Be Better

The 2011-2013 Budget for the State of Wisconsin is the most fiscally responsible two-year Badger State spending plan in at least a generation. It pays the bills, is short on accounting gimmicks, restrains spending and includes measures that will improve government efficiency and invigorate the private marketplace in order to help individuals and businesses here create jobs.

It is a good budget.

That being said, it could be better.

The document forwarded by the legislature still contains onerous interference into the private market. Program cuts that could have been made were modified for political expediency. And, although it has a dramatic decrease in earmarks over budgets past, is not pork free.

In a perfect world, we would see vetoes on the following items:

1. Craft brewers are gaining market share because they are meeting a consumer demand. The Legislature has no business restricting the production and marketing of a good or service on the basis of the size or scope of the actors involved.

2. On SeniorCare, the governor got it right the first time. The legislature’s moves added unnecessary expense to the budget. There is no sound reason Wisconsin’s seniors enrolled in the program shouldn’t first exhaust federal remedies, such as Medicare Part D. We are the only state in the nation with a stand-alone drug entitlement program for the elderly.

3. At a time when we are empowering management in their dealings with government labor, tying the hands of the Milwaukee Police Department makes neither fiscal nor ideological sense. The proposal that mandates that suspended officers receive pay during termination appeals has no place in state law, or this budget.

4. The legislature meddled when it decided to create an individual income tax deferral for investments in Wisconsin businesses. Why do they insist on picking winners and losers? Does the Legislature really believe an investor will commit his/her retirement savings to a Wisconsin business because the government will hand out a modest break on the capital gains? Investment of capital flows to attractive projects and businesses regardless of geographic boundaries.

5. The recycling mandate and its 19 million dollar price tag should end up back on the scrap heap. If a government entity believes a service is necessary, it should pay for it.

6. State taxpayers should not subsidize high-speed broadband internet access. WiscNet should not be a government priority. Private service providers are fully capable of meeting this need without government competition.

7. We would have preferred to see zero dollars in bonding authority for the purchase of more land via the Stewardship Fund. The legislature significantly cut Walker’s request but they should have eliminated it all together. The state owns enough land.

8. And while it will not happen, you would not hear us howl if the veto pen was used to make the School Choice plan available to all families statewide. We need an education system whose sole focus is the education of the child, not artificial boundaries or the status quo.

9. This budget modifies state law to make it easier and less expensive for government to exercise eminent domain in a few specific cases. It’s a needless increase in the ability of the state to interfere with property rights. If changes to the state’s eminent domain law are truly warranted, they should be considered as a separate piece of legislation, not in the budget.

10. Finally, the pork and earmarks remain a thorn. As we said earlier, this is hardly a pork-laden document like the Doyle budgets of the last decade. Nonetheless the habit has proven hard to break. And while this list is not comprehensive, worthy or not, these projects deserve to be line-itemed out.

  • The elimination of the state per diem limit for sewerage district officials
  • The new position at Crex Meadows Wildlife Education Center
  • The $10,000 for the Sheboygan Aerospace port
  • $300,000 for the Bay Area Medical Center in Marinette
  • $25,000 for the Copper Falls State Park in Oconto

The State Budget is a solid plan. The best this state has seen in decades. It eliminates the structural deficit that has plagued this state for the last three administrations. But why settle for good?

Governor Walker will announce his vetoes on Sunday. Clearly he could make the plan even better.

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Posted in News, mi perspectives, mi reports | June 23, 2011 | | 5 Comments

Green Jobs…at What Cost?

MacIver News Service | January 28, 2011

Despite millions in government grants and subsidies, the Manitowoc company President Barack Obama called a glimpse of the future lost $4.2 million last year and cannot promise shareholders it will be profitable in the foreseeable future.

Even Orion Energy Systems admits there are a lot of risks and uncertainties in the green energy industry.

“Many technologies do not become commercially profitable products, applications or services despite extensive development and commercialization efforts,”the company stated in its most recent 10-K SEC filing on June 14, 2010. 

The last five years have been a rollercoaster for Orion.  It lost a total of $3.9 million in 2005 and 2006, made $4.3 million in the next three years, and then finally lost $4.2 million in the 2010 fiscal year.

“We may continue to incur further net losses and there can be no assurance that we will be able to increase our revenue, expand our customer base or be profitable,” the report indicates.

Investors have responded to the company’s volatility, and Orion stock has plummeted in the past four years.  It closed 2007 at $18.82 a share.  By the end of 2010 it was $3.34.

Regardless, President Obama is putting his, and the U.S. taxpayers’, money on companies like Orion.

“It’s important to remember that this plant, this company has also been supported over the years not just by the Department of Agriculture and the Small Business Administration, but by tax credits and awards we created to give a leg up to renewable energy companies,” Obama said at the Orion plant on Wednesday.

The State of Wisconsin has also given its share trying to help Orion to succeed.  Since 2005, the state has given the company $350,000 in community development zone tax credits, $506,000 in economic development funds, and $420,000 from the Wisconsin Energy Independence Fund.  Plus the company got another $260,000 in stimulus funds for a State Energy project.

In addition to direct aid, public policy has also helped the struggling company.  Wisconsin law requires that 10 percent of all electricity sold in the state come from renewable sources by 2015.  Orion knows that without government intervention like that, there would be little prospect for the green economy.

“The reduction, elimination or expiration of government mandates and subsidies or economic or tax rebates, credits and/or incentives for alternative renewable energy systems would likely substantially reduce the demand for, and economic feasibility of, any solar photovoltaic and/or wind electricity generating products, applications or services and could materially reduce any prospects for our successfully introducing any new products, applications or services using such technologies,” the SEC report states.

Currently Orion has about 250 workers and, according to Obama, could have as many as 300 working there by the end of the year.  However, tracking green jobs and the return on that taxpayer subsidized investment can be difficult to track, as the MacIver News Service reported in 2010.  At that time the wind industry was claiming thousands of manufacturing jobs directly tied to wind energy, but MacIver News Service was only able to identify three dozen jobs, after calling every single primary manufacturer on the wind energy industries database.

Regardless, as evidenced by his State of the Union Address and his comments in Wisconsin this week, President Obama policies will continue to emphasize green energy companies like Orion Energy Systems in Manotowoc.

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Posted in News, mi investigations | January 28, 2011 | | 26 Comments

Congressman Wants Public Hearing on Environmental Impact of Planned Milwaukee-Madison Rail Line

MacIver News Service | October 13, 2010

[Brookfield, Wisc...] Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner wants a federal agency to hold hearing on the environmental impact of the proposed Milwaukee-Madison rail line because the project design has changed dramatically since the last review nine years ago.

“The plan has changed and FEMA has done a remapping of the state therefore the Environmental Impact Statement is out of date,” Sensenbrenner told MacIver News. “We shouldn’t be giving waivers because this is a politically correct project.”

The Republican sent a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers offering comments on the environmental assessment that is being conducted in conjunction with the permit for the proposed passenger rail service between Milwaukee and Madison.

The permit under consideration is for the first phase of the 85-mile long project to reinstate and upgrade the passenger rail service.

“I disagree with rushing the first phase of this project to construction without allowing the public’s concerns to be heard,” Sensenbrenner wrote to Ms. Tamara Cameron, Chief of the Regulatory Branch, St. Paul Branch, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Congressman Sensenbrenner said he wrote the letter to because he is concerned that the public hearing on the environmental assessment was held in 2001 and the impact to wetlands in the communities has increased “from 13.5 acres at the time of the hearing to 23.8 acres in the permit application.”

Sensenbrenner readily admits that a new environmental review could stall the project.

“We can’t afford to do this project in good times, much less now,” said Sensenbrenner. “Regardless, we should follow the rules.”

The Congressman said politics shouldn’t impact the standard regulatory process for a project of this scope.

“I have opposed this rail project from the inception because it is plain and simply a boondoggle that we can’t afford,” said Sensenbrenner. “However, at the very least the public has a right to public hearings to learn about the impact this will have on their communities.  This is why we have a public comment period.  I fear without additional hearings, the public will not know fully what it’s getting itself into.”

Click here for previous coverage on the train project.

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Posted in News | October 13, 2010 | | 1 Comment

Facts About ‘Green Job’ Creation Elusive as the Wind

MacIver News Service | September 1, 2010

[Madison, Wisc...] Although they are touted and promoted by policy makers and opinion leaders across the state, accurately defining and keeping track of ‘green jobs’ has proven nearly impossible in Wisconsin.

Take, for example, ‘green jobs’ associated with the wind industry.

Wisc. Governor Jim Doyle (D)

“Clean energy technology and high-end manufacturing are Wisconsin’s future,” Governor Jim Doyle said in his final State of the State address.  “We have more than 300 companies and thousands of jobs in the wind industry.”

That statistic is impossible to verify.

The State of Wisconsin does not track those companies nor the jobs within the industry.  When contacted, the Office of Energy Independence (an agency created by Governor Doyle in 2007) directed MacIver News to Wisconsin Wind Works, a self-described “consortium of manufacturers representing the wind manufacturing supply chain within Wisconsin.”

The advocacy group maintains an online wind energy-related supply chain database, although a routine examination of the data proved just how unreliable the figures are.

When the online, searchable database was utilized earlier this summer, it listed 340 companies in Wisconsin connected to the wind industry, a fact which, without additional investigation would appear to be in line with the Governor’s statement.  However, further examination showed many of those companies were not currently serving the wind industry and were only listed because they someday could serve the wind industry.

For example, the database listed 38 manufacturers, but only 24 of them have anything to actually do with the wind energy sector presently.

Of those 24 Wisconsin manufacturers, only eight were categorized as primary suppliers.  Another four companies were listed as both primary and secondary suppliers.  A MacIver News Service reporter contacted all eight primary suppliers and the four companies listed as primary/secondary suppliers in our initial query and what we found further eroded the credibility of Governor Doyle’s claims.

When contacted, the companies listed as both primary and secondary suppliers all described themselves merely as secondary suppliers.  That means they produce products that are not exclusive to the wind energy.  For example, Bushman Equipment manufactures lifts that move heavy pieces of equipment, which, among many other uses, can be used to handle wind turbines.

Wisconsin Wind Works’ database is not only generous with the number of companies within their supply chain it associates as being primary suppliers, there are issues with the actual job numbers listed for each company as well. Many of the figures are either inflated,  the jobs are not located in Wisconsin, or they cannot be tied to wind energy.

For example, Rexnord Industries was one of the eight Wisconsin manufacturers listed in our query as directly serving the wind energy industry.  The database shows the company has 6,000 employees.  Yet a Rexnord official told the MacIver News Service that the company only has 1,500 employees in Wisconsin, and only five of those have jobs which are directly tied to the wind industry.

Wisconsin Wind Works’ database says Orchid International has 600 employees, but a company spokesperson told MacIver it only has 150.  Amsoil Inc. in Superior has 236 employees listed in the Wisconsin Wind Works database, but a company representative told the MacIver News Service that only 6 of them work on wind energy-related products.

In all, at the time of our search, the database claimed 7,632 jobs among the eight manufacturers that were current primary suppliers to the wind industry.  Yet, the MacIver News Service was only able to identify 31 jobs at those companies which were specifically tied to wind energy related products.

Manufacturers told MacIver News that other employees might work on wind-related products occasionally, but it does not represent the bulk of their workload.

Another 1,077 workers are listed among the secondary suppliers and we did not investigate that claim.

VAL-FAB, one of the companies listed as both a primary and secondary supplier, explained to MacIver News that it initially had high hopes for the wind energy industry that never materialized.  The company specializes in fabrication for the energy sector.

William Capelle, Director of Business Development at VAL-FAB, said “At first we thought we might be able to manufacture the actual towers, but it turns out 90 percent of those are imported from Spain.”

Since the MacIver News Service first examined the Wisconsin Wind Works database, the number of companies listed has increased to 360.  A reporter attempted to contact the organization for comment about the veracity of their data, but Wisconsin wind Works, which solicits members by selling itself as the  “preferred partner of wind energy professionals,” did not respond.

They are, however, holding a Wind Energy Symposium in Milwaukee on October 13th.

Meanwhile the Office of Energy Independence continues to pursue the Doyle Administration’s green energy policies.  As Doyle said during his final State of the State address, “anyone who says there aren’t jobs in the clean energy economy had better open their eyes.”

There is no doubt that some jobs in the wind industry exist in Wisconsin. The accurate number of these ‘green jobs’ is proving to be, at best, elusive

Representatives of Doyle’s office did not respond to repeated request for comments regarding the information contained within this article.

By Bill Osmulski
MacIver News Service Investigative Reporter

Wisconsin Wind Works’ directory

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Posted in News, mi investigations | August 31, 2010 | | 2 Comments

Debating the Fallout from the Milwaukee-area Floods

This week’s installment of “That’s Debatable” is a disagreement over the fallout from last week’s Milwaukee-area floods.

Each week, the website WisOpinion.com asks two veterans of Wisconsin policy and politics, Scot Ross of One Wisconsin Now and our own Brian Fraley (a Director here at the John K. MacIver Institute for Public Policy) to engage in exchanges on a topic of their choosing. The comments reflect the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of their employers.

From Fraley’s entry, this week:

Um, when your basement is flooded with knee-deep raw sewage and all the beaches are closed because BILLIONS of gallons of raw sewage has been dumped into the Lake by Barrett’s MMSD, real people don’t give d–n which politician is posing for holy pictures on the news.

You can read the entire exchange here.

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Posted in mi perspectives | July 29, 2010 | | Comments Off

Hraychuck Removed from Committee Post

MacIver News Service – [Madison, Wisc.]  After months of public hearings, debate and closed door, private negotiations over controversial global warming legislation, the revised bill was scheduled for a vote in an Assembly committee on Thursday.

One of the committee’s members, Balsam Lake Democrat Ann Hraychuck, was not in the hearing room at the time of the vote. It was later learned that she was suddenly no longer a member of the Assembly Special Committee on Clean Energy Jobs.

Find out why in this report from the MacIver News Service.

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Posted in News | April 16, 2010 | | Comments Off
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