Today officially marks the end of the dies caniculares, the forty sultry, simmering “dog days” of summer. We at the Leader have not been immune to the lethargy this season typically brings on. Nevertheless, to help you cut through the news-haze, we bring you several stories that may have slipped through the cracks over the last week.
Union-Run Program Helps MATC Students Fight Crushing Debt Burden
Against a backdrop of soaring higher-education costs, the Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC) announced two new full-ride scholarships for Black and Hispanic students. There’s just one problem: many students awarded these scholarships can’t take advantage of them. The reason? They are still in debt for previous classes they took at MATC. That’s where the school’s faculty union comes in. AFT Local 212 established the FAST Fund, an emergency aid program that has already paid off $300,000 in student debt. It’s just one more example of how working-class solidarity gets the goods (WUWM).
Flow My Tears, the Landlord Said
To anyone who rents an apartment in Milwaukee, Youssef “Joe” Berrada really needs no introduction. As the man who runs companies that own over 8,000 rental units in the city, Joe has become infamous for being one of the city’s leading evictors, for violating landlord-tenant law during the pandemic, and for managing an empire of decaying, rat-infested abodes. Now, Joe is suing the Milwaukee Autonomous Tenants Union for defamation, claiming that a protest and social media posts following a fire at one of his properties has damaged his reputation in the community. Which prompts us to ask: exactly what reputation is that? (Wisconsin Examiner)
Thanks to Act 12, Cops are Back in MPS
If anyone was worried that the “school to prison pipeline” wasn’t operating at full capacity in Milwaukee, worry no more. As a result of Act 12, the law everyone described as a “shared revenue” bill, Milwaukee Police will be forced to return to the city’s public schools – a move that could cost over $1 million per year. The move reverses significant policy changes Milwaukee Public Schools made several years ago to terminate contracts between the district and the Milwaukee Police Department. The deadline for MPS to implement the new policy is in several weeks. (TMJ4)
The Special Non-Session
Here’s how Wisconsin politics goes. Republicans pass a budget that leaves out critical funding for child care, family leave, and the economically vital University of Wisconsin system. Governor Tony Evers signs it (albeit with some line-item vetoes. Then he calls a special session demanding that Republicans reconsider the common-sense policies they left out. The legislature returns to Madison, only to gavel in and gavel out in less than sixty seconds because (gasp) Republicans are under no obligation to even discuss the legislation Evers puts on the table. We get it: the strategy here is to invite Republicans to proudly and publicly piss on popular programs. With an election year coming, and with the possibility of new maps, there’s some logic to that. In the meantime, child care providers are closing up shop. Policy crises, after all, don’t really wait for the fall of an even-numbered year. (AP)
Youth Coup (Now with 0% More Youth)
Retail politics really doesn’t get better than this. Former governor and ham-sandwich afficionado Scott Walker, hot on the trail of voters in the 18–25 set, appeared at the Wisconsin State Fair to attend one of Milwaukee’s hottest youth events of the summer: “Herman’s Hermits starring Peter Noone.” No doubt he was elbow to elbow with impressionable undergrads dancing the night away to “Mrs. Brown You Have a Lovely Daughter.” For those of you who can’t keep up with the latest issues of Tiger Beat, you should not confuse this event with a performance by “Herman’s Hermits starring Barry Whitwam.” We’re talking about PETER NOONE here – Herman’s Hermits’ original singer, and not the INFIDEL Whitwam, who is still in a legal battle with Noone over the right to perform under the name. At any rate, something tells me that Walker needed to do some damage control with the youngins after being forced to walk back his recent comment that “the voting age should be the same as the drinking age.” While he obviously initially meant to say that the voting age should be raised (an idea which has gained ground in Republican circles since the last election cycle), disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of youth voters, he now said that he hadn’t meant it at all. He only wanted to lower the drinking age, he told a crowd at a Milwaukee Press Club event. Walker’s plan for winning back the youth—about as youth-friendly as an “Up With People” record––evidently involves dealing with “liberal indoctrination at schools.” Yes, Scott, it’s not your deeply unpopular ideas that repel the youth, but the fact that they’re not being reminded enough that slavery was “a good thing, actually.” Nevertheless, the headlines will blandly read that “Republicans Seek Inroads With Young Voters.” These inroads will no doubt be built much as expressways are, by leveling and displacement.
Milwaukee Teachers Fight to Keep Hate Group Out of Milwaukee
When it seemed likely that Milwaukee’s Saint Kate Hotel would host a town hall organized by the famed right-wing hate group Moms for Liberty ahead of the upcoming Republican presidential debate, the Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association (MTEA) fought back. Upon hearing news that Moms for Liberty—an organization whose members have targeted teachers and school officials with hateful speech, advance conspiracy theories and spread anti-LGBTQ rhetoric––would be using the downtown arts hotel as a venue, MTEA members launched a social media campaign urging the Saint Kate to draw a line in the sand. On Thursday, MTEA announced that the hotel would no longer host the group. Yet only hours later, the union learned that the event would be moved to the Pfister Hotel (less off-brand, perhaps, than the Saint Kate). The Marcus Corporation, which owns both hotels, put out a statement announcing that it welcomes guests “from a wide range of backgrounds.” This is only a taste of the reality Milwaukee’s political class has created by welcoming members of a reactionary death-cult during next summer’s RNC. Are we even remotely prepared? (MTEA)
