Judge dismisses Bangstad motions in zoning cases
Zoning panel revokes CUP; Bangstad heads to appeals court
It was a double whammy in Oneida County circuit court last week for Minocqua Brewing Company owner Kirk Bangstad, as circuit judge Michael Bloom thwarted Bangstad’s efforts to have a major zoning complaint against him dismissed and to have the circuit court issue an injunction prohibiting the county from shutting down his business by revoking his conditional use permit.
Court decision squashes legislative oversight of Stewardship purchases
Ziegler: Decision could aggregate power in the executive branch
A state Supreme Court decision earlier this month booted a key tool that the legislature’s Joint Finance Committee has used to oversee the state’s Stewardship land acquisition program, nullifying the committee’s power to block specific program projects.
Biden out, Harris in: Wisconsin reacts
The response by state politicians to last Sunday’s announcement that President Joe Biden had withdrawn from the presidential race was generally standard fare — Democrats heaped praise on the president and called him a “consequential” leader for the ages; Republicans criticized what they called a Democratic cover-up of Biden’s cognitive decline — but there were a few new wrinkles, from subtle language to turn-about proposals.
They’re back: Ballot drop boxes are in for November
The Wisconsin Supreme Court has reversed its own decision from two years ago, ruling 4-3 to reinstate the use of ballot drop boxes as a legal and legitimate way to vote in the state.
Marshfield Clinic, Sanford Health aim for year-end merger
Health care systems pursue swift union amid past hurdles
After two previous failed merger attempts, Marshfield Clinic Health System is hoping the third time will be the charm, as the ailing health care giant recently announced a merger with Sanford Health, which has a number of failed mergers under its belt as well.
CUP approved over neighbors, town’s objections
A Lake Tomahawk couple secured a conditional use permit for a large home in Lake Tomahawk last week, overcoming objections from neighbors and the town board.
County schedules another permit revocation hearing for Bangstad
New allegations trigger hearing
For the second time in just more than a month, the Oneida County Planning & Development Committee has scheduled a revocation hearing after complaints that Minocqua Brewing Company owner Kirk Bangstad has continued to violate conditions of his conditional use permit to operate an outdoor beer garden at his Minocqua Brewing Company location.
Wisconsin Supreme Court tosses injunction against pro-life protester
Late last month, the Wisconsin Supreme Court unanimously struck a blow for free speech, concluding that a court order prohibiting an anti-abortion protester from being near a Planned Parenthood worker violated his First Amendment rights.
Door County judge grants relief to short-term rental owners in Sister Bay
Judge pins injunction on village’s procedural violations
In a case that could ultimately have ramifications for short-term rentals around the state, a Door County judge has issued a temporary injunction against the village of Sister Bay, allowing a short-term rental cottage to resume rentals while the owners of the cottage appeal a decision to deny them a license.
State Supreme Court will hear challenge to Evers’s 400-year veto
WMC: Four centuries of tax increases with no voter approval
The Wisconsin Supreme Court has accepted a petition to hear a challenge to Gov. Tony Evers’s veto last year that allows property taxes to increase for the next 402 years, filed by the WMC (Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce) Litigation Center on behalf of two taxpayers.
Affair roils Vilas County courthouse
Editor’s Note: On Tuesday, June 25 the Vilas County Board of Supervisors discussed a pair of resolutions supporting the recall of the officials named in this story. Ultimately, the board tabled the resolution with respect to Judge Daniel Overbey. The resolution related to Clerk of Court Beth Soltow failed on an 18-2 vote. A full story on the county board action will follow in our next edition.
Oneida County zoning suspends Bangstad permit for 90 days
Outdoor operations would trigger a new revocation hearing
Concluding that Minocqua Brewing Company owner Kirk Bangstad has still failed to meet many conditions of his conditional use permit to operate an outdoor beer garden at his Minocqua Brewing Company location, the Oneida County zoning committee suspended the permit for 90 days on Thursday, June 20.
County to hire outside consultant, counsel to aid HSC transition
The Oneida County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously last week to retain outside counsel and to hire an outside consultant to aid in the transition of delivery of services from the soon-to-be-defunct Human Service Center to a newly created county human services department.
WILL challenges constitutionality of DNR gun rule
Says rule could lead to fines for law-abiding citizens
The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) is taking on an administrative rule crafted by the state Department of Natural Resources, saying it violates the Second Amendment and could result in fines for law-abiding citizens this summer.
Judge denies temporary injunction against Bangstad
County says allowing law to be flaunted renders code ‘toothless’
Saying he was not judging the merits of the case, Oneida County circuit judge Michael Bloom on Monday nonetheless said Oneida County did not meet the criteria for a temporary injunction that would have immediately shut down Kirk Bangstad’s Minocqua Brewing Company.
Court grants contempt motion against Bangstad
MBC owner must meet court’s conditions or serve 120 days in jail
A Wisconsin circuit court judge has granted a motion for contempt against Minocqua Brewing Company (MBC) owner Kirk Bangstad for failing to show up at a court-ordered hearing, and he must meet an array of conditions — including paying legal fees and costs and providing certain financial records — or spend 120 days in the Oneida County jail.
Wisconsin tourism scores another record-breaking year
Hampered by mild December, Oneida, Vilas growth lags state
Wisconsin’s tourism industry delivered to the state another record-breaking year in 2023, generating $25 billion in total economic impact, according to newly released state data.
Lawmakers ask tough questions about ATF shooting of airport director
Northwoods congressman Tiffany decries ‘dual system of justice’
In multiple congressional hearings, lawmakers have asked tough questions about the recent shooting and killing of the Little Rock, Arkansas, airport director by federal agents as they executed a search warrant in a predawn raid of his house.
Oneida County schedules revocation hearing for Bangstad CUP
Committee says evidence shows multiple violations of permit conditions
The Oneida County zoning committee has scheduled a public hearing to consider revoking Kirk Bangstad’s conditional use permit for a Minocqua beer garden, after reviewing evidence pointing to a bevy of alleged violations of permit conditions.
Oops! ‘Secret group’ is secret no more
Butkus group monitors OC zoning
A secret (or maybe not-so-secret) group of environmentalists that has supposedly been suspected of monitoring the activities of the Oneida County zoning committee has been accidentally exposed by the organizer of the group, an activist with Wisconsin Lakes.
Wisconsin GOP passes resolution supporting income tax elimination
Idea has traction among grassroots; GOP leadership, not so much
It was pretty much a run-of-the-mill state Republican Party convention in May over in Appleton — notwithstanding some expected fireworks involving Assembly speaker Robin Vos — with the GOP passing resolutions that have become mainstream for the party but that Democrats call extremist.
DNR official cautions towns about enhanced wake regs
Multiple towns across Wisconsin are passing ordinances regulating artificial enhanced wakes on state waters, but many of them lack any evidentiary mechanism, and last week a state Department of Natural Resources administrative warden cautioned that towns could be headed for troubled legal waters of their own if they resort to ad hoc or citizen enforcement.
Trump, Biden run neck-and-neck with summer looming
April presidential polls have brought May …. more presidential polls, and the last batch looks eerily similar to all the others over the past half-year, with Donald Trump clinging nationally to an ever-so-slight lead over President Joe Biden, including the latest Marquette Law School poll released this past week.
Oneida County board taps Hartman for administrative coordinator
Oneida County has a new administrative coordinator, and it is one of the county’s own elected officials, Tracy Hartman, who is also the county clerk.
SCOTUS lets federal agency fund itself
Alito dissent: Consumer bureau ‘blatantly attempts’ to evade constitution
In a 7-2 vote, with four conservatives joining three liberals, the U.S. Supreme Court last week rejected a challenge to the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau’s funding mechanism, which largely allows the federal consumer protection agency to fund itself with only a limited monetary cap and no congressional oversight.
Oneida County moves closer to shoreland ordinance revisions
Agency still opposes boathouse stairs, other provisions
Oneida County is moving forward with shoreland ordinance revisions, some of which the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources says it won’t approve, but this week the county’s zoning director told the committee the agency had softened some positions in meetings with staff and outside counsel.
Federal judge tosses lawsuit challenging absentee witness signatures
Judge: Argument by Dem allies ‘makes no sense’
A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Democratic activists that sought to void a state law requiring voters to have a witness signature for their absentee ballots.
Oneida County moves closer to job offers for HSC staff
Rideout proposes additional 50 positions for new Human Services Department
Oneida County officials have been promising for a while now that most employees of the soon-to-be-defunct tri-county Human Service Center (HSC) would be offered jobs in the county’s newly formed Department of Human Services, and sure enough the county took a big step last week in making those offers a reality, presenting a plan to the county’s executive committee to create 51 new positions for 2025.
Election year duel: Microsoft and Biden versus Foxconn and Trump
Biden: Foxconn was just that, ‘a con’
President Joe Biden, Gov. Tony Evers, and a bevy of Democrats descended on Racine County this past week to celebrate Microsoft’s announcement that it would invest $3.3 billion in an artificial intelligence (AI) datacenter campus in Mount Pleasant — and to gloat that the facility is planned for land that Republicans once promised would be an economic Goliath powered by Foxconn.
Bradley, Dallet frame age-old constitutional debate
Independent interpretation or inventing constitutional rights?
It is an argument as old as the Republic itself — whether the U.S. constitution should be strictly or loosely interpreted — and in a recent Wisconsin Supreme Court decision the debate exploded full scale in a case that, oddly enough, the justices decided unanimously.
Biden administration sides with tribes on Line 5
Then again, administration opposes tribes on Line 5
The Biden administration has weighed in, in court on a controversial Canadian oil pipeline known as Line 5, which runs through tribal lands, both agreeing with tribes that the Canadian pipeline owner is trespassing but opposing the court’s order to immediately shut the pipeline down.
Police remove pro-Palestinian protest encampment at UW-Madison
WILL files discrimination lawsuits against Northwestern
After issuing multiple warnings, scores of police with riot shields forcibly removed a Pro-Palestinian tent encampment from the UW-Madison’s Library Mall last week, as campus protests against Israel’s war to annihilate the terrorist group known as Hamas spread across the country.
Kaul wants state Supreme Court to allow voter drop boxes
In Teigen, Kaul argues, the previous court rewrote the law
In a brief filed last week before the Wisconsin Supreme Court, state attorney general Josh Kaul asked justices to overrule the state’s current ban on election drop boxes, arguing that Wisconsin law does not prohibit the use of drop boxes as a way for Wisconsin voters to deliver their absentee ballots in Wisconsin elections.
Federal judge denies Bangstad motion for preliminary injunction
Court stresses ruling is no reflection on the merits of case
A federal judge has denied Minocqua Brewing Company (MBC) owner Kirk Bangstad’s motion for a preliminary injunction that would have given his business immediate access across town land without the town’s permission.
Nemec is Oneida County’s new forestry director
Oneida County has a new forestry director, Jill Nemec, after the county board confirmed her hiring during its April 16 meeting.
Bangstad a no-show at supplemental examination hearing
Oneida County also files complaint for forfeitures
Legal complications for Minocqua Brewing Company owner Kirk Bangstad continued to pile up this past week, as Oneida County filed a complaint for forfeitures for zoning violations that could cost Bangstad tens of thousands of dollars.
County board re-elects Holewinski board chairman
The Oneida County Board of Supervisors has re-elected supervisor Scott Holewinski as chairman of the board, with a unanimous vote by acclamation this week after no one ran against him.
Lakeland Times files records request for Pelican River Forest documents
Forest Service to Tiffany: DNR follows the rules
With questions still circulating about the state Department of Natural Resources’s purchase of a conservation easement in the Pelican River Forest, questions ranging from the state’s procurement of a bridge loan to fund it to the lack of coordination with local governments, The Lakeland Times has filed an open records request with the DNR to try and discover some answers.
Evers vetoes PFAS bill, orders JFC to meet
JFC Republicans: Thanks but no thanks
Gov. Tony Evers vetoed legislation last week to provide comprehensive PFAS relief to eligible communities — dollars that have been approved in the state budget — but the governor said the package of bills contained poison pills designed to help polluters, and he ordered the legislature’s Joint Finance Committee to meet in special session to deal with the situation.
DA files open meetings complaint against Lake Tom officials
Oneida County district attorney Jillian Pfeifer has filed verified open meetings complaints against the Lake Tomahawk town chairman and a town supervisor, saying she believes the two violated the state’s open meetings laws when they attended an unnoticed presentation on enhanced wake boat regulations last year.
Oneida County zoning denies CUP for Cassian wellness center
Lower property values, incompatibility with land use plans cited
On a 5-0 vote, the Oneida County planning and development committee denied last week a conditional use permit application (CUP) by the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council (GLITC) to construct an adolescent recovery and wellness center in the town of Cassian.
Human Service Center was mired in controversy for years
County ignored opinion that model was a dinosaur
A sharp outcry from law enforcement and social services agencies these past few years in Oneida, Forest, and Vilas counties has finally led to the demise of the Human Service Center as a vendor for various mental and behavioral health services to those counties, but serious troubles have long plagued the agency dating back more than 20 years.
Sowinski crushes Fugle in Oneida County judge’s race
Oneida County assistant district attorney Mary Sowinski swept to victory Tuesday in the county’s circuit court judge’s race, defeating Oneida County corporation counsel Michael Fugle and winning nearly 67 percent of the vote.
New studies point to environmental causes for autism
A crescendo of evidence mounts for dual causation
As the numbers of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder have continued to climb through the years — the latest official figures from last year show that 1 in 36, or 2.8 percent, of 8-year-olds had autism in 2020 — scientists have intensified their efforts to pinpoint a cause or causes, and new studies this past year have added to a growing belief that environmental factors play a pivotal role.
OC board urges state legislature to consider enhanced wake rules
On March 19, the Oneida County board of supervisors passed and sent to the state legislature a resolution urging lawmakers to establish minimum standards that prohibit enhanced/excessive wakes within 500 feet of the shore and in waters shallower than 20 feet in depth.
GOP, Dems pass massive spending measures
Johnson in the crosshairs; Tiffany votes against minibus bills
Northwoods U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany joined other fiscal conservatives this past month in voting against two massive “minibus” spending bills, but they passed anyway as the GOP House leadership helped Democrats push the measures across the finish line.
Times files new open meetings complaint against Lake Tomahawk’s DeMet, Lopez
The Lakeland Times has filed a new open meetings complaint against Lake Tomahawk town chairman George DeMet and town supervisor Lenore Lopez, alleging that a March 13 vote to move forward with an enhanced wake boat ordinance was the product of an illegal quorum that should be overturned.
OC board opposes ‘blanket’ national forest plan amendments
The Oneida County board of supervisors voted unanimously this past week — with two members absent — to oppose implementation of blanket amendments that would be applied to all 128 Forest Service federal lands that have property management plans, rather than the current practice of making revisions on a property-by-property basis.
In judge’s race, Sowinski stresses independence, community values
Oneida County assistant district attorney Mary Sowinski, a fifth-generation resident of Oneida County from Sugar Camp, says that generational continuity and the community values it represents is a huge reason she is seeking a seat on the Oneida County circuit court as judge this spring.
Northwoods River News wins Best in Division award from WNA
Paper also earns top award for general excellence
Scoring 25 total awards and four first place awards, The Northwoods River News was named Best Newspaper in its circulation division at the 2023 Wisconsin Newspaper Association convention last week.