MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – State legislators are once again pushing to create a task force focusing on missing and murdered African American women and girls in Wisconsin.

A bill to create this passed in the state Assembly back in February, but it failed to make it to the Senate floor despite bipartisan support.

Representative Shelia Stubbs is the author behind the bill. She and other lawmakers held a press conference at the State Capitol Thursday urging the Senate to reconvene and schedule a floor vote.

“How much longer must families of missing persons in our state wait for justice,” Rep. Stubbs said.

Among those waiting for their loved ones to come back home is Tanesha Howard. Howard’s daughter, Joniah Walker, has been missing from Milwaukee since June of 2022.

“I take it literally minute by minute,” Howard said. “It’s like a nightmare that never ends. She’s out there somewhere and somebody knows something. I have faith that she’s still alive, that she’s out there.”

As of 2020, Wisconsin had the highest homicide victimization rate for black women and girls in the United States at 20.2 out of every 100,000, according to The Guardian.

“I was shocked to discover that Wisconsin, a state that I love, the state that I’m raising my children in, the state where my husband and I are pastors in, the state where my mother brought me to be raised since the age of 5, had the worst numbers for black female homicide victimization in the nation,” Rep. Stubbs said.

The MMAAWG task force would aim to develop strategies to prevent violence, improve investigations and support families impacted by missing or murdered black women and girls in Wisconsin.

“I employ everyone to join me in this effort until something is done about this issue in the great state of Wisconsin,” Rep. Stubbs said.

The bill would require Attorney General Josh Kaul to establish the task force within 45 days of the proposal becoming law.

The task force is similar to the Wisconsin Department of Justice’s missing and murdered indigenous women task force created by Kaul in 2020. Kaul does have the ability to create the proposed MMAAWG task force without a Senate vote.

Rep. Stubbs said she spoke to Kaul about him taking this action, but Kaul told her funding for the task force would be a problem.

“I can say to you from many conversations, funding is an issue and at this point, I don’t care that funding is an issue,” Rep. Stubbs said. “I want something done now.”

State Senator Duey Stroebel, who is the GOP chair of the Senate Government Operations Committee, responded to Stubbs’ press conference Thursday. Sen. Stroebel said he would not give the bill a hearing.

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MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – FAFSA applications reached a new low as high school seniors try to submit their forms through a new portal process.

According to the U.S. Department of Education, submissions for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) dropped down 33.9% from 2023.

High school counselors, college finance experts and elected officials all said the new application process is to blame for the low turnout.

”The problem is the form,” La Follette High School Academic Career Planning Coordinator Annie Hand Braga said. “There have been all of the things that were promised with this better FAFSA that students would be able to do, they just haven’t all materialized or they didn’t materialize when the form opened.”

Braga and La Follette High School Multilingual Counselor Vanessa Hlavacka work with students and their parents to help them go through the financial aid process. The two said some students would not be able to attend college without help from the federal government.

”When we were finally able to submit, it brought me to happy tears for this student just knowing what it means for him and his family,” Hlvacka said. “It’s life changing for so many people. Even without those kinds of scholarships in mind, just the opportunity to see what kind of financial support is out there from the government, makes college attainable for many of our students.”

The U.S. Dept. of Ed. rolled out a new online application portal this year to make the process simpler. Under Secretary James Kvall acknowledged the new format did not go as planned.

“We have had some bumps get in there this year,” he said. ”It’s required us to replace up to 20 computer systems. Some of which are older than the parents that are filling out the form. So, it’s a major major IT project for us and it has been a challenging one.”

He said Congress voted to make legislative changes with FAFSA in 2020 and this was part of the result. When asked what his department is doing to improve things, he said they’ve made significant progression over the last few weeks. “We’ve made a lot of progress within the last few weeks,” he said. “The FAFSA is now up and running smoothly. We’ve had about 9 million people submit their FAFSA and we’re processing them in about one to three days.”

UW Madison Assistant Director of Federal Rewards Katy Weisenburger said her office is working to extend deadlines for students who, to know fault of their own, couldn’t make the FAFSA process work.

”I have seen a lot of students be very discouraged, yes, for sure…. I have had parents crying about not being able to get this done,” she said. “It’s a really awful situation. I would not be surprised if some students choose to not apply for financial aid or choose to not go to school because of this situation, which is really sad.”

Weisenburger said college hopefuls and their parents should continue to reach out to the FAFSA helpline and call their desired school’s financial aid offices to request deadlines.

UW Madison’s Financial Aid Office can be reached at 608-262-3060 for help.

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ST CROIX FALLS, WI — DrydenWire.com — Susan Badtke is a Senior Planner with the West Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission. She assisted in the completion of the 2020 Polk County Housing Needs Assessment, a housing study seeking to understand the current housing challenges and help municipalities address population growth and future housing needs.

The host, Kirk Anderson, is the Mayor of St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, and has for the past 4 years has tried to encourage the development of new housing for seniors, families, and the workforce, both at market rate and affordable costs. Joined by Susan Badtke, WCWRPC, together they talk about the challenges we face in the housing market, projections for future growth/needs, and how municipalities can work with developers and state government better to facilitate a more comprehensive focus on housing than what is typical in many cities, towns, and villages.

Focus: Housing Shortages & Affordability.

• What does the future look like for the next generation of homeowners in West Central Wisconsin?

The entire wide-ranging chat was live-streamed at 8:30a (CST) on DrydenWire’s Facebook page Thursday, May 16, 2024.

ICYMI: You can watch the recording on Facebook Watch (here), on YouTube (here), or stream below.