Farah, an Afghan refugee, moved to Appleton in January 2022 after fleeing unrest in her home country. 

She had never experienced winter before and arrived in Wisconsin during what’s traditionally the coldest month of the year.

“I was crying,” Farah recalled. “I told my husband, ‘No, I don’t want to stay here. It’s so cold. I really cannot.’” 

But she and her husband both found jobs soon after and eventually chose to make the Badger state their home, even if she still hasn’t gotten used to frigid Wisconsin winters.

“The people are very friendly,” Farah said of Wisconsin residents. “Most of the time, when I talk to people, they say, ‘Haven’t you faced any racist things or any negative comments from the people?’ I say, ‘No, I really haven’t.’”

She’s one of many Afghan refugees who are making a home in Wisconsin after fleeing Afghanistan when the Taliban returned to power. According to the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families, more than 800 Afghan refugees resettled in Wisconsin in 2022. Of those, 181 resettled in the Fox Valley.

On President Donald Trump’s first day in office in 2025, he suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program. That has left a number of Afghans who worked alongside the U.S. government and military for years in limbo, NPR reported. Beginning in 2021, thousands of Afghan refugees in similar situations were sent to Fort McCoy in Sparta, and some eventually settled in the state through that program.

WPR is withholding Farah’s last name out of concern that her family in Afghanistan could be targeted by the Taliban due to her role in helping advance American interests in Afghanistan before the 2021 U.S. withdrawal.

Farah is now a group program specialist for World Relief Wisconsin. She has helped Afghan refugees in the Fox Cities tell their stories and connect with neighbors. One way is through a recent oral history exhibit in the region. 

World Relief partnered with the History Museum at the Castle in Appleton to design the “Our Afghan Neighbors” exhibit. 

The exhibit, designed as mobile pop-up banners, features portraits and stories of Afghans who immigrated to the U.S. seeking education, freedom and democracy. Farah conducted interviews with refugees highlighting the diversity within the Afghan community, but also their shared values and aspirations.

“These people who are coming, all of them hate war and violence — they just escaped from that,” Farah said. “They just want peace. They value education. They want to improve their life here. They want to support their kids. They want their kids to be happy here.”

Farah and her husband have a son. But especially for Afghan refugees with daughters, Farah says moving to the U.S. provides better opportunities.

“In Afghanistan now, the girls cannot go to school after their sixth grade, so they will be at home, and it is the worst thing that can happen to a family,” she said. “The people who have daughters, they know that they have a future here.”

Dustin Mack, chief curator for the History Museum at the Castle, said the community’s response to the exhibit has been “overwhelmingly positive.” He said the exhibit was designed to be able to be moved between different places like schools, universities, churches and businesses.

In fact, the exhibit is already booked through most of the spring, he said.

“Anybody can reach out to the History Museum and book the exhibit and bring it to their facility to help continue to share this story and get to know our new Afghan neighbors,” Mack said. “It’s been great to see so many people interested and willing to continue to share this story.”

Life in Afghanistan

Not only did Farah help make the exhibit a reality, but her story is featured in the exhibit. 

Farah grew up in western Afghanistan in the Herat Province, one of 34 provinces in the country. She loved going to school.

“I have very good memories of my parents supporting me going to school, then university,” she said.

When she went to college, she studied education and English literature. After finishing her university studies, Farah began working for the Lincoln Learning Center in Afghanistan in 2014 as part of a United States-funded project.

“I was teaching English as a second language for university and school students,” Farah said. “We were advising the students who wanted to come to the United States to continue their education, and we did a lot of cultural programs. I did a lot of information programs for women’s rights or girls’ right to education.”

The partnership with the U.S. government, Farah said, helped thousands of Afghans come to the United States for their master’s or doctorate degrees before they returned to Afghanistan to teach in universities. Farah’s husband also worked with the U.S. government as a university lecturer. 

Their work for the American government made them both eligible for a Special Immigrant Visa, which allowed anyone who worked for the government for more than two years eligible to leave Afghanistan when they felt at risk, Farah said.

As the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan declined throughout 2020 and into 2021, the Taliban was seizing more and more land.

When the Taliban came into Herat in the summer of 2021, Farah remembers being told by her employer that she was no longer safe and she needed to go to the capital city of Kabul with her husband and then-two-year-old son.

Farah, her husband and their son lived out of a hotel in Kabul for about a month, Farah said. After the Taliban had taken control of the Afghan government, she described it as a time of immense fear.

Farah said Afghanistan had experienced social reforms before the Taliban returned to power that gave women more freedom to get an education and advance. 

That all went away when the Taliban returned to power, Farah says.

“Everything changed,” she said. “Women didn’t want to stay in that country and experience the same things that they had like 20 years ago. That was the reason everyone just wanted to get out of Afghanistan and not see those scary scenes from their childhood.”

One day at the hotel, Farah said she received a call from her father-in-law who asked, “Where did you put your documents?”

He explained that people were searching homes to learn who was working with the U.S. government. She told him her documents were in her bedroom.

“They burned all the documents that we had, like certificates and a lot of things that we had with the U.S. government,” Farah said.

Coming to America

After living in a hotel for about a month, Farah, her husband and their son decided to leave Afghanistan. Her employer helped them get a visa to enter Pakistan. Farah says it was fairly common for people in Afghanistan to go to Pakistan for medical reasons.

“Whenever you met a person from the government, like the Taliban, they’d ask you why you are going to the airport. Who did you work with? A lot of questions,” she said. “If they knew you worked with another government, especially the U.S., they would kill you, or they wouldn’t let you go out of Afghanistan.”

Farah and her family were able to get out of the country, traveling first to Pakistan and then to Qatar before coming to the United States.

After arriving in Wisconsin, Farah not only had to adjust to the cold winters, but also to other cultural differences. She said it was difficult to find halal foods that she and her family would eat back in Afghanistan.

But she said she had a lot of support in adjusting to life in the Fox Valley.

“We were resettled by World Relief. They gave us a good neighbor team, who helped us with transportation, and they even took us to further areas like Oshkosh or Milwaukee to get halal food and all of that,” Farah said. “They were a very huge help for us to find the things that we needed.”

Now, Farah is working to help other refugees adjust in her role as a group program specialist with World Relief Wisconsin. The organization’s financial future may be uncertain after threats to federal funding by the Trump administration in January 2025.

“The cost of living is lower than in some other states, so we are seeing other Afghans coming,” Farah said. “We have an Afghan family who opened a store here, so we don’t need to go to Oshkosh or Milwaukee. It’s going well, and we are still learning about life here.”

This story was originally published on wisconsinlife.org.

‘Our Afghan Neighbors’ exhibit explores life for Fox Valley refugees is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Fernanda Jimenez, a 24-year-old Racine resident, came to the United States from Mexico with her mother and siblings when she was just 5 years old. It’s the only home she can remember.

For almost a decade, Jimenez has been protected from deportation by the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program, launched under the Obama administration. The program allows people who came to the country illegally as children to get work permits and continue living in America.

Earlier this year, Jimenez graduated from Alverno College in Milwaukee. She currently works as a grant writer, helping nonprofits apply for funding. But she’s also in the process of applying to law school.

“I like helping nonprofits get funding to do the work that we need in our country and especially our communities, but I’m more passionate about community organizing,” she said. “I’d like to eventually use legal skills after law school for community organizing.”

Jimenez has big dreams, but she says she’s been feeling a looming anxiety since former President Donald Trump won his bid to return to the White House in this year’s presidential race.

She was still in high school when Trump was first elected in 2016, but she says she still remembers feeling “terrified” about what his election would mean for her parents who don’t have permanent legal status and what it would mean for DACA’s future.

Those fears have come roaring back in recent weeks. 

“Our community is terrified. They’re uncertain of their futures, they’re concerned for their family members who are undocumented and not protected under DACA,” Jimenez said. “A lot of naturalized citizens are concerned as well. The mass deportation threat is being taken seriously.”

On the campaign trail, Trump promised to lead the largest deportation effort in U.S. history. Shortly after the election, he announced that Tom Homan, former acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, would serve as his administration’s “border czar.”

In interviews with Fox News last week, Homan said he would prioritize deporting people who threaten public safety or pose risks to national security. But he also told the network that anyone in the country illegally is “not off the table,” and the administration would perform workplace immigration raids. 

Immigrant rights group plans organizing efforts

Following Trump’s reelection, Voces de La Frontera, a Milwaukee-based immigrant rights group, has been holding community meetings in Green Bay, Milwaukee and Dane County to plan next steps, according to Christine Neumann-Ortiz, the organization’s founding executive director.

She said many of the immigrants in Wisconsin without permanent legal status are fearful of the prospect of mass deportations, but she doesn’t believe they will leave the country preemptively. Rather, she said they may leave Wisconsin for states that provide more protections to immigrants.

Neumann-Ortiz said Voces is using the regional meetings to brainstorm ways it can organize around protecting immigrants without permanent legal status. She said the group plans to raise awareness through mass strikes, protests and civil disobedience. 

“We really are going to have to very strongly be a movement that stands for human decency, solidarity, and we’re going to have to do that in the streets,” she said. 

Neumann-Ortiz also said she believes most Trump voters cast ballots for him because of economic concerns, not because they wanted to see people forcibly removed from their communities.

“I do think as things unfold, there’s going to be shock waves that are going to happen that are going to have many people open their eyes, regret their decisions and see what they can do to help,” she said.

David Najera, Hispanic outreach coordinator for the Republican Party of Wisconsin, does not share the concerns about mass deportations.

“My parents came from Mexico and Texas. They came the right way, and that’s the way I’d like to see people come,” he said.

Najera said he supports Trump’s immigration policies, citing concerns about crime, infectious disease and government resources.

“The immigrants are just overwhelming the hospitals, schools and everything else, and taking our tax money,” Najera said. “I’m not saying they’re all bad, but there’s a majority of them that are just getting out of their jails over there in different countries, and coming here with bad intentions.”

Multiple studies have shown immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans. And Wisconsin’s immigrants without permanent legal status paid $240 million in federal, state and local taxes in 2022, according to the American Immigration Council.

How are Wisconsin immigration attorneys advising clients?

Marc Christopher, an immigration attorney based in Milwaukee, represents clients in federal immigration court who are facing deportation or seeking asylum. Christopher said he doesn’t expect the Trump administration’s deportation effort to be limited to people with serious criminal convictions or those who pose security concerns.

He said he expects increased targeting of individuals who haven’t committed crimes or have been charged with minor offenses, like driving without a license. Immigrants living in Wisconsin without proof of citizenship or legal residency can’t get driver’s licenses.

“What I’m telling my clients to do is make sure that you follow the law to a tee,” Christopher said. “If you do not have a driver’s license, do not drive. If you can have someone else drive you to work or drive your children to school, make sure and do that because that’s the most common way that they get thrown into the immigration court process.”

Aissa Olivarez, managing attorney for the Community Immigration Law Center in Madison, said she expects the incoming administration to expand the use of “expedited removal.” It’s a process that allows the government to deport people without presenting their case to an immigration judge if the person has been in the country for less than two years.

“I’m also advising people to start gathering proof that they’ve been here for more than two years — phone bills, light bills, leases, school information — to be able to show in case they are stopped and questioned by immigration authorities,” Olivarez said.

Second Trump term reignites fears over DACA’s future, impact on mixed-status families

Christopher and Olivarez both said the DACA program, and other federal programs giving immigrants temporary protected statuses, could end in the coming years.

Trump previously tried to end the DACA program, but it was upheld in a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision with Chief Justice John Roberts siding with four liberal justices. The current court has a 6-3 conservative majority, meaning Roberts would no longer be the deciding vote.

“It’s (DACA) all but assuredly going to be found unconstitutional by the current Supreme Court,” Christopher said of the DACA program. 

Jimenez, the DACA recipient from Racine, said she’s afraid being a participant in the program will make her a target for deportation by the federal government.

“We have to provide, every two years, an updated information application of where we live, our biometrics, our pictures, and they have to be recent pictures,” she said. “They have our entire information. And that’s really where our fear is at. They know who we are. They know we’re undocumented.”

Immigrant rights advocates are also concerned that a mass deportation effort could devastate the estimated 28,000 families in Wisconsin with mixed-immigration status. Those families include households where one spouse may be a U.S. citizen married to someone who doesn’t have permanent legal status, or where the parents of U.S. citizen children lack legal status.

Jimenez said her brother is part of a mixed-status family. She says he is a DACA recipient, his girlfriend is a legal resident, and his children are U.S. citizens.

“If he is to be deported, his kids would suffer the most not having their father with them, and my parents, who I fear (for) the most, have no protection,” she said. “They have to work. They have to drive to work. They have to drive without a license.”

What could a second Trump term mean for asylum seekers in Wisconsin?

Christopher, the immigration attorney from Milwaukee, said individuals seeking asylum in Wisconsin are in the country legally as they wait to make their case to the government that they should be granted asylum in the United States. 

Under the last Trump administration, Christopher said the federal government narrowed the qualifications to be granted asylum. He said the previous Trump administration made it so those fleeing cartel or gang violence in their home country did not qualify and rolled back protections for those fleeing gender-based violence.

If Trump tightens restrictions on the qualifications on asylum again, Christopher said those new restrictions would apply to people already in Wisconsin waiting to make their case to immigration officials.

“You’re not protected by the rules at the time that you apply,” he said. “It’s going to be a major shift.”

Byron Chavez, a 28-year-old asylum seeker from Nicaragua, has been living in Whitewater since 2022. He applied for asylum and is waiting to make his case to the government. 

He said he fled government oppression and human rights violations in Nicaragua. Since coming to Wisconsin, Chavez said he’s fallen in love with Whitewater and wants to make it his permanent home.

“The community is very friendly. … You got everything you need and everything is close,” he said. “The diversity you have here, it’s what makes Whitewater a really nice place.”

If he gets an asylum hearing after Trump takes office, Chavez says he’s hopeful the government will hear him out and grant him asylum. 

“I’m a little bit more concerned because I think the immigration law will be stricter,” he said. “But other than that, I like to go by the book. I’m doing things the way they should, and hopefully that talks about my desire of being here. I want to do things the right way.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

‘Our community is terrified’: Wisconsin immigrants brace for threat of mass deportations is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Voters in northeast Wisconsin will choose a new representative in Congress next month, with both candidates for Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District coming from the private sector. 

Republican Tony Wied, a businessman from De Pere, and Democrat Kristin Lyerly, an OB-GYN from De Pere, are both running for the seat previously held by former U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher, a Republican who resigned earlier this year. 

Wied and Lyerly will each be on the ballot twice on Nov. 5, for both a general and special election. The special election will allow the winner to finish Gallagher’s term in Congress.

Wied, who owned a chain of Dino Stop convenience stores until 2022, received the endorsement of former President Donald Trump when he entered the race as a political unknown.

During a crowded GOP primary race, he leaned into the Trump endorsement, and he’s also campaigned on his experience as a small business owner.

“I will take the approach that I’ve always taken when running my business, raising my family and conducting myself over 48 years,” Wied said at a recent debate. “I’ll take a pragmatic approach. I’m not one to scream and attack people. I’m one to attack problems.”

Lyerly has been an outspoken advocate for reproductive rights since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. She became a plaintiff in a lawsuit challenging Wisconsin’s pre-Civil War abortion law.

She ran for an Assembly seat in 2020, but lost to incumbent state Rep. John Macco, R-Ledgeview. She said she voted Republican for much of her life.

“I never voted for a Democrat until I was probably in my 30s, and I never became a Democrat until right before I ran for office,” Lyerly said at the debate. “I’m an independent thinker. I’m somebody who listens to people, just like I do in the office when I’m talking to a patient.”

From inflation to abortion, Wied and Lyerly at odds on the issues

During their recent debate, Wied and Lyerly squared off on inflation, abortion, immigration and education. 

On inflation, Wied said he wants to cut government spending to bring costs down, calling inflation a “tax” on the lower and middle classes.

“It’s no different than each and every one of you in your own households. You have to look at every single budget, and that’s what I will bring to Congress,” he said. “We have to have a balanced budget. We have to move towards less spending.”

Beyond government spending, Lyerly argued that “corporate greed” also played an outsized role in driving inflation. She proposed creating new federal programs to help address rising housing costs, which have contributed to inflation.

“We can use federal lands for public development,” she said. “There are many things that we can do as members of Congress that will help to take the pressure off of the housing market and get first-time home buyers into their homes.”

On abortion, Wied has said he believes the issue is one for the states and not the federal government. During the debate, he was asked what he believes Wisconsin’s abortion policy should be. He didn’t expressly answer.

“It won’t be at the federal level, so that’s not on my plate,” Wied said. “I am going to continue to work hard on the things that I can control in the United States House of Representatives.”

Meanwhile, Lyerly said she believes women should “have the freedom to make our own choices” about their bodies. She called Wied’s position of leaving abortion policy up to the states a “cop-out.”

“That tells me that in states with bans, where mothers die at a rate three times greater than in states without bans, you’re OK with that,” she said. 

On immigration, Wied said he is in favor of bringing back the pandemic-era “Remain in Mexico” policy and completing the border wall.

Lyerly said she would support a bipartisan border security bill that was negotiated by Senate Republicans and Democrats, but was derailed by Trump.

“The people who pulled my opponent’s strings said no (to the bill),” Lyerly said. “They said no because they want to use it for politics. They want to use it to induce fear.”

Wied argued the bill didn’t do enough to reestablish the policies of the Trump administration.

“This bill does not go far enough,” he said. “We need to close this border down (and) find an effective immigration policy.”

During the debate, a University of Wisconsin-Green Bay student asked both candidates for their views on bringing the cost of college down, and on student loan relief. 

Wied was not in favor of student loan forgiveness, but Lyerly said she was open to the idea. Both said more needs to be done to get students into the skilled trades, but Lyerly criticized Wied for his support for ending the U.S. Department of Education.

“By eliminating the Department of Education, that would eliminate a number of funding streams for students,” Lyerly said. “Not only that, but it would drive states and local municipalities into chaos.”

Wied said he believes the Department of Education is essentially micromanaging schools.

“You should have the control to run your schools here locally, and I do not believe in the federal government teaching our children,” he said. “We have federal bureaucrats continuing to get involved in our children’s education.”

What do their supporters say?

Whether it’s Wied or Lyerly, the winner of the 8th District will be a first-time officeholder. Supporters for both think their candidate is up for the challenge.

De Pere resident Bob Gryboski said he’s known Wied for years. Gryboski runs a construction company with his brother and thinks Wied’s business background makes him the right candidate.

“Being a small business owner, you get to meet people on all scales of the income scale, and you need to interact with those people and work together to get things done,” Gryboski said. “He’s going to have a really good sense of the community in general.”

Gryboski said he thought Trump’s endorsement would help Wied, even as he acknowledged the former president had been “a polarizing individual.”

“I agree with many of the policies that (Trump) supports,” Gryboski said. “By Tony getting that endorsement, that would indicate that he obviously also will be supporting a lot of the policies.”

Shawano resident Lora Perdelwitz is a Lyerly supporter who got to know the candidate at a few campaign stops in Shawano. She says she feels like Lyerly listens to voters in the same way she listens to her medical patients.

“I want someone representing me who has that trait because if you’re listening to the people you’re representing, you can represent what their wants and needs are,” Perdelwitz said. “The things she talks about are in alignment with my wants and needs at this point, as far as reproductive rights.”

Perdelwitz said Trump’s endorsement of Wied is “incredibly concerning,” saying the Jan. 6 insurrection remains top of mind for her. 

“To me, that’s a huge red flag,” she said. “If you’re using his endorsement to get you votes, that’s a little frightening.”

As of Sept. 30, Lyerly had raised and spent more money than Wied, according to the Federal Elections Commission.

Lyerly raised more than $2 million dollars, spent roughly $1.4 million and had roughly $603,000 of cash on hand heading into the final leg of the race. Wied raised more than $1.3 million, spent about $1.1 million and had roughly $230,000 of cash on hand.

The 8th Congressional District has been held by Republicans since 2011, and the Cook Political Report rates the seat as “solid Republican.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

Tony Wied, Kristin Lyerly face off in race for northeast Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

In early September, Green Bay City Clerk Celestine Jeffreys sat in a conference room for a dry run of what a “man-made” threat to public safety on Election Day might look like.

The training brought together officials from the City Attorney’s Office to the Green Bay Metro Fire Department, not to mention representatives from the Wisconsin Elections Commission. The exercise was led by a facilitator from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Jeffreys couldn’t provide details of the scenario officials ran through. But she said it evolved from the city receiving a “concerning” piece of information into something that would pose a real risk to election workers and voters.

“Worst case scenario is something that you plan for and not necessarily something that you communicate to the public because you don’t want to scare people,” she said. “But people would be concerned if some of the things that we discussed happened.”

The exercise was meant to help the city identify where it may have vulnerabilities and to think through what officials’ priorities would be if there was a real threat to public safety on Election Day. 

It was a much larger version of a similar training the city conducted ahead of the 2022 midterms, Jeffreys said. That year’s training was a first for the city of Green Bay.

After 2020, Jeffreys said the frequency and intensity of verbal assaults and threatening interactions with the public forced the city to develop a “very robust security protocol and profile around elections.”

In many ways, Green Bay has been a microcosm of backlash officials faced across the country in the wake of the 2020 election. 

President Joe Biden’s roughly 20,000-vote victory in the state four years ago made local officials the target for baseless claims of election fraud, spearheaded nationally by former President Donald Trump.

In Green Bay, where Biden won by around 4,000 votes, those false claims led to harassment and threats toward local officials and an ongoing level of animosity that has continued in the years since the election.

Through court filings, the city has gone public with at least three incidents of members of the public “verbally assaulting” either city staff or a local newspaper reporter in recent years.

“Those years following the 2020 election were some of the most fearful, stressful and unconventional life experiences I’ve ever had,” said Amaad Rivera-Wagner, who has worked in the Green Bay mayor’s office since 2020 and now is a Democratic state Assembly candidate.

Some are worried this election, with Trump back at the top of the Republican ticket, could result in additional threats.

The Green Bay experience

Almost immediately after the 2020 election was called, Rivera-Wagner said city officials and staff had their emails and phones flooded with threats from people all over the country, sending a “wave of fear” through City Hall. Rivera-Wagner said he personally became a target of harassment.

“It ended up setting me up to be doxed, harassed, stalked,” he said. “I had death threats. They stopped my husband at his job because they didn’t believe that he was real.”

The same day rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol to overturn the results of the 2020 election, protesters gathered outside Green Bay City Hall for a “Stop the Steal” rally. The protest was organized by now-Ald. Melinda Eck, who was elected to the city council in 2022.

Eck did not return repeated requests for an interview, but at the protest, she told WTAQ-FM that Trump supporters wouldn’t back down, saying, “There’s a bunch of patriots out there and they are going to fight for their freedom.”

Green Bay has been a central focus for others who’ve echoed Trump’s claims, including former state Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who was hired by the Wisconsin Assembly to investigate the 2020 election. As part of his investigation, Gableman called for Mayor Eric Genrich’s arrest. 

The mayor declined to comment for this story, but described the fallout of Gableman’s probe in a 2023 interview about a threat he received during his reelection campaign.

“We received a lot of emails and communications suggesting treason and all kinds of things because of the election conspiracy theories that have been circulated for a very long time,” Genrich said last year.

Earlier this year, Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher stepped down before his term ended and told The Washington Post that threats to his family led to the decision. Gallagher had famously called out Trump supporters during the Jan. 6 insurrection, calling the events of that day “Banana Republic crap” in a video recorded from his Capitol office.

Former U.S. Rep. Reid Ribble, a Republican and outspoken Trump critic who represented Green Bay from 2011 to 2017, has a theory on why the city has been such a focus for some of the former president’s most ardent supporters. In short, they view Green Bay as winnable.

“In Milwaukee and Dane County, they believe the Democrats are going to ‘steal’ it no matter what,” Ribble said. “The bigger issue is this whole idea that the elections themselves aren’t safe, when, in fact, they are.”

A statewide issue

While some local officials have faced intense pressure in Green Bay, it’s hardly the only place where it felt like running elections changed after 2020. In fact, a 2023 Brennan Center survey of local elections officials around the country showed 45 percent were concerned for the safety of other election officials and workers in future elections.

In Dane County, Madison’s clerk received multiple death threats, and Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe was granted a security detail due to concerns for her safety.

Election Day safety training exercises, like the one in Green Bay, have become more common across Wisconsin, especially after the Jan. 6 insurrection, said Dane County Clerk Scott McDonell. 

McDonell said he’s participated in several of them with municipalities in his county in recent years and has a few more set for this election cycle. He said they can range from preparing for cyber attacks to bomb threats.

“It really does feel a bit like we’ve turned into more of an emergency management department than an election department,” he said.

Sam Liebert, Wisconsin state director for the voting rights group All Voting is Local, said local clerks across Wisconsin have increased their coordination with local law enforcement in preparation of the 2024 election and possible safety concerns.

“They have done more training around things like mass casualty or active shooter-type events,” he said. “A lot of clerks are or have installed silent alarms in their offices if something were to happen that goes directly to law enforcement.”

Liebert said his organization held town halls with clerks around the state this year, and “a large number of clerks” plan to put their families up in hotels or have them stay in another city the night before the election and on Election Day in case “things go sideways.”

“It’s a very real threat,” Liebert said. “It’s a very real concern.”

Bracing for 2024

The Republican Party of Brown County has promoted poll watching and has held election observer training sessions ahead of the November election.

Party Chair Doug Reich declined to be interviewed, but provided a statement via email.

“There was a number of issues regarding that (2020) election which caused people to question election integrity,” he said. “As a result, nationwide there has been advocacy to improve election integrity.”

For clerks, Jeffreys said there’s a balancing act between preserving the right of the public to observe elections and preserving the right of voters to cast private ballots.

In April 2022, according to court documents, an election observer in Green Bay “verbally assaulted” staff in the city clerk’s office after a voter delivered an absentee ballot, which resulted in the voter crying and being escorted to her vehicle.

Jeffreys said the incident was part of an effort by some election observers to “police elections.” She said she welcomes poll watchers but said they should not try to insert themselves into election processes.

“Unfortunately, that continues to this day,” she said. “I’m confident that in November, we’ll have even more of that.”

Following the 2020 election, Jeffreys said her office has worked closely with the Green Bay Police Department to develop a security protocol for elections, both at City Hall and at polling locations. It’s unclear if Green Bay officials will face harassment and threats in November, but she said the city is prepared for “every eventuality.”

Jeffreys said Green Bay will ensure that eligible voters are registered and that their votes are counted. Beyond doing that work to the letter of the law, she said everything else is out of her hands.

“We are going to do everything that we are required to do to ensure that people’s votes are counted,” she said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but we are ready.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

Green Bay spent years rehashing the 2020 election. Now the city is bracing for November. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Green Bay broke ground on the first steps toward developing what the city said will be its largest-ever housing development.

Plans call for the development of a minimum of 200 single- and multi-family homes, a public park and urban farm on a roughly 26-acre parcel donated by a local employer, according to Amaad Rivera-Wagner, the city’s project manager for the redevelopment and the mayor’s chief of staff.

“We are essentially building a brand new neighborhood on land that has been essentially a farm or not utilized for nearly 100 years,” Rivera-Wagner said.

The groundbreaking marked the start of work on infrastructure and public amenities serving the site, like roads, utilities, the park and the urban farm.

“We are technically doing two different processes at the same time,” Rivera-Wagner said. “There’s a public amenities process and there’s a housing process.”

In 2021, JBS Foods Group, which employs roughly 1,200 people at its beef processing plant in Green Bay, donated the property on the east side. The company also gave the city $500,000 to use to address the housing shortage in the community. 

The previous year, a housing market study commissioned by the city found Green Bay needed between 3,314 and 7,441 rental units and between 4,052 and 9,098 owner-occupied units by 2040 to keep up with demand.

Since the donation, Green Bay has worked with roughly 40 community stakeholders to develop plans for the site and received assistance from Harvard University and Bloomberg Philanthropies. The city also hosted meetings, where residents shared input on what they’d like to see.

“This is both the largest development we’ve ever done and the largest community-led effort,” Rivera-Wagner said.

Rivera-Wagner said the development aims to provide “missing middle housing” — homes and apartments that are affordable to households earning 80 to 120 percent of the area’s median income. The median household income in the city was about $55,000 in 2022, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Green Bay selected two developers to build housing for the first phase of the project after opening requests for proposals in January. The developers will purchase the land from the city. Green Bay estimates the development will create $30 million in property value.

When complete, the project will include duplexes, triplexes, apartments, townhomes and single-family homes, Rivera-Wagner said.

Milwaukee-based developer Revel49 proposed building 94 apartments, five single-family homes and 18 townhomes. It was selected to build an apartment building and multigenerational townhomes. Madison-based Gorman & Company proposed building 132 apartments, 32 townhomes and 20 single-family homes. It was selected to build apartments.

Ted Matkom, Wisconsin Market president for Gorman & Company, said developers are still negotiating the terms of a development agreement with the city, so unit estimates will change.

“My understanding is the land is (going to be sold) for $1,” Matkom said. “But to be honest with you, we have not reached a total agreement with the city.”

He also said Gorman & Company met “a couple times” with the city related to what’s being built, but “it’s far from approved or designed.”

Revel49 Managing Partner Collin Price said the single-family homes will come in the second phase of the project.

“There’s no single-family residences in phase one, so that’s all been put off to the sideline for phase two,” he said.

Rivera-Wagner said the city is spending roughly $14 million to build infrastructure and amenities. He said $5 million of that comes from a state grant funded by the federal American Rescue Plan Act.

Rivera-Wagner said that portion of the project will be finished within a year. Matkom and Price said they anticipate beginning construction next spring and finishing by the end of 2026.

“The most important part for the city and the community is to deliver the housing as soon as we can, due to the high demand,” Price said.

The city hopes to start a requests for proposal process for the remaining units in the next three to six months, with the goal of “constantly building out this neighborhood,” Rivera-Wagner said.

“People will be able to go and hang out in this neighborhood within a year,” Rivera-Wagner said. “They’ll be able to live within this neighborhood in two years, and we’re hoping to fully build out within three to four years.”

At the groundbreaking, state and local leaders celebrated the development moving forward.

“I just want to truly express my appreciation for what you all have (done to) come together to dream big and to achieve this dream together,” said state Department of Administration Secretary Kathy Blumenfeld.

JBS Green Bay Human Resources Director Brad Bothun said the company’s donation was part of a program to strengthen the communities where the company’s employees live.

“The increase in affordable housing in our region is something that will benefit our team members, their families and many of our neighbors as well,” Bothun said. “We cannot wait to see how this incredible project transforms this neighborhood and this community.”

In addition to housing, the project will include a community park, with seating, spaces for food trucks, a bike path and playground. 

Tara Yang, management consultant with the Ashwaubenon nonprofit Wello, said the development also includes an urban farm that will be made possible thanks to partnerships among local farmers, community organizations and cultural leaders. She said the new neighborhood will help the Green Bay community thrive.

“It represents potential — potential for expanding housing opportunities, creating accessible parks and building bridges between communities,” she said. “It’s about ensuring that everyone — regardless of the background — has access to the resources, connections and opportunities.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

‘A brand new neighborhood’: Green Bay sets stage for largest-ever housing development is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

For the past 14 years, Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District has voted reliably Republican. This year’s election could test whether it’s also reliably in the corner of former President Donald Trump.

There are three GOP candidates vying for the seat — state Sen. André Jacque, former state Sen. Roger Roth and businessman Tony Wied. Each has presented himself as a different brand of Republican than former U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher, who resigned earlier this year. But only Wied, a political newcomer, received Trump’s endorsement. 

Republican voters in the district took notice when the former president chimed in. For Green Bay resident Matthew Belekevich, it sealed the deal. He said he supports Wied because of Trump.

“I trust his judgment,” Belekevich said of Trump. “If he endorses somebody, then trust the judgment.”

Not everyone feels the same way. Lloyd Miller, a member of the Connected in Christ Green Bay area faith group, said Trump’s endorsement shouldn’t be a factor.

“That isn’t what I’m buying,” said Miller, who supports Roth in the primary. “I’m buying what they’re gonna do, not who supported them.”

The Cook Political Report rates the 8th Congressional District “solid Republican.” In fact, Gallagher never received less than 60 percent of the vote in any general election.

“It’s quite possible that the person who emerges from the Republican primary will be the person who represents the district,” said Aaron Weinschenk, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

But Trump endorsements across the country have largely been seen as a double-edged sword, said Weinschenk.

“Trump endorsements are helpful to Republicans in primaries,” he said. “But then Trump-backed Republicans do worse in general elections.”

Who are the candidates?

Wied was virtually unknown in Wisconsin politics before Trump announced his endorsement in April.

Since then, he’s framed himself as a political outsider standing up to “career politicians” and has leaned into his experience running Dino Stop convenience stores. He’s also promoted himself as the most closely aligned with Trump, putting the former president’s endorsement on his yard signs.

“We have career politicians who are self-interested in a go along and get along situation,” he said in a phone interview with WPR. “I have a history in business of going line by line in our budgets, and we need to have people that are committed to the fate of our country.”

Roth has promoted himself as the most well-rounded candidate, citing his time in the Wisconsin Air National Guard, his business experience as a homebuilder and his time in the state Legislature, including a stint as Senate president. Roth is the nephew of former 8th District U.S. Rep. Toby Roth, who held the seat from 1979 to 1997. Roth ran for the 8th District in 2010 but failed to advance past the primary.

“I’m the one candidate that has small business experience, military experience and legislative experience,” Roth told WPR at a recent campaign event. “I can go to Washington and will, on day one, lead on those important issues, but time is of the essence.”

Jacque describes himself as a proven “conservative fighter” who has taken on the establishment and has leaned into conservative social issues, saying he’s “proudly pro-life.”

“My opponents might be better looking or have bigger wallets,” he told WPR after a July 25 debate. “But ultimately, I’m the guy that’s gonna stand by what he says and is willing to take on the establishment, as well as the special interests.”

Previous 8th District Republicans criticized Trump

Jacque, Roth and Wied all wholeheartedly support Trump. That’s to be expected in most 2024 Republican primaries. But Republicans who previously held the 8th District over the last 14 years clashed with Trump at times, sometimes forcefully.

Former U.S. Rep. Reid Ribble, who held the seat from 2011 to 2017, has been an outspoken Trump critic since 2016 when he warned that Trump had done lasting damage to the Republican Party. Earlier this year, he lashed out at both Trump and his supporters, telling WPR they were “populists” and not true conservatives.

Gallagher, who retired this year after first being elected in 2016, voted in line with Trump almost 87 percent of the time when Trump was president. But he publicly criticized Trump during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. At the time, he called the riot “Banana Republic crap” and implored the former president to call it off.

Gallagher angered House Republicans earlier this year when he voted against impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the Biden administration’s handling of the southern border.

The GOP backlash was swift. While he did not mention Gallagher by name, fellow Wisconsin Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden said he was “shocked and disgusted” by the votes of his colleagues, and the Brown County Republican Party said it was “deeply concerned” by Gallagher’s actions. Just three days later, Gallagher announced he would not seek reelection.

It was an abrupt change of political fortunes for Gallagher, who was once seen as a rising star in his party. But his recent breaks from Trump tarnished him in the eyes of some GOP voters in the district.

“I didn’t think he voted the way I wanted him to on a lot of subjects,” said village of Bellevue resident Edward Simpson, a volunteer for Roth’s campaign. “He didn’t vote the way I expected him to.”

In 2024, GOP candidates take different approach

That split between Republican voters and Gallagher may have contributed to why all three GOP campaigns have been careful to avoid criticizing Trump. For example, they each released statements supportive of the former president when he was convicted of 34 felonies related to hush money payments he made to a porn star.

All three faced a Trump loyalty test of sorts during a July 19 debate, when the moderator asked all three to say whether they believed the 2020 election was stolen, a false claim repeated often by Trump.

Wied did not directly answer the question, and the moderator eventually cut his microphone. 

Roth said “no,” but said he did have issues with how the election was conducted.

Jacque responded with an emphatic “hell yes,” to the delight of the crowd.

A statewide canvas, partial recount, nonpartisan audit and multiple court decisions all showed that Trump lost Wisconsin to Joe Biden.

Beyond rehashing 2020, all three candidates have also referenced how they would work with Trump in office, particularly on immigration.

Wied has said he would help Trump’s mass immigrant deportation effort, advocated for bringing back the pandemic-era “Remain in Mexico” policy and described himself as Trump’s hand-picked candidate.

Roth said he visited the southern border with former Trump administration officials and said he would go to Congress to “reinstitute the policies of the Trump administration.”

And Jacque has called for Congress to impeach the homeland security secretary again following the assassination attempt on the former president. He also accused some in the media of what he called “Trump derangement syndrome.”

When it comes to the economy, all three candidates said they would work to reduce federal government spending in order to reduce inflation. 

Wied pledged to go through the federal budget “line by line” and also proposed “completely eliminating” some federal agencies, including the Department of Education.

“Our agencies are completely bloated,” he said. “I think we can cut each of them and cut spending in half.”

Roth said he would support working to rescind some of the unspent federal money from the American Rescue Plan Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.

“These are monies that have been allocated that haven’t been spent yet,” he said. “Let’s pull those out.”

Jacque said he would advocate for “zero-based budgeting,” a method where all expenses must be justified and approved for a specific budget period. In response to a question about interest rates, he also said he supports ending the Federal Reserve.

“We need to starve the beast, and the beast is government,” he said.

‘Don’t count Democrats out completely’

Given the makeup of the 8th District, whoever emerges from the GOP primary will have a built-in advantage. Trump himself received about 57 percent of the vote in the district in 2020.

All of the candidates are running for both a general and special election for the seat. The special election will allow whoever wins in November to finish Gallagher’s term in Congress.

The winner of the primary will face Democrat Kristin Lyerly, an OB-GYN and outspoken abortion rights advocate who is vying to be the first woman elected to the district. At a July town hall in Appleton, she told WPR she will continue to fight for abortion rights because she believes those decisions should be made between patients and doctors, not politicians.

Lyerly said the three Republican candidates are all “very different” and she’s excited to get through the primary to see who her opponent in November will be.

“Between now and then, we’re really focusing on what we can do and getting to places where Democrats haven’t been in the past,” Lyerly said.

Lyerly will offer a sharp contrast to the primary winner. All three GOP candidates describe themselves as “pro-life,” or anti-abortion. Wied and Roth both framed abortion as a state issue, while Jacque has indicated he’s open to cutting “federal subsidies” for abortions.

Weinschenk, at UW-Green Bay, said abortion is one issue where Democrats may have a leg up on Republicans, especially in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade. 

“Don’t count Democrats out completely,” Weinschenk said. “I mean, it depends on the issues, and a lot can change.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

GOP primary in 8th Congressional District puts Trump endorsement to test is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

High school sophomore McCartney Schwab spreads several dishes on a counter, scooping ice cream into each.

It’s her third summer working at Wilson’s Restaurant & Ice Cream Parlor in Door County’s village of Ephraim, which sits along Eagle Harbor on the eastern side of the bay of Green Bay.

Schwab said her co-workers, boss and passion for making ice cream sundaes are what keeps her coming back — but making some extra cash doesn’t hurt either.

“I’ve been able to save a lot of money,” she said. “It’s helped me pay for gas when I go driving and have the independence to pay for my own food if I want to go out with friends.”

The ice cream parlor opened for the summer season earlier this month. Walking inside the century-old building is almost like stepping back in time. Teens take and prepare ice cream orders behind a counter as oldies music pours out of a jukebox that still plays records.

Each summer, Wilson’s hires about 70 seasonal employees. Of those, roughly 20 to 25 are high school aged, according to owner Sarah Martin.

Martin, a former first grade teacher, said she loves giving teens their first job experience, helping them gain skills they’ll use later in life.

“A lot of people ask if I miss teaching, and I’m like, ‘I really don’t feel that far removed from it,’” she said. “It’s just a different type of teaching. Sometimes I feel more like the principal. I have to call parents and stuff like that in certain situations.”

More than 35,000 14- and 15-year-olds join the state’s workforce each year, according to work permit data from the state Department of Workforce Development. May and June are traditionally the months the department issues the most permits each year. Those months last year accounted for about 39% of all permits.

Wisconsin’s older teens, 16- to 19-year-olds, are also working or seeking jobs at higher rates than their peers nationally. Among that age group, DWD says 55.3% are either working or looking for work. That’s more than 18% higher than the national average.

Even as teens have taken an increasingly important role in the state economy, some states, including Wisconsin, have tried to pass legislation critics say rolls back child labor protections. In 2023, Wisconsin Republicans introduced a bill to eliminate work permits for 14- and 15-year-olds. This year, they passed the bill on a party-line vote, but Democratic Gov. Tony Evers vetoed it.

Many of the teens joining Wisconsin’s labor force this summer will likely be working in restaurants. An estimated 1 in 3 Americans’ first job was in a restaurant, said Susan Quam, executive vice president of the Wisconsin Restaurant Association.

That’s why the association works with its member businesses to give them the resources to be good mentors to teens and comply with state and federal child labor laws, Quam said.

“We’re a place where kids learn those soft skills — how to show up on time, how to take care of a uniform, all those different entry level skills — so we want to make sure that we provide that safe space for them,” she said.

Child labor concerns aren’t just a thing of the past

Child labor was widespread in America during the Industrial Revolution. In the 1800s, it was common for children as young as 10 to work in factories, mines and farms. They often worked long hours in hazardous conditions for low wages.

In the early 1900s, efforts to regulate child labor began to gain momentum, culminating in the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938. The law, signed by President Franklin Roosevelt, prohibited children under 14 from working in most industries, capped work days at three hours on school days until a teen turns 16, and prohibited hazardous work until 18 for most industries.

Even with more regulations than in past centuries, safety concerns around child labor today aren’t just a remnant of a bygone era. Last summer, Wisconsin made national headlines when a 16-year-old died from injuries sustained working at a northern Wisconsin sawmill. In September, the company was ordered to pay nearly $200,000 in fines for federal child labor violations.

From 2018 to 2022, Wisconsin had the second-most federal child labor law violations among its neighbors, averaging 99 per year, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor. Illinois averaged 52.8 violations per year, Michigan averaged 260.4 and Minnesota averaged 39.6.

During that same period, the U.S. Department of Labor saw a 69% increase in children being illegally employed nationally. Last February, the agency announced new efforts to boost enforcement.

After trending downward from 2016 to 2018, state-level child labor complaints have been up in recent years, but remain lower than they were in 2015, according to DWD data. 

The state received 96 complaints in 2015, 49 in 2016, 32 in 2017, 18 in 2018, 25 in 2019 and 2020, 42 in 2021, 80 in 2022, and 62 last year. So far this year, DWD has received 15 complaints.

Matthew White, director of the Bureau of Investigations at DWD’s Equal Rights Division, said more companies are hiring teens due to the structural labor shortage in Wisconsin. The state has had more job openings than job seekers since 2021, and its unemployment rate has remained near record lows for more than a year.

“As you see the baby boomers retire, that importance isn’t diminished,” White said. “It is a critical issue, and it speaks to why we need to focus on making sure that the workplace is safe for teens.”

White said not every complaint means an employer was violating state child labor regulations. He attributed the rise since 2019 to the department becoming more aggressive in getting anonymous complaints, taking referrals from other agencies and looking for opportunities to do more outreach and have more discussion with employers.

Bill removing work permits for teens blocked in Wisconsin

In his veto message of the bill that would have removed work permits for 14- and 15-year-olds, Gov. Evers said he objected to “eliminating a process that ensures our kids are protected from employers that may exploit youth and inexperience or subject children to hazardous or illegal working conditions.” 

But the bill’s supporters argued it would have sped up hiring by cutting red tape and making it easier for kids to work, without repealing workplace safety or school attendance standards.

“If a teenager wants a job, they should be able to apply to a job and start working,” said state Rep. Clint Moses, R-Menomonie, in testimony for a hearing on the bill. “They shouldn’t need approval by their school and state to obtain a job.”

Critics, like the state AFL-CIO labor organization, said the change would remove important oversight.

“What has happened in Wisconsin is unfortunately part of a larger trend across the nation to roll back child labor laws,” said Stephanie Bloomingdale, president for the Wisconsin AFL-CIO. “We need to make sure that we are protecting our kids.”

While the proposal had backing from the National Federation of Independent Business and  Wisconsin Independent Businesses Inc., not all business groups were unanimous in their support. The Wisconsin Restaurant Association took a neutral lobbying position on the work permit bill. 

Quam said the 2017 law repealing work permits for 16- and 17-year-olds, signed into law by Republican former Gov. Scott Walker, has streamlined hiring. But restaurants feared the bill for younger teens would have exposed them to legal liability.

She said younger teen workers are subject to strict federal restrictions on the hours they can work and the equipment they can use, whereas 16- and 17-year-olds are less limited. The work permit process for 14- and 15-year-olds, she said, helps protect restaurants because it ensures parents and employers review the restrictions they need to follow.

“We just had concerns that it was going to take away a safeguard for everybody,” she said.

Beyond the educational component of the permit process, part of the revenue generated by work permits has paid for one full-time equal rights officer, tasked with investigating labor law violations. White says the DWD has three full-time officials investigating those violations.

Summer hiring a mixed bag

Employers across the state are in the midst of hiring their workforce for the summer tourism months. 

In the restaurant industry, overall recruitment was better this year than last year, Quam said. Restaurants hope the better recruitment environment continues as they ramp up in May and June, with the goal of being fully staffed by the July 4 holiday.

“Everybody’s still scrambling pretty hard to find and fill their summer workforce,” Quam said. “Even with the great (labor force) participation rate compared to the country, it’s still not meeting the needs we have in our tourism months.”

At Wilson’s Restaurant & Ice Cream Parlor, Martin said hiring has been a challenge in recent years. But this year, she had recruitment help from her two teenage sons who are working at the business and have enlisted their friends.

“The last few years have definitely been more challenging than they were in the past,” she said. “This year, I feel pretty lucky.”

For her youngest son, Chase, it’ll be his first summer working at the ice cream parlor. He said he’s excited to help after growing up around the business.

“It’s gonna be fun,” he said. “A couple of my friends are working here, too.”

While some have had an easier time with hiring this year, finding summer talent is still a challenge for many Northwoods businesses, said Krystal Westfahl, president and chief executive of the Let’s Minocqua Visitors Bureau. 

“It seems that we are losing people from the workforce faster than we’re gaining them,” she said. “As a tourism destination, we need a lot of summer help.”

Stevens Point job fair tries to address area workforce needs

At an April job fair hosted by the Boys & Girls Club of Portage County, tables filled a gymnasium at the club’s facility. Students between 12 and 18 roamed the room, stopping to speak with employers.

High school junior Eden Ewton attended the career fair, looking for job shadowing and volunteering opportunities. Last summer, she worked in a summer camp kitchen. She said she wanted to get hands-on experience that would prepare her for a possible career working with animals.

“In a perfect world, I would want to volunteer (or) job shadow at an animal rehab facility,” she said. “The Humane Society also sounds interesting.”

Kevin Quevillon, CEO of the Boys & Girls Club of Portage County, said this year’s event was the third job fair the club has hosted. The idea was developed based on feedback from the region’s business community.

“We, as a youth organization, really need to prepare kids for the workforce more and maybe better,” Quevillon said. “We heard that loud and clear.”

Beyond the career fairs, the club also offers job training and interview preparation to local high school students, as well as job opportunities to area teens and University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point students, Quevillon said.

At the job fair, Nick Ockwig, human resource manager at Holiday Inn Hotel and Convention Center in Stevens Point, said his company only hires people 16 or older, but has a variety of openings in the summer tourism season.

Ockwig said he always hopes to find workers who have a good work ethic and who may find a career in the hospitality industry, but it can often be hit or miss.

“You hope you find the right one, but it’s like that with adults, too,” he said. “That doesn’t mean just because you’re an adult, you’re gonna do the right job or do the right thing.”

Students weigh in on the value of work

Teens and employers say work experience is important for both teens’ development and local communities’ economic health. 

Schwab at Wilson’s in Door County said she’s learned valuable life lessons while spending her summers working.

“I feel like it’s important to work,” she said. “It helps you build communication skills, and it can help you earn some money for what you do later in life.”

Having a job can also provide social benefits, said 14-year-old Marin Gransee. It’s Gransee’s first summer at Wilson’s, but she previously helped out at a separate Door County restaurant owned by her family.

“I’ve always liked working. I don’t like just sitting around,” Gransee said. “It’s more fun just doing stuff and being with people. I’m pretty social, so I find it actually really fun.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

Amid debate about child labor rules, Wisconsin teens take summer jobs is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Like many communities across the country, Green Bay has been struggling with a shortage of affordable housing. A new, federally funded development on the city’s east side hopes to help.

Senior Advisor to the President Tom Perez visited the development Thursday to see those federal funds in action. He was joined by Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich and United Way of Brown County CEO Robyn Davis.

Together, they toured City East Center, a three-story affordable housing project that broke ground last August.

According to the city, the more than $10 million project is funded, in part, through the American Rescue Plan Act, or ARPA, and a $1 million federal grant. City East Center is being built on previously vacant land that was owned by the city. 

It includes 43 apartments, 36 of which will be for households earning less than 60 percent of the area’s median income. The local United Way will occupy the first floor and serve as a community gathering space.

“This is partnership in action,” Perez said. “This is people’s taxpayer dollars being put to good use to enable 43 families to have remarkably wonderful housing and support services that are literally right in their building.”

Officials said they anticipate the construction project to be done by the end of July. Rental applications are already open.

Davis said the City East Center will become the cornerstone for United Way of Brown County’s Thriving Neighborhood Initiative, aimed at strengthening the community. 

“Place matters, and being in the community with the community that we serve is of paramount importance to our mission,” Davis said. “It will create a new collaborative space to bring services, programming and resources to both City East residents and the residents of the surrounding neighborhood.”

While local officials expressed optimism that the project would help address the city’s affordable housing shortage, the Republican Party of Brown County criticized the project.

In a statement, county Republicans blamed inflation for why Green Bay residents struggle to find affordable housing, saying prices have skyrocketed under the Biden administration.

“The federal government’s out-of-control deficits have fueled this destructive inflation, and yet Biden and the partisan Democrat mayor of Green Bay believe we are gullible enough to celebrate their federally funded ‘solution’ to their federally funded problem,” the Brown County GOP said in a statement.

Landlords have said inflation has contributed to rising rents, but Green Bay has been struggling with an affordable housing shortage for years.

A 2020 housing market study commissioned by the city found Green Bay needed between 3,314 and 7,441 rental units and between 4,052 and 9,098 owner-occupied units by 2040 to keep up with demand.

And the issue isn’t exclusive to Green Bay. Developers and housing advocates have said Wisconsin didn’t build enough housing units following the 2008 Great Recession. 

The state needs to build at least 140,000 housing units by 2030 to keep pace with current demand and 227,000 units if Wisconsin hopes to grow its working-age population, according to a 2023 report by Forward Analytics, the research arm of the Wisconsin Counties Association.

Genrich called the City East Center “one of the most exciting developments” in Green Bay. He said it wouldn’t be possible without partnerships with local nonprofits, as well as the state and federal government. 

He added the city received nearly $24 million in ARPA funding, which has helped pay for an array of projects in the city. 

“For the project just behind us, there’s an ARPA loan in there that really got us over the top. There’s low-income housing tax credits that were critical to making this project possible in the first place,” Genrich said. “It just required a ton of work, thought and commitment to prioritizing affordable housing and quality living for our residents here.”

This story was originally published by WPR.

Federal funds help push Green Bay affordable housing project past finish line is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.