7/26/2024

LANSING - According to a press release yesterday, the Michigan Corrections Organization has received no response from Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s office weeks after submitting a request for assistance from the National Guard to address staff shortages in correctional facilities.  On July 3, MCO President Byron Osborn sent a letter to Governor Whitmer requesting that she authorize the Michigan National Guard to provide assistance to short-staffed prisons. Osborn said in the letter he described how corrections officers are being forced to work exhaustive amounts of mandatory overtime and how the prisons are being operated with unsafe officer-to-prisoner ratios.  The MCO said 13 of the 26 state prisons are operating with officer vacancy rates greater than 18%. The Marquette Branch Prison and the Baraga Correctional Facility are both seeing staffing levels down by more than a third.

7/26/2024

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A group of legislators, farmers and conservationists studying how to manage Wisconsin's sandhill crane population is set to hold its first meeting next month. The Joint Legislative Council's 12-member Study Committee on Sandhill Cranes is set to meet Aug. 1 at the Horicon Marsh State Wildlife Area and hear presentations by a state bird ecologist and an International Crane Foundation director. The council puts together committees to study issues every even-numbered year. The sandhill crane committee will eventually recommend legislation to manage the crane population and reduce crop damage the cranes cause. Options could include seeking federal approval for a hunting season.

7/25/2024

HURLEY – The Iron County Finance Committee Makes a Decision About what to do with Remaining ARPA Funds. Members voted to spend the remaining funds the county received from the American Rescue Plan Act on items already worked into the budget for the current fiscal year in order to save those budgeted funds. The finance committee is an arm of the Iron County Board of Supervisors and has been working to streamline the county’s current and pending budgets. Department heads are being asked for suggestions for expenditure. The total remaining ARPA funds come to around $70,000.