Month: November 2019

The Fond du Lac County Sheriff’s Office says a convicted child sex offender is moving to a new location in the county.  Sheriff Ryan Waldschmidt says 55 year old Jeffrey Abitz is moving Friday from the city of Fond du Lac to an apartment at N6221 County Highway K in the town of Empire.  Abitz is on extended supervision until 2027 for manufacture/delivery of heroin and possession of narcotic drugs.  He was convicted […]

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin election officials are refusing to name a handful of local clerks that testing showed may be vulnerable to cyberattacks.  The state Elections Commission asked all 2,700 local clerks to log into the state election system this summer. Commission staff in August said they detected five clerks using Windows XP. Microsoft stopped supporting Windows XP in 2014.  The Associated Press filed a records request seeking the clerks' names. […]

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Legislature's Republican-controlled budget committee has approved settling the first lawsuit under the GOP's lame-duck statutes.  Republicans passed legislation in December that forces Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul to get committee approval before settling lawsuits. Kaul has refused to discuss any cases with the committee, saying settlement negotiations are confidential.   But Kaul asked the committee on Thursday to sign off on a settlement with the owners and […]

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Attorney General Josh Kaul is trying to find ways to handle emergency detentions better, saying police are wasting time driving detainees to the only state hospital that will accept them.  Wisconsin police can lawfully take people who may pose a threat to themselves or others to a state treatment facility for holding.  Officers had taken such people to mental hospitals in Madison or Oshkosh. But in 2014 state […]

The Fond du Lac County Highway commissioner says work should be wrapping up soon on the biggest road construction of the season.   Work on Highway V and Pioneer Road  started in the spring with utility work, with actual road reconstruction starting in late June.  "Right now there going to do some of the side roads and get the first layer done on that.  The goal is to hopefully button that project […]

Recent discussion about the Fond du Lac Lakeside Park pavilion has raised interest about a little known plan that was first discussed more than a decade ago, but never officially made public,  to build a  Marine Center at the park.   The idea was the brainchild of Fond du Lac native and retired UW-Fond du Lac English professor Ellen Balthazor.   Balthazor says she wanted to do something to honor the memory of her twin […]

The Waupun School Board has approved a 2020 budget that includes a slight drop in the tax levy.    School District administrator Steve Hill says the budget includes a 35 cent decline in the mill rate to $9.33 per  thousand of assessed value.  Hill says  there are several factors including a $973,000 increase in state aid.  "The state budget gave more funds to school districts which helps out the local property taxes,"   Hill told […]

RICHLAND CENTER, Wis. (AP) — Richland Center's police chief has been charged with sexually assaulting a bartender and stealing her tips.  Chief Lucas Clements faces three counts of fourth-degree sexual assault and theft. A criminal complaint says Clements groped the female bartender multiple times at the unnamed bar last June. The bartender told state investigators Clements appeared drunk when he arrived and she served him three drinks before he groped her […]