Mar
13
Whitewater Police Department to Apply for Federal Grant
March 13, 2020 | Leave a Comment
On March 3, 2020, Whitewater Chief of Police Aaron Raap and Deputy Chief Dan Meyer approached the Whitewater City Council to asked and received permission to apply for a federal grant that would provide them with the opportunity to hire an additional School Resource Officer.
As of right now, the Whitewater Police Department have only one School Resource Officer (SRO) who is responsible for handling law enforcement response, education and liaison for the 1,939 students within the 5 Whitewater schools.
The biggest reason for the Whitewater law enforcement wanting to apply for the 2020 COPS Hiring Program Grant (CHP), is because school-related calls for service has increased by 58.3% from 2017 to 2019. Additionally, the total law enforcement cases created by those calls for service increased 46.3% in 2017 to 2019.
The increase in calls for service and cases handled has forced the one SRO officer to switch from a proactive role to a reactive role. These calls have “subsequently limited our SRO’s ability to focus on proactive duties including education, youth engagement, training related to active threat assessment and response and development of school safety plans.” (Common Council Agenda 1).
When asked by City Council President, Patrick Singer, what has caused the increase in calls, Deputy Meyer said that they, “don’t have a good answer other than a much greater need for services.”
If the Whitewater Police Department was able to receive grant funding, the department will utilize the monetary support to fund a second SRO position within the department. One SRO would be assigned to the Whitewater High School, with the second SRO being assigned to duties related to the Whitewater Middle School and three elementary schools. By hiring the second SRO, each resource officer would be able to focus on the specific needs of the students and staff in the facility assigned to them.
In terms of a financial impact, the grant, if received, “would provide up to 75% of funding of the approved entry-level salaries and fringe benefits of each newly hired and/or rehired full-time sworn career law enforcement officer over the three-year awayrd period with a minimum of 25% local cash match requirement and a maximum federal share of $125,000 per officer position.” (City Council Agenda 2). This means that that first three years of salary, based on a salary of $100,000, would be covered by the grant with the last year having to be paid for by Whitewater.
However, the CHP grant does stipulate that all award recipients must retain any CHP-funded officer must retain officer positions for at least 12 months immediately after the 36 months of federal funding has ended for each position.
Aside from safety increase, one of the major benefits of having a second SRO officer is that it would allow for the fostering and developing of positive relationships with the students. Chief Rapp said, “If the only time they get to talk to the SRO is when they are in trouble, they will develop a negative association with police, which is not what we want.” With only one SRO officer, there is very little time for proactive types of interactions. To have the addition of a second SRO, they would be able to “drastically improve the ability to have the positive contacts wanted.” (Whitewater PD School Resource Officer (SRO) Program Overview 1).
Once the officers were done stating their case in front of the Whitewater Common Council, Common Council President Patrick Singer said, “If there was ever a time to apply for a grant, it’s now.” The vote followed immediately after, with a unanimous decision in favor of applying for the grant.
Oct
20
Ariana Grande and Pete Davidson Split?!?
October 20, 2018 | Leave a Comment
Oct
4
Lady Eagles Set to Defeat Breast Cancer
October 4, 2018 | Leave a Comment
I have been to a lot of volleyball games over the years, but none of them ever compare to “Pink Night.” Never have I been to a volleyball game where the crowd is so excited, the food is so tasty, and the cause is so important.
“Pink Night,” which is put on by Jefferson High School in Jefferson, WI, is an annual event hosted by the Jefferson volleyball teams to help raise money in support of breast cancer awareness, with all proceeds going to the Fort Healthcare Mammogram Voucher Program.
The event, which occured on Tuesday, Oct. 2nd, brought in members from the Jefferson community and beyond, leading to bleachers full of people.
There is something very powerful about looking around a gymnasium and seeing the students, staff, and community members dressed in pink knowing that everyone is here fighting for the same cause.
Junior varsity player, Presley Biewer, said, “It’s just really special to play in such an important game that has such a good cause behind it.” Biewer, who despite only being a freshman, made the more prestige junior varsity team said this has been her favorite part of the season so far. “Just looking out into the crowd and knowing that this is more than just a game tonight is really a cool and inspiring thing.” Biewer said.
Biewer’s teammate, Aidyn Messman jumped in to say that, “the crowd was the reason we were so determined to win.” The junior varsity Lady Eagles won 2-3, beating out opponents Beloit Turner. Varsity also one their match against Beloit Turner in a final score of 3-0.
Cathy Crucius, an english teacher at Jefferson High School, was one of the many faculty members to make it out to the event. “It’s so great to see so many people come out and support not only our athletes, but the event as well,” Crucius stated, “I’m not really surprised by the turn out, however, breast cancer is something that affects so many of us, and although the cancer itself is such a negative thing, it gives us so many positive events that only bring us closer together.”
Crucius is right, breast cancer is something that affects a lot of people. Studies show that about one in eight women develop invasive breast cancer at some point in their life, with an estimated 266,120 new cases of breast cancer expected to be diagnosed in 2018 alone.
With stats like that it can be hard to look at the positive side of things, however with events like “Pink Night,” we are only moving in the right direction to one day end the battle of breast cancer.
The Lady Eagles promoting the event during Jefferson’s Gemütlichkeit parade
Fans cheering on their favorite player!
Sep
11
My Digital Self
September 11, 2018 | Leave a Comment
Do you remember where you were when you first heard Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards? How about you when you heard Michael Jackson had passed away? Did you even bat an eye when Britney Spears shaved off all of her hair?
As a journalism major, I like to stay up to date on all things news; national, international, state, you name it. As a self-proclaimed pop culture junky, I am not ashamed to say that I am mostly reading E!News, TMZ, and US Weekly, my favorite of the three of course being E!News.
E!News, short for Entertainment News, is the most reliable celebrity news site around.
Reliability is the most important thing to me when I am receiving information from a website, which is why I mostly just read TMZ for fun. Often times, I will check a celebrities social media before I believe what a website is telling me.
Originally started in 1987 as a service on TV that aired movie trailers, entertainment news, event and awards coverage, and interviews, E!News has become so much more, especially with the emergence of the internet.
Their website has a very nice layout and is easy to navigate, it is not hard to find what you originally came looking for. While E!News offers a variety of different medias to view their story, I prefer the old fashioned way of reading text. Sometimes I will scroll through photos, but I almost never view stories in the audio or video format.
I find that reading the story rather than viewing it allows me to consume the information at my own pace, which would be why a text format is my favorite way to receive news.
Instagram is my social media of choice, I do not use Twitter, and I hardly ever use Facebook. So, while Facebook and Twitter hardly ever lead me to news, Instagram often does.
One of the best things E!News has done is link up their Instagram with their website. As someone who receives a lot celebrity news straight from social media, the fact that I can click the photo on their Instagram and have it take me to the story is very convenient.
However, as much as I love E!News, sometimes I will just do a quick Google search for a specific celebrity I would like news on. As a big Taylor Swift fan, I do this often to make sure I am always up to date on everything Swift. Often times, when I find news this way, I just click the first link or whichever story I have not read yet.
When I was younger I used to comment a lot on posts about Taylor Swift with the desperate dream that she would see my comment defending her and immediately reach out and be my friend. In case you were wondering, that never happened.
While I do not post comments with the same agenda now, nor do I even really post comments, I do dabble in the occasional, “LEAVE TAYLOR SWIFT ALONE” comment (Que video of Chris Crocker defending Britney Spears circa 2007).
Aside from celebrity gossip blogs, I read a lot of travel, lifestyle, and fashion blogs. Zoe Sugg, better known for her online persona Zoella, is by far my favorite blogger. Her posts are always lighthearted and fun, all while keeping me in the loop about what is trending.