Green Bay News

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – A Wisconsin laboratory confirms it was one of several that were mistakenly shipped live anthrax spores last week.

BBI Detection of Madison, which employs around 20 people, remains partially closed.

Jackie Lustig, a spokeswoman for Alere Inc., which operates BBI, says no employees have gotten sick and nobody is in danger. She also says there’s no danger to the public.

BBI makes technology for detecting biological threats, including anthrax detection kits.

The Army says it meant to send dead anthrax samples to 18 labs in nine states, but there may have been a failure in the technical process for killing them. While federal officials would not identify the non-government labs, they said four people at labs in Delaware, Texas and Wisconsin were advised to get antibiotics as a precaution.

HOUSTON (AP) – Floodwaters submerged highways and threatened homes Friday in Texas as another round of heavy rain added to the damage inflicted by storms that have killed at least 22 people and left 13 missing.

The line of thunderstorms that stalled over Dallas dropped as much as 7 more inches overnight. That rainfall contributed to another death early Friday, when firefighters in a Dallas suburb said a man drowned in his truck after it was swept into a culvert. Houston-area authorities confirmed the death of an 87-year-old man who was swept away when a boat attempting to rescue him from a bayou overturned. The man had previously been counted among the missing. His body was recovered from the Houston Ship Channel.

The rain also seeped into homes and stranded hundreds of drivers, many of whom lingered along highways that were nearly gridlocked from the high water and abandoned vehicles.

Fire rescue crews responded to about 260 calls that included trapped vehicles and accidents, authorities said.

Exacerbating the problem for first-responders are people who have been going around barricades to take pictures of the floodwaters, said Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins. He said those people are endangering themselves and stretching thin the first responders’ resources.

“Floodwaters are never safe to play around, take a picture around, walk around,” Jenkins said. “We don’t need any more loss of life.”

Jenkins also said he is considering issuing evacuation orders for Dallas-area neighborhoods depending on the latest flood projections.

The Colorado River in Wharton and the Brazos and San Jacinto rivers near Houston were the main focus of concern as floodwaters moved from North and Central Texas downstream toward the Gulf of Mexico.

Floodwater was creeping into neighborhoods in the suburban Houston city of Kingwood near the swollen San Jacinto River, where residents were keeping a close eye on water levels.

“Everybody’s worried about it,” James Simms said from his second-story balcony, looking down at a flood that had reached his garage. “Those people who are going to leave are already gone. There’s others like us who are going to wait until it’s mandatory.”

Teams continued to search through debris piles along rivers. Bodies found on Thursday raised the confirmed death toll to at least 26, including storm victims from Oklahoma.

The Brazos River, which had been receding, rose above flood stage again Friday in Parker County, west of Fort Worth, and was expected to climb higher with the planned opening of the flood gates at Possum Kingdom Lake upstream. People in about 250 homes near the river were asked to voluntarily evacuate.

With the water moving rapidly down the river, serious flooding was expected in the downstream communities of Simonton and Thompsons. Fort Bend County Sheriff Troy Nehls said some residents of Simonton had already been asked to leave.

Forecasters said the Colorado River at Wharton could crest on Saturday, causing major flooding in the community 60 miles southwest of Houston. Voluntary evacuations were underway in the city’s low-lying west side.

Emergency teams rescued a dozen people from flooded homes and stranded vehicles late Thursday in Johnson County south of Dallas.

By early Friday, crews had retrieved the 21 occupants of a houseboat that went adrift in Lake Travis in Austin.

This week’s record rainfall in Texas eased the state’s drought and swelled rivers and lakes to the point that they may not return to normal levels until July.

Just weeks ago, much of the state was parched with varying levels of drought. But the same drenching rainfall that paralyzed parts of Houston and swept away a vacation home with eight people inside also offered relief from a long dry spell.

Many cities were still in danger of flooding as heavy rain from earlier in the week poured downstream, pushing rivers over their banks.

“There’s so much water in Texas and Oklahoma that it’s going to take quite a while for those rivers to recede,” said Mark Wiley, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Fort Worth, Texas.

If normal amounts of precipitation return, rivers will probably drop to average levels by the Fourth of July, he said.

“Six months ago, we were dying for this stuff,” he said. “And now we’re saying, ‘Please, please stop.'”

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Lozano reported from Houston and Robbins from Wimberley.

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Associated Press journalists David Warren, Jamie Stengle and Terry Wallace in Dallas; John L. Mone in Wimberley; and Joshua Replogle in Houston contributed to this report.

NEW YORK (AP) — There’s a new bird’s eye view of New York City.

The One World Trade Center observatory officially opened to the public on Friday with a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Visitors will get a view of the city and its surroundings from above 1,250 feet, with sight lines stretching 50 miles past the Manhattan skyline and Statue of Liberty to the Atlantic Ocean.

The observatory takes up levels 100, 101, and 102 of the building, the nation’s tallest, at 1,776 feet. The main public viewing space is on the 100th floor, with restaurants on the 101st floor, and an event space on the 102nd floor.

Visitors reach the observatory via one of five elevators called ‘skypods’ that zip them to the observatory in 60 seconds. Along with a spectacular view, they will see a video called ‘Voices’ about those who built One WTC. There’s also a virtual time lapse that recreates the development of the New York City skyline and beyond from the 1600s to present day.

Those not fond of high elevations can walk on video screens that show the dizzying view below.

Tickets are $32 for adults and $26 for children ages 6 to 12 and $30 for seniors. Admission is free for family members of those who died on Sept. 11, as well as those who worked in the rescue and recovery.

Officials expect 3 million to 4 million visitors a year.

Tickets are available at the observatory ticket booth and online.

It looks scarier than it actually is.

The Wisconsin DNR shared a picture of a large wasp that is starting to appear in Wisconsin. It’s called a giant ichneumon.

They are large, native parasitic wasps with long tails that mean no harm to humans.

The DNR says their long tails are used to probe trees for woodborer larvae and not for stinging.

MADISON (AP) – The Legislature’s budget committee won’t finish its work on Friday as originally planned.

The Joint Finance Committee has delayed until next week decisions on a financing plan for a Milwaukee Bucks arena and highway funding. Both items were originally scheduled to be taken up Friday, but Republicans who control the Legislature have not been able to reach agreements on those issues.

The panel was meeting Friday on other topic, including funding of the University of Wisconsin and the Department of Natural Resources.

The committee plans to meet again on Tuesday to continue its work. Once completed in committee, the budget goes to the Senate and Assembly where more changes can be made.

Gov. Scott Walker can also rewrite the plan with his extensive veto power.

ZURICH (AP) – Sepp Blatter was re-elected as FIFA president for a fifth term on Friday, chosen to lead world soccer despite separate U.S. and Swiss criminal investigations into corruption.

The 209 FIFA member federations gave the 79-year-old Blatter another four-year term after Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan conceded defeat after losing 133-73 in the first round.

Prince Ali’s promise of a clean break from FIFA’s tarnished recent history was rejected despite the worst scandal in the organization’s 111-year history.

“I like you, I like my job,” Blatter said to cheering voters. “I am not perfect, nobody is perfect, but we will do a good job together I am sure.”

The election went ahead Friday after U.S. and Swiss federal investigations struck at the heart of Blatter’s “football family” this week. Two FIFA vice presidents and a recently elected FIFA executive committee member were still in custody Friday as the votes were counted.

Still, soccer leaders worldwide stayed loyal to their embattled president of 17 years, even though Prince Ali pushed the election to a second round by getting a surprising 73 votes.

Before the second round started, Prince Ali stood before the congress and conceded.

“I want to thank all of you who were brave enough to support me,” said the prince, who previously spoke of a culture of intimidation at FIFA. “It’s been a wonderful journey in terms of knowing you, working with you.”

Blatter has blamed others for bringing shame and humiliation on the sport. In a pre-election address to voters on Friday, Blatter said it was “impossible” for him and FIFA to “keep an eye” on everyone and be responsible for everything that happened in world soccer.

Blatter won despite calls for his resignation from UEFA president Michel Platini and others. Platini said Thursday that UEFA could pull out of FIFA and withdraw from the World Cup if Blatter was re-elected.

FIFA’s big-money sponsors have also called for change within FIFA. Visa warned Thursday that it could pull out of its contract, which is worth at least $25 million a year through 2022.

In what appeared to be warning to UEFA, Blatter pledged to change the representation of his influential executive committee, where Europe currently has eight of 25 voting members.

Platini sat still and did not clap during Blatter’s post-victory speech.

Blatter also said he would retain a 32-team World Cup and resist expanding what is FIFA’s cash cow.

The defeated 39-year-old prince was a FIFA vice president for the past four years with a close-up view of Blatter’s previous scandal-hit mandate.

Blatter was re-elected unopposed in 2011 after promising to fight corruption and support key investigations of the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bidding contests and a bribery scandal which removed his Qatari opponent from the presidential ballot.

Those probes were conducted in-house by FIFA’s own judicial bodies. The latest investigations promise deeper trouble for FIFA with federal law enforcement agencies delving into soccer’s affairs.

Raids on FIFA’s favorite luxury downtown Zurich hotel and its own headquarters were launched early Wednesday by Swiss police.

Senior FIFA officials were among seven men arrested at the request of American federal prosecutors investigating bribery, money-laundering and wire fraud. The 2018 and 2022 World Cups – awarded to Russia and Qatar, respectively – are the focus of a separate Swiss federal probe of suspected financial wrongdoing.

Last November, Blatter and FIFA filed a criminal complaint with the Swiss attorney general’s office against non-Swiss nationals.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – The Legislature’s budget committee won’t finish its work on Friday as originally planned.

The Joint Finance Committee has delayed until next week decisions on a financing plan for a Milwaukee Bucks arena and highway funding. Both items were originally scheduled to be taken up Friday, but Republicans who control the Legislature have not been able to reach agreements on those issues.

The panel was meeting Friday on other topic, including funding of the University of Wisconsin and the Department of Natural Resources.

The committee plans to meet again on Tuesday to continue its work. Once completed in committee, the budget goes to the Senate and Assembly where more changes can be made.

Gov. Scott Walker can also rewrite the plan with his extensive veto power.

Find a schedule of breakfasts on the farm across the state.

The DNR reminds drivers the dangers of deer-vehicle crashes as June approaches.

Wildlife officials say deer pose a huge hazard for motorists because of their size, speed and unpredictable nature.

Deer activity increases this time of year, as does look for places to give birth and the young deer separate from their mothers.

The DOT says in four of the last five years, June ranked as the worst or second worst month for motorist injuries from deer-related crashes.

Last year, state law agencies reported more than 18,000 deer crashes.Dane County was the highest with 863, while Shawano county came in second with 725.

The DOT says deer are the third most commonly hit object, behind other vehicles or a fixed object, such as a tree.

JUNEAU – A man who made a series of bomb threats – and then was discovered to be a sex offender refereeing prep sports events – was convicted of 13 counts Friday.

Aaron Schreiber will be sentenced Aug. 28 in Dodge County circuit court, according to online court records.

Schreiber entered Alford pleas Friday – in which he maintained his innocence but acknowledged there is enough evidence to convict of him – to these counts:

* three counts of being a child sex offender working with children,

* five counts of making a bomb scare,

* five counts of bail jumping.

A judge then found him guilty on those counts. And while another 26 counts from Dodge County were dismissed, he still faces cases in several other counties:

* Schreiber faces five counts in Fond du Lac County of being a sex offender working with children, plus one bomb scare count. An Aug. 4 plea and sentencing hearing is scheduled.

*  In Green Lake County, a June 22 status hearing is set on one bomb scare count, one working with children count, and one violate the sex offender reigstry count.

* A Walworth County, no dates are currently scheduled on a sex offender working with children count.

Schreiber allegedly made the threats to various businesses in the Waupun area in November of 2013, including calls to a school, a hospital and other businesses.  Authorities also say he is a registered sex offender and allegedly violated the sex offender registry, by refereeing school sporting events.

Schreiber’s referee license with the WIAA was revoked in 2013.

Submitted May 29, 2015, by Sherri Lindlbauer, who writes:

“Niagara flooding”

MADISON (AP) – Applicants for coaching jobs at the University of Wisconsin, and other positions, would no longer be subject to the open records law under a proposal slated to be approved by the Legislature’s budget-writing committee.

The proposal up for a vote Friday would limit the names of applicants that would have to be released publicly. The public would only have access to finalists “seriously considered for appointment” for the jobs of UW System president, vice presidents, chancellor and vice chancellors for each campus.

That would mean the public would no longer be able to see who has applied for jobs like football or basketball coach.

In December, after Gary Andersen left as football coach, The Associated Press used the open records law to report that 46 people applied to succeed him.

LAS VEGAS (AP) – The Nevada Supreme Court has overturned a $500,000 jury award to a man who alleged that he was groped in 1984 as a 13-year-old by a Catholic priest who had a history of sexual abuse in Wisconsin before being sent to Las Vegas.

An attorney for the man, now in his 40s, expressed shock Friday at the ruling that the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay didn’t have sufficient ties to Nevada to be held liable for the acts of John Patrick Feeney.

The lawyer, Jeffrey Anderson, calls the unanimous high court ruling a kick in the gut and a heartbreaker.

The man filed the civil suit in 2008 as John Doe 119.

Claims against Feeney, the Catholic Diocese of Reno-Las Vegas and the bishop in Nevada were dismissed before trial.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Former New Orleans Saints football player Darren Sharper has pleaded guilty to federal charges stemming from allegations he drugged and assaulted women in four states.

Sharper, wearing an orange jumpsuit while his hands and feet were shackled, pleaded guilty to three counts related to distributing drugs with intent to commit rape.

Under the plea agreement outlined Friday in a New Orleans courthouse, Sharper would serve nine years in prison.

The judge now has to decide whether to accept the plea agreement. The next hearing in the case is set for Aug. 20.

Sharper has already pleaded guilty or no contest to charges in Nevada, Arizona and California to similar charges.

Sharper was part of the New Orleans Saints’ 2010 Super Bowl victory. He began his career with the Green Bay Packers.

MADISON – The Legislature’s budget committee plans to approve a plan that would give the Neenah/Menasha Twin Trestles Project up to $1.6 million in state land stewardship money.

The cities of Neenah and Menasha plan to construct two pedestrian trestle bridges over the Fox River along with new trail connections to two existing trails, according to a motion from Republicans on the Joint Finance Committee. The project would create a 3.2-mile loop around Little Lake Butte des Morts and connect it with existing trails.

The state funding would cover up to half of the costs of the project.

The bridges would be built over the south branch of the Fox River and Neenah and across the north branch of the Fox River in Menasha.

The total project is expected to cost $3.2 million.

The funding is included in the budget plan for the state Department of Natural Resources. The Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee is expected to take a vote on the plan during a meeting Friday afternoon.

PORT WASHINGTON (AP) – TV actor Dustin Diamond says he didn’t intentionally stab a man in a barroom scuffle just outside of Milwaukee.

The 38-year-old Diamond, who played Screech in the 1990s show “Saved by the Bell,” is accused of stabbing a man on Christmas Day in Port Washington, about 25 miles north of Milwaukee. Diamond on Friday told a jury that he was trying to protect his girlfriend during a bar fight.

Diamond has pleaded not guilty to recklessly endangering public safety.

The man who was stabbed, 25-year-old Casey Smet, testified Thursday that he didn’t know he had been stabbed until he left the bar and was talking to police.

Diamond testified that he thinks Smet hurt himself when he grabbed Diamond.

If convicted, Diamond could face up to 10 years in prison.

MADISON (AP) — Republicans who control the Legislature’s powerful finance committee say they’ll reject Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to freeze state land purchases but accept his proposal to eliminate dozens of Department of Natural Resources employees, including more than half the researchers in the agency’s science bureau.

Walker’s fellow Republicans have long criticized the stewardship program. They maintain the program removes too much land from the tax rolls, closes off too much land from being used for hunting and fishing and has accumulated massive debt.

But Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, has said Walker’s proposal goes too far. It would place a moratorium on land purchases through the state’s stewardship program until its debt drops to $1 for every $8 spent since the program’s inception in 1989. The program won’t reach that ratio until 2028.

The finance committee planned to vote Friday or early Saturday on a wide-ranging motion affecting the DNR’s budget. Part of the motion calls for rejecting the governor’s plan but reducing the program’s borrowing authority to $33.2 million in each fiscal year until 2019-20 and scaling back its total bonding authority to $1.2 billion.

The bottom line is the program will be able to borrow less money to purchase land, in turn limiting acres purchased, but land buys could still take place.

The GOP reduced the program’s borrowing authority in the last state budget, too. That spending plan limited annual borrowing authority to $50 million until 2019-20 and total borrowing authority to $1.3 billion.

Walker’s budget also calls for eliminating 80 DNR positions, including 19 researchers from the agency’s science bureau and 11 natural resources educator positions. The reductions would leave the science bureau with about 18 researchers and the DNR with seven educators.

The Republicans’ motion would leave those position cuts untouched in the budget.

If the cuts survive in the budget’s final form — the full Legislature must still approve the spending plan — the agency could lose dozens of additional positions the budget doesn’t take into account. Under state law, before the DNR can lay off any permanent employees it must first eliminate limited-term, probationary and project workers who share the same job title. That means the agency potentially could be forced to eliminate 49 such research scientists and 41 such educators.

Opponents have warned the position reductions will hurt the DNR’s ability to make sound decisions based on science.

MADISON (AP) – Wisconsin Supreme Court members are continuing to disagree over how to run court.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports State Supreme Court Chief Justice Patience Roggensack has hired a temporary administrator to fill a job that has been vacant for nearly a year. Roggensack announced Thursday that J. Denis Moran, who served as court director for more than two decades, will begin next week.

But Justices Ann Walsh Bradley and N. Patrick Crooks contend Roggensack didn’t have the ability to hire Moran.

Roggensack wasn’t immediately available Friday morning to respond.

The court’s disputes have intensified since last month, when voters approved changing how the chief justice is selected. Conservatives on the court chose Roggensack to replace longtime Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson, who has sued to be reinstated.

BERLIN (AP) — The mystery of Swiss cheese and its disappearing holes has been solved: The milk’s too clean.

A Swiss agricultural institute discovered that tiny specks of hay are responsible for the famous holes in cheeses like Emmentaler or Appenzeller. As milk matures into cheese these “microscopically small hay particles” help create the holes in the traditional Swiss cheese varieties.

The government-funded Agroscope institute said in a statement Thursday that the transition from age-old milking methods in barns to fully-automated, industrial milking systems had caused holes to decline during the last 15 years.

In a series of tests, scientists added different amounts of hay dust to the milk and discovered it allowed them to regulate the number of holes.

MADISON — Gov. Scott Walker’s proposed $300 million budget cut to the University of Wisconsin System is slated to be voted on by the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee.

The UW cut up for a vote Friday is one of the most controversial pieces of Walker’s two-year state spending plan. Republicans who control the budget-writing committee have already said they won’t go along with Walker’s plan to give UW more independence from state laws and oversight.

That independence was designed to help UW deal with the budget cut. There’s been a bipartisan push to reduce the $300 million reduction, but it’s unclear how much of the money will be restored.

Walker’s budget also calls for continuing a tuition freeze for two years, making it harder for UW to plug a cut.

The budget committee meeting was scheduled to start at 10 a.m. Friday, but leaders say it’s been pushed back at least two hours while Democrats review motions from Republicans.

Other issues scheduled for votes Friday include funding for state highways, DNR staffing, the state’s land stewardship program and financing for a new Milwaukee arena.

FOX 11’s Andrew LaCombe is in Madison covering the budget debate. He’ll have the latest on FOX 11 News at Five and Nine with updates throughout the day on fox11online.com.