W A S H B U R N C O U N T Y
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INSIDE
Feb. 11, 2015
Wednesday, February 11, 2015 Vol. 126, No. 26 • Shell Lake, Wis.
We e ke nd w atch • Community Valentine’s Day Dance @ Shell Lake • Cabaret @ Shell Lake Arts Center • See calendar on page 6 for details
75¢
“A Recipe For Love”
Love in any language Page 8
Turkey call maker honored Page 9
Gracen Zaloudek received a kiss from her mother and aunt after their performance of Harry Connick Jr.’s classic “A Recipe For Love,” at the 10th-annual Valentine Vignette benefit concert held Sunday, Feb. 8, at Spooner Wesleyan Church. Shown (L to R): April Becker, Gracen Zaloudek and Julie Zaloudek. See story and more photos on page 2. - Photo by Larry Samson
A trickle-down effect Federal security mandates effect on local law enforcement
A roundup of prep sports Pages 10-12
BREAKERS
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MADISON - Public school officials are expressing concerns about a possible $127 million cut in state funding. Gov. Scott Walker proposed a $150-per-student cut in state aid for the first year of his proposed twoyear budget. Dan Rossmiller is the government relations director at the Wisconsin Association of School Boards. He said the reduction is significant enough to be felt statewide. “If you look at the two-year budget, it’s relatively flat but if you look at the first year of the budget there is a definite cut,” Rossmiller said. “There’s a $150-per-pupil cut to every district of the state. It’s a real cut that cannot be made up by going to property taxes without a referendum.” Rossmiller said the second year of the budget would increase spending by $165 per student. However, the School Administrators Alliance estimates that would still result in a net loss of $135 in aid per student over the course of the biennium. Walker has said he would be willing to add more money for public education to the budget if more money becomes available and as long as his proposed property tax cut is preserved. - Kirsten Durst, WPR News
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Danielle H. Moe | Staff writer SHELL LAKE — Being able to communicate and access information is an ability often taken for granted by many Americans. The options are nearly endless to how people can access information and communicate with others, through their cell phones, tablets and personal computers. For law enforcement communications have upgraded along with technology, but not nearly as quickly. In the state of Wisconsin, law enforcement agencies are addressing a new mandate that will effectively cut off their form of communication with the state and federal Departments of Justice. “Anybody that’s on the state system right now that accesses the state system, just like we do, in this state, has to change and there’s a lot of them,” said Washburn County Sheriff Terry Dryden. All tickets, crash reports and information searches conducted by law enforcement are done on a computer inside a squad vehicle. Depending on the department, the system used to send or look up information from the state uses either the Mobile Data Browser or the Wisconsin Mobile Data Communication Network. The Washburn County Sheriff’s Office uses the system Mobile Data Browser, which uses two radio antennas on the back of each squad and allows officers to access and send information to the state. They are also responsible for maintaining the 911 or dispatch communications line. The problem is that the Criminal Justice Information Services, a division of the Federal Bureau of Investigations, has determined that the MDB technology doesn’t, “meet the specific advanced authentication requirements set by the CJIS security policies for reliable, mobile access to the DOJ system.” As of Dec. 31, 2015, the Wisconsin State Patrol will be discontinuing the use of both systems. The Wisconsin State Patrol has already switched to the new MACH system. In a memo sent to all law enforcement agencies still using either of the old systems, the WSP suggests that they to convert, at their own expense, to a new system that is encryption enabled, the Mobile Architecture for Communications software, or MACH. “Once this is installed, the deputies will be using the Internet wirelessly, from their squad
A Wisconsin State Patrol officer uses a laptop inside a squad to complete a report. — Photo from WSP car, to talk to the state of Wisconsin via encryption, so nobody can get into it,” explained Dryden. The cost for the switch to the MACH system for the sheriff’s office is $20,000. That covers updating all 10 squads to the MACH system, but that doesn’t include the reoccurring monthly fee for each squad car to have a wireless card. “The card is in a modem, and then when the modem is activated the information goes out just kind of like what your cell phone does,” explained Dryden. He said the change will entail removing two existing antennas and radios on each squad and installing a modem that houses the wireless card. Like the sheriff’s office, the Shell Lake Police Department and the Spooner Police Department will be affected by this, too. Dave Wilson, chief of the SLPD, explained that the department is using a different method to circumvent the need to update. “We use a wireless air card for our computer systems (in the squads) and because we have extremely good cell coverage in the city of Shell Lake we don’t have to worry about dead spots and nonconnectivity like they would have to in the county,” said Wilson. He said that comparing the systems used between the Shell Lake and Washburn County are like comparing different types of fruit. In Shell Lake’s case they will be
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See Federal security, page 3