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Thursday, March 1, 2018 • Vol. 136, No. 32 • Stoughton, WI • ConnectStoughton.com • $1.25
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Wrestling
State title No. 49 Lewis wins at 120, four others reach podium ANTHONY IOZZO Assistant sports editor
BILL LIVICK Unified Newspaper Group
A couple that moved to Stoughton last year is interested in buying a cityowned building on Fourth Street known as the power plant, renovating it and opening a distillery. Abby and Nick Abramovich, along with their 18-month-old son Byron, came here last September from Peoria, Illinois, and noticed the abandoned power plant building overlooking the Yahara River. Both chemical engineers, the Abramoviches have been thinking about starting a small business and feel the city-owned power plant building has potential.
“We keep coming back to the brewing or distillery idea, because that’s what Nick likes doing a lot,” Abby Abramovich, who works in Madison as a project manager for DuPont, told the Hub. “We’ve seen the building a lot and thought it would work for us.” The couple worked for the food-processing company Archer Daniels Midland in Peoria for three years before moving to Stoughton. They live a few blocks south of Main Street, not far from the power plant. With its riverfront location, large open interior space and history, the building meets the couple’s needs for size and location, Abramovich said, adding it doesn’t appear that it would be too expensive to renovate.
Turn to Distillery/Page 16
City of Stoughton
Mandt Community Center ownership returned
Inside
Photo by Anthony Iozzo
Junior Hunter Lewis celebrates his 120-pound title Saturday in the WIAA Division 1 state individual wrestling meet. Lewis won a 1-0 decision over Hartland Arrowhead senior Dominic Dentinto to become the 49th champion in Stoughton High School history.
Board OKs teacher contract Most educators will receive 1.26 percent raise for this year
District will get a retroactive pay bump after the School Board ratified the district’s 2017-18 master contract with the Stoughton Education Association SCOTT DE LARUELLE (SEA) Monday night. The contract runs through June Unified Newspaper Group 30 of this year. Included in the contract Most educators in the Stoughton Area School is a 1.26 percent increase
Courier Hub
to base wages, retroactive to the beginning of the school year on July 1, 2017. Educators hired new to the district will not get the pay increase The contract also includes supplemental pay for the district’s four “professional levels” of educators. Minus the base wage
increase, those in the “Initial Professional” group will get $1,105, “Collaborative Professionals” will get $1,261, “Innovative Professionals” will receive $1,463 and “System Professionals” will get $1,664. Educators who opt out of the district’s
Turn to Contract/Page 12
Save on home equity loans, auto loans, and personal loans. Contact Sandy and Katelyn.
Founders pay off city loan BILL LIVICK Unified Newspaper Group
After two decades, ownership of the Mandt Community Center has been returned to the organization that built the facility. Mandt Community Center Inc. built the community center at 400 Mandt Pa r k w a y i n 1 9 9 3 a n d operated it for five years before encountering financial trouble paying its construction loan. In February 1998, the organization and the city entered an agreement in which the city took out an
$870,000 low-interest loan and assumed ownership of the building until the debt was paid. Mandt Community Center manager Bart Quale explained that MCCI and the city refinanced the initial loan in February 2008, which left the organization with a new bond total of $485,000. MCCI made its final payment on the loan Feb. 1, and on Feb. 13 the Common Council acknowledged that fact and returned the building to its rightful owners. The city continues to lease the land the center is on to MCCI.
Turn to Mandt/Page 16
Sandy Quam
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Katelyn Elsing Personal Banker NMLS #1404303
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Pages 9, 11
Powering a distillery New residents have idea for historic building
Stoughton wrestling crowned its 49th individual state champion Saturday at the WIAA Division 1 individual state wrestling championships. The Vikings added two-runner-up finishes, a fifth-place and a sixth-place at the 75th annual meet, which started Thursday at the UW Fieldhouse. And there’s more to come – team state is this weekend. Saturday, Junior Hunter Lewis claimed the 120-pound title with a 1-0 win over second-ranked Hartland Arrowhead senior Dominic Dentino, and senior Tyler Dow (160) and sophomore Braeden Whitehead (126) both lost matches in the final to finish runner-up. Senior Aodan Marshall took fifth as a heavyweight, and freshman Brooks Empey took sixth. Junior Luke Geister-Jones also competed at state. The Vikings now have 11 medalists out of 12 state qualifiers in the past two seasons, including three champions and five runner-up finishes. The WIAA Division 1 team state tournament is Friday and Saturday, March 2-3, at the UW Fieldhouse. The Vikings earned the No. 3 seed and open at 5:30 p.m. Friday against Marshfield. The winner of that match takes on the winner of No. 2 Kaukauna and Mukwonago. Stoughton has finished runner-up for three straight seasons.
More photos and information on the 75th annual individual state wrestling meet
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