$245,164
Total combined donations raised by the five Democratic candidates in the primary for Assembly District 76, which represents the isthmus and near-east Madison. Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford, who raised $108,640 ahead of the primary, won the nomination by about 500 votes. She’ll face Nina Chat, a Republican who has raised much less, in November.
‘This is not a time for political laryngitis’
— The Rev. Al Sharpton, joined by Attorney Ben Crump and others while speaking ahead of Corey Ruiz’s funeral on Aug. 14 at the Fountain of Life Covenant Church. Sharpton urged elected leaders to speak up about Ruiz’s killing, lent his support to activists, and offered to ‘help kick some hell up in this town’ despite a recent knee replacement.
3,796
Unofficially, the number of votes statewide separating David Crowley and Francesca Hong in a nailbiter of a Democratic primary, out of a total 792,009 votes cast for seven different candidates. At a campaign night watch party at Atwood Music Hall, Hong thanked and praised those who had helped build a ‘multipartisan, multiracial, working-class movement;’ she’s since helped Crowley campaign.
‘This amounts to having a champagne taste but utilizing a beer budget’
— Ald. Joann Pritchett, the lone vote against two public art projects at an Aug. 4 council meeting. Pritchett objected to spending on designs from non-Madison artists. At the State Street Campus Ramp there will be sculptures of giant American robins and their blue eggs; at the South Point Public Works Facility, five blue glass birds will ‘skim the water.’
$5.8 million
Total cost for civil engineers to develop a new master plan for the Dane County Airport, which hasn’t had an update in more than three decades. However; the county’s expecting to only pay a small fraction of the expense; the rest is expected to be covered by grants from the FAA.
2036
Year when Chris Taylor’s term on the Wisconsin Supreme Court will expire; the former state representative and county judge had her formal investiture on Aug. 14. Wisconsin Supreme Court justices serve 10 years at a time, and are elected by voters in a ‘nonpartisan’ election, whereas U.S. Supreme Court justices are nominated by the president, confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and serve for life.
‘I wanted to see if fake polls could really penetrate the ecosystem that easily.’
— Rahil Prakash, the 21-year-old behind fake polling firm Median Strategies, speaking to The Guardian after the website closed shop. The ‘social experiment’ had published fake polling data for Wisconsin’s primary for governor and showed Rep. Hong more than 20 points ahead. Still no word on Wedgewood Polls, another mysterious polling operation that has no staff publicly identified. Its website is seemingly obsessed with gazebos, which it says are ‘the original public square.’
78%
Percent of registered voters who say the costs of data centers outweigh the benefits, according to a Marquette Law School poll conducted in the week following the Aug. 11 primary. Opposition has grown since last October, when this number was at 55%.
