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The following program is a PBS Wisconsin original production.

Frederica Freyberg:

Wisconsin cities plea for more state funding. Despite the current cold, winters in the state become some of the fastest warming in the country and for some Wisconsinites, aid for Ukraine remains an emergency.

I’m Frederica Freyberg. Tonight on “Here & Now,” Racine mayor Cory Mason on the dire need for more local funding. We speak to one Wisconsinite whose work has raised tens of millions of dollars’ worth of aid for Ukraine and the next in our series of interviews with the state Supreme Court candidates with Judge Everett Mitchell. It’s “Here & Now” for February 3rd.

Announcer:

Funding for “Here & Now” is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.

Frederica Freyberg:

City mayors across the state are imploring legislative leaders to allocate more funding for municipalities known as shared revenue in the upcoming state budget. Racine Mayor Cory Mason says every year he’s told there’s no money but in a year when Wisconsin’s bank account is showing an historic $7.1 billion surplus, he now says now is the time to fund police and essential services. The mayor joins us now. Thanks for being here.

Cory Mason:

My pleasure, thanks for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:

We expect when he rolls out his two-year budget Governor Tony Evers will include his proposal of sending 20% of the state’s sales tax back to local communities for shared revenue. When you heard that proposal that he made in the State of the State address, what was your reaction?

Cory Mason:

Overwhelmingly positive. I mean, really, the governor’s shown some real leadership here. Just to put it in context for people though, we’ve had the state’s share of funds to local services, it’s been frozen for more than a decade. For the city of Racine, in real dollar terms, we get less than we did more than a decade ago and that makes it very difficult to maintain services when costs continue to rise. So the fact the governor committing that kind of a funding source, both in terms of its increase and then also its sustainable growth in the future, obviously myself and mayors all over the state were obviously very excited to hear about that.

Frederica Freyberg:

Have you done the math on that for the city of Racine? Do you have any kind of rough numbers what that mean or could mean?

Cory Mason:

That’s where the details will really come out because obviously there’s different levels of government have different ideas about how that increase would be but it would be about an additional half billion dollars that would go back to local governments. How that’s distributed through cities, villages, towns and counties is an ongoing conversation. What we do know though is, a generation ago about 12% of the state budget went back to local governments. Now it’s at 5% so we know we need a reinvestment in local communities if we’re going to keep our neighborhoods safe.

Frederica Freyberg:

Paint the picture for us. What has that meant in terms of local services?

Cory Mason:

There’s real stress on local services. Our ability to maintain services and frankly to give police and fire fighters the raises they deserve becomes harder and harder. As health care costs might go up 10%, 15% a year, if your revenues remain very flat, it’s just a matter of time before there’s a real tension between giving workers the raises they deserve so we can recruit and retain them in these professions and maintain vital public services if you’re still dealing with budgets that are at levels from 10, 12, 15 years ago.

Frederica Freyberg:

Also, there are the levy limits as you well know and the only way under those legislatively-imposed limits is to get more tax dollars is to go to a referendum but Racine last year had a referendum for $2 million to hire 11 new police officers and it failed. Are you able at this time to preserve public safety under that scenario?

Cory Mason:

That is the real tension. We’re in negotiations right now but certainly the raises we have on the table exceed our ability to maintain those funds in the future. We have to put real offers on the table though because we need to maintain a police force and EMS and fire fighting force. It’s at a crisis point for communities like Racine. We know there were dozens of public safety referendums throughout the state last November. 85% of them passed. Unfortunately ours was one that didn’t. Those are really our two options: either going to referendum or getting the state to reinvest in its commitment to funding local services. But everybody agreed last year that funding the police was a priority. Everyone agreed about that. This is the opportunity for the legislature and the governor to come together and make good on that commitment the governor has already laid out before us.

Frederica Freyberg:

Speaking of that, having served in the legislature yourself, what is your expectation about how the Republican majority will respond to the Evers proposal to share 20% of the state sales tax?

Cory Mason:

I have said to some people who were like, this is great. We’re going to get a huge increase. And I’ve warned people the increase doesn’t come until the legislature weighs in and actually passes it in the biannual budget. And I will say as somebody who was in the legislature for a long time and might have been more skeptical in other years, but I do know in conversations we’ve had with other communications, the legislature is very much having conversations about this model about the 20% sales tax going. So if both the governor and the legislature agree roughly on the framework and what they need to do is negotiate what the details are, I feel more optimistic about funding shared revenue this year than I have in a long time.

Frederica Freyberg:

As mayor of a major city, what is your message now to budget writers at the state Capitol?

Cory Mason:

If you want to have safe and healthy communities, you have to invest in law enforcement and you have to invest in public safety. They know that. The city of Racine and communities all over the state need the resources. And we need the state to make good on its commitment to fill its responsibility to fund local services. I think at the end of the day everybody agrees to that and I’m just really hoping with this new framework laid out by the governor under his leadership the legislature will come in and find a model we can all agree on but we are at a point where the legislature can’t kick this can down the road any further. It’s getting to a place where providing basic services, like police and fire, is becoming harder and harder for communities like mine and many others all over the state.

Frederica Freyberg:

Mayor Cory Mason. Thanks very much.

Cory Mason:

Thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:

You can watch the governor’s upcoming state budget address on Wednesday, February 15 at 7:00 p.m. It’s live from the state Capitol on PBS Wisconsin and on Wisconsin Public Radio.

Also on the eastern side of the state, temperatures outside might be freezing but for two Wisconsin cities the average winter temperature has increased more than almost anywhere else in the United States. Nathan Denzin has more.

Nathan Denzin:

Milwaukee and Green Bay have seen average winter temperatures increase by 6.1 degrees and 5.7 degrees since 1970. That makes Milwaukee the second fastest warming city in the country and Green Bay the fifth. Part of the climbing temperature comes from Lake Michigan which has seen a decline in ice coverage over the last 50 years. However, Wisconsin’s coast isn’t the only area with quickly rising thermometers. The northwest part of the state has seen warmer winter days than southern Wisconsin, a trend expected to continue for decades. With rising temperatures come significant ecological concerns. Without an ice buffer on Lake Michigan, winter waves are more likely to crash into shorelines speeding up erosion and damaging infrastructure. Turning to the middle of the state, warmer weather will eventually mean less snow, which will harm wildlife like the snowshoe hare which relies on snow for camouflage. Without drastic change, experts say Wisconsin will warm by up to 8 degrees this century. For “Here & Now,” I’m Nathan Denzin.

Frederica Freyberg:

Shifting to world news, even though Ukraine is no longer front of mind for many Americans, the war from Russia’s invasion nearly one year ago continues to ravage the country’s people. Some Wisconsinites refuse to let up in their efforts to send aid overseas including our next guest who has sent more than $25 million worth of goods to the Ukrainian people. Valentyna Pavsyukova of Fairchild joins us now. Thank you for being here.

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

Thank you for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:

Do you find the war is no longer top of mind for Americans?

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

You know, in many ways, the death is no longer news to so many people. We’re just so used to hearing about dying. People are dying in different countries. Children are dying, born and unborn and it’s not in news anymore. However, I see there’s — at the same time — very big awakening in the people. Just generally, what’s happening is touching so deeply with a question. Which world do we want to see? Where are we going with all that is in front of us? What will be the future. I think in the beginning of course, it was just a big shock. It was a lot of humanitarian effort is being given to Ukraine just from local organizations, so are bigger organizations and generally United States of America have helped so much. It’s true at this point a little bit we are shifting to the — I would say there’s a contrast, right? People want it to be done, want it to be finished as soon as possible and yet it just goes on and right now we all feel in Ukraine. We feel deep. Let’s say a focus. We’ll go on until the war is going to be over until it’s going to be a victory, no matter what anybody think.

Frederica Freyberg:

What you’re hearing from people in Ukraine about the conditions now?

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

Conditions are right anow quite severe. It’s winter and our country’s living only on 30% energy supply. Some parts of Kyiv, for example, our capital, is struggling very much right now with heat and electricity. Every city has a particular schedule basically when they can have electricity so which means you’re only limited to a certain time to prepare your food and imagine if you have elder people who are bedridden or children, very small young babies, this is very difficult. Very difficult, very hard right now.

Frederica Freyberg:

Your organization, Chalice of Mercy, sends millions of pounds of donated goods. Everything from clothes and food to blankets but it seems very importantly medical supplies and these are in the tens of millions of dollars’ worth of goods as we pointed out you’re sending. How are these medical supplies being used?

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

So once we ship everything to Ukraine and we work out of the warehouse here in Twin Cities. I have a very big group of volunteers, Ukrainian people who are immigrants a long time ago or those that came through the program U4U and they have a very great desire of course to participate in any way so it gives them opportunity. Once everything is packed on very big pallets, we send those to New Jersey to a great company we work with and then it’s shipped to Warsaw and from Warsaw transferred to Lviv. And from Lviv to Zaporizhia city. That’s the city I’m from. I’m a citizen of United States but I was immigrated to United States 21 years ago and Chalice of Mercy exist for 15 years of my American life so it’s very big. So basically once it’s been in Zaporizhia, we have a warehouse that is ours. Team of volunteers – we receives requests from the medical teams in hospitals and trench hospitals, mobile clinics that save lives immediately, right on the spot right there. The amount of wounded people are soldiers is so vast, sometimes just a small clinic receives about 100 wounded soldiers a day and it’s going to be a very severe surgery, serious matters. We collect everything that is requested and then either we go right there, right to the front lines and bring these medical supplies or they come and get it from the warehouse we distribute from.

Frederica Freyberg:

Why do you work so tirelessly to do this?

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

It’s my country. It’s my heart is absolutely co-suffering with my people. It’s heartbreaking to see what Ukraine is going through. It’s a very, very happy country, happy people. People that are hardworking which just desire to have our own — to continue our future without having this communistic socialistic ideologies. And it’s so much in my heart because I grew up in the time when the Soviet Union fell and it was still in the hearts of people that say it’s a good thing. It’s just something that we live, the way how we lived and now there’s no doubt anymore because Ukraine — and let me put it this way, Ukraine always has been a subject of — for Russia because this war is not only 12 months now. Almost anniversary, very soon it’s going to be anniversary of one year. But before that, it was nine years. So a partial invasion happened nine years, right? But before that is 100 years which started from Lenin and then Stalin, the man-made famine and the revolution and out of 32 million people, 10 million people died just because of starvation. So we always have been a focus because we would not submit to the Russian imperialism and therefore it is so much within me and it touches me to help my country to breakthrough from that silk thread with which we have been tied to the red dragon’s tail.

Frederica Freyberg:

We leave it there. Thank you for your work, Valentyna Pavsyukova.

Valentyna Pavsyukova:

Thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:

It is February and more and more people around the state and country are realizing the importance of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race this spring. There are four candidates running and the primary election on February 21st will determine which two advance to the general election in April. “Here & Now” senior political reporter Zac Schultz continues our series of interviews with the candidates, this week with Everett Mitchell, a Dane County circuit court judge.

Zac Schultz:

Give me a sense of your judiciary philosophy, if it can be boiled down.

Everett Mitchell:

I think for the most part, my judicial philosophy is kind of rooted in two pieces. One, it is understanding an understanding of a living document so the way we view the Constitution really is about making sure we look at it to expand and cover the current issues we do and the current issues we will encounter as a future generation and I think our Constitution was written to be able to give us the flexibility to be able to expand that. But there are times when I think you need to have what I call a bifocal approach where you need to be able to understand the original intent of the Constitution but don’t let that original intent stop you from being able to expand it to include some of the things that are important for our state moving forward. It’s that living Constitution perspective as a judge that allows for flexibility when making decisions that impact everyday Wisconsinites.

Zac Schultz:

When a strict constructionist or constitutional originalist will hear that, they’ll say, well that allows you to bring your politics. That allows you to read into the Constitution what you want to. How do you respond to that?

Everett Mitchell:

I would say that really is not given. We have amendments for a reason. I didn’t make up amendments. We have a whole bunch of amendments that allowed for them to expand the kinds of things our Constitution did not envision. It didn’t envision women voting. It did not envision Black people who were enslaved being free. It did not envision access to certain voting rights. It didn’t envision all those things. If we only reflected on straight constitutionalism, it’s almost as though you’re going to disregard all those other amendments that have allowed for our communities to evolve and continue to meet the needs where we see people need. It’s not disregarding. It is actually embracing what the spirit of the Constitution was meant and that’s why we were able to have all those amendments to give access to things the original intent and original framers did not give access to.

Zac Schultz:

Justice Louis Butler was the first African-American man to be serve on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. When he ran for re-election, he faced one of the most racist campaigns we’ve ever seen launched against a justice.

Everett Mitchell:

Probably the first.

Zac Schultz:

What have you learned from him and what in preparing for this race for you?

Everett Mitchell:

One, I think I spent a lot of time thinking about — first of all, he’s endorsed me. I listened to him. I learned from him. I talked to him about what things he would have done differently at that time. And as a judicial career, I spent a lot of time investing in the things that make hearts matter. Making sure we’re clear about our messaging with our young people, ensuring we are focused on the right messaging in communities and then being transparent with people because having conversations about race, having conversations about the things that really do incarcerate the minds and imaginations so many different people who have been affected by racist cultures really allows for me then to be able to have those conversations. I think Justice Butler at that time, he was getting hit with something nobody had ever been done before, the darkening of skin, the tones. I’ve had great conversations with helping many members of our community for years, really helping them understand all of us have been programmed with this super-predator myth. Any time they want to scare majority white individuals in our communities, all they do is darker skin, play some undertones and it sends people back to the ’80s and ’90s when they were programmed every night to think about young Black men as dangerous. And it sits in our subconscious. For me, it’s explaining to people, you have a choice. You don’t have to continue to let that ruin your subconscious or you can listen to who people are and not let TV ads scare you into believing the person can’t represent your particular interests.

Zac Schultz:

You compare what Justice Butler went through to what we saw last year in the U.S. Senate race with Mandela Barnes, has there been a change and what can you learn from that race just last year?

Everett Mitchell:

Again, I think you go back to that same perception. This idea – what makes you dangerous, what makes you afraid and people will make things up in order to create that. It’s really up to Wisconsinites and all people really to say we’re not going to allow these kinds of images to deter us from understanding who people are. Listening to their ideas, listening to their concerns and making our decisions based on that. I think we’ve learned a lot from that. I think watching the Mandela race is a reminder these attacks are still out there but I also say the same thing about Wisconsin. We elected Obama twice. So this narrative can be broken because we broke it twice. And we broke it to elect our first African-American president and Wisconsin was the ones who gave him that victory twice. Yes, we have that history but we also have a history of being progressive on ideas and using character as opposed to color to define who individuals are.

Zac Schultz:

What do you think of the other candidates in this race? Are you running against them in the primary? Are you trying to distinguish yourselves as one of the two so-called liberals versus two conservatives?

Everett Mitchell:

I think what defines me differently is we are all going to have our values that make a difference, right? Former prosecutors elected as judges committed to the rule of law but what differentiates me between them is my leadership both on the bench and off the bench. Rather using my voice and my power of the Black robe to take handcuffs off children to make it more fair or the rules to C-CAP so we can remove C-CAP and remove people who have been charged and been dismissed or evictions that have been dismissed. In fact I just found out UW Law School created an app that allows for people to more easily get those charges they have been found not guilty of or those evictions off their C-CAP record even easier. So now people actually have easy access but if I had never made that motion and fought for that then, we wouldn’t be in these years later being able to give relief to Wisconsinite. It’s those kind of actions and those kind of values that really differentiate me from the rest of the field of individuals who are there because I’m really trying to make sure the system is fair and none of this stuff about talking about I’m going to be fair because it’s not fair and there’s a whole bunch of inequality built into the system but it’s our job as judges to ensure those that come before do receive due process in a fair and balanced way and we’re not just simply repeating or redoing the system that sometimes can oppress and hurt those that are there in front of us.

Zac Schultz:

One of the phrases that gets tossed around a lot is judicial activism. What’s that mean to you? Does it have a meaning that you think most people can agree on?

Everett Mitchell:

I think it just basically means judges are involving themselves in creating legislation from the bench. They’re not just following the rule of law but they’re actually taking a more proactive stance in their rulings to impact decisions being made. An example of judicial activism in some ways is the Roe decision – the overturning of Roe because in many ways they were asking for and doing something the world was not really asking for. It was a conservative group. That was an act of what I thought was an act of conservative activism. So judicial activism really is that, is creating legislation from your decision which is kind of interesting because in many ways, if anybody’s ever been a circuit court judge, you’re always asked to make decisions for which there are no answers both in statute or case law so you have to be active in creating fairness. You have to be active in creating just outcomes for people. You have to be active in the community to make reforms, to make our community better. In many ways it’s a political term that’s meant to distract us away from the roles that judges, really everyday judges really do because it’s not always defined clearly what you’re supposed to do and how you’re supposed to rule and make these decisions.

Zac Schultz:

This is going to be one of the most highly anticipated Supreme Court elections in the state’s history. Are you getting that sense from people you’re talking to that they understand the magnitude? The fact there are a lot of people outside of Wisconsin paying attention to the significance of this race?

Everett Mitchell:

I think they are. I think – what you’ve got to understand is a lot of Wisconsinites are still struggling with inflation. Jobs, joblessness and rents that are skyrocketing. I mean how much it costs to get a carton of eggs now? I mean used to be you go to Kwik Trip and you be able to get some for 99 cents. Those days are gone. So I think the everyday struggles a lot of Wisconsinites are facing, that’s what I’ve heard when I traveled throughout the state is really sucking up that energy. I think as we turn more toward February, it will give more ability for people to say, ok, how does this matter to me? How is that? If a campaign is effective and I think we’ve been effective in many places, helping people understand the court systems have a direct impact on your life. How does it impact you? Well you felt it in November with gerrymandering. How does it impact you? You feel it with incarceration and the impact incarceration has on minority communities. How does it impact you? Well, the Supreme Court is reviewing ICWA, Indian Child Welfare Act and its potential impact on our native and indigenous communities. Translating the need for having people who understand the world of issues that so many Wisconsinites feel is going to be important to getting people to understand why this race is important and significant.

Frederica Freyberg:

Next week on our program, we speak with Supreme Court candidate Judge Jennifer Dorow. You can see all of our interviews with the four candidates on our news page and for more on this and other issues facing Wisconsin, visit our website at PBSwisconsin.org and click on the news tag. That’s our program for tonight. I’m Frederica Freyberg. Have a good weekend.

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Funding for “Here & Now” is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.