Local News Briefs Wednesday 1/13/16

Lottery officials says tonight’s Powerball Jackpot will hit
$1.5 billion dollars. Officials say last week’s Powerball sales in Wisconsin were $21,709,943.  That compares to the previous few months where
sales were between $950k-$3.5 million each week. It also closes in on the prior
weekly Powerball sales record of $22.3 million for the week of August 25, 2001,
when the Powerball jackpot was $295 million.

 

Steven Avery is attempting a second appeal of his murder
conviction.  That says it’s a process
that began before his case became a national obsession.  Avery’s attorneys say the appeal was started
before the Netflix program was released in late December. The appeal claims law
enforcement was using an illegal warrant and a juror was about to get him.  Avery was convicted of by a jury in 2007 of
killing Teresa Halbach in 2005.

 

The Winnebago County Sheriff’s Department had to rescue a
pair of ice fisherman off of Lake
Poygan on Monday
morning.  The men were fishing all night
when a crack in the ice prevented them from getting back to shore.  An air boat was able to get the men back to
shore safely.  They were dressed for the
elements and were uninjured.

(WRN) Governor
Scott Walker has rolled out a plan he says will help more students pay for
college. The package calls for lifting the cap on deducting student loan
interest and increase grant opportunities for technical college students. It
does not include a plan touted by Democrats, which would set up a system for
re-financing student loan debt. Walker questions whether the state could actually set up a
program that could actually provide lower rates than the federal government.

(WRN) A Republican state lawmaker found himself quickly
apologizing, after a tense debate on the Assembly floor saw him “flipping
off” the minority leader. State Representative Peter Barca was one of
several Democrats who took issue with a recent racially-charged press release
about Milwaukee‘s
crime rate from Slinger Republican Bob Gannon. Gannon did later apologize, saying he got caught up in
the heat of the battle and made a gesture that was improper for the Assembly floor.
 

(WRN) A Wisconsin House Republican critiques President
Barack Obama’s final State of the Union address.  Congressman Reid Ribble found one item he can agree
with the president on — the need for redistricting reform. As
for the rest, Ribble found Obama’s statements on foreign policy to be
confusing, and based on Ribbles attempts to reach out to the president, Obama’s
call to bridge the partisan divide ironic.
Ribble says a Republican president would allow
Congress to deliver on Speaker Paul Ryan’s goal of being the “proposition
party.”