ashley smart, ashley haynes

Ashley Smart leaves Conley papers to join BizTimes Milwaukee

Dec. 4, 2021

Ashley (Haynes) Smart has joined BizTimes Milwaukee as a reporter covering startups, technology and manufacturing. Smart previously worked for Conley Media as an education reporter for The (Waukesha) Freeman and, most recently, as managing editor of the (West Bend) Daily News and (Cedarburg) News Graphic.

A 2017 graduate of UW-Milwaukee, Smart worked in college for Media Milwaukee, the school's digital-first news publication. She also did freelance work for The Freeman while in school.

Matthew DeFour

Your Right to Know: School investigation records should be public

Dec. 1, 2021

In the latest "Your Right to Know" column, Matthew DeFour of the Wisconsin State Journal uses two hidden-camera cases at Madison East High School to illustrate the need for school investigation records to be available to the public.

Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, a group dedicated to open government. The column is available to WNA members for republication at no cost. 

Wisconsin Policy Forum logo

Wisconsin’s drop in tax rank among nation’s largest

Dec. 1, 2021

In the span of two decades, there may be no state that has seen a greater drop in its tax burden than Wisconsin, which saw its ranking among states plunge from fourth to the middle-of-the-pack. The drop in Wisconsin’s state and local taxes as a share of personal income was the largest or nearly the largest of any state — depending on how it’s measured — since 1999.

polco, coronavirus, voter registration, presidential debates, covid-19

New poll gauges concern about omicron variant

Dec. 1, 2021

A new poll question gauging readers' level of concern about the omicron variant of COVID-19 is available to be used by WNA members. We are asking the question in light of the recent wave of travel and other restrictions that have been introduced in an attempt to slow the spread of the variant.

Results from our previous poll question regarding mandatory civics education in Wisconsin schools are also now available.

John Foust, advertising, ad-libs

Use fresh ads to catch more customers for your advertisers

Nov. 29, 2021

In his latest "Ad-libs" column, John Foust outlines how everybody wins when you develop fresh ads for loyal customers rather than continue running the same basic ads that have grown stale over time.

Foust has conducted training programs for thousands of newspaper advertising professionals and offers training videos to sales departments looking to save time and get quick results from in-house training.

Wisconsin Policy Forum logo

Locals give wheel taxes the gas

Nov. 24, 2021

Collections from local vehicle registration fees in Wisconsin rose rapidly in recent years, with revenues tripling between 2017 and 2021. The trend was driven by new fees approved in Madison as well as Milwaukee and Dane counties, but many other communities also added or increased fees.

pat mulvaney

Pat Mulvaney retires from Monroe County Herald; Kariann Farrey named new editor

Nov. 24, 2021

Longtime editor Pat Mulvaney has retired after 22 years with the Monroe County Herald. Mulvaney joined the Sparta Herald and Monroe County Democrat as a reported in 1999. In 2005, he was named editor of the Herald, and remained in the role after the newspaper merged with the Democrat in 2015.

Mulvaney was succeeded by Kariann Farrey, who started her newspaper career working in the advertising departments at her hometown paper, the Daily Tribune, and later the (Manitowoc) Herald Times Reporter. She moved to the newsroom in 2000 and worked as a copy editor at the Times Reporter, a reporter at the Rapid City (S.D.) Journal, and as a copy editor for the La Crosse Tribune. Most recently, Farrey has worked remotely as a freelance copy editor for The Mason County Journal in Shelton, Wash., and The Buffalo (Wyo.) Bulletin.

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