Weekly commentary from Bill Lueders, Money & Politics Project director.

Only three of the University of Wisconsin System’s 13 four-year campuses — Platteville, Stevens Point and Parkside — have more than half of students, faculty and staff signed up to receive text alerts, according to a review by the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. The overall participation rate for all 13 campuses is about 32 percent, the Center found, based on data from each campus.

“It’s hard not to make people too worried about a lot of things,” said UW-Madison pediatric endocrinologist Ellen Connor, after running through a plethora of hypothesized health effects — genital abnormalities, tumors, lower sperm counts, diabetes, early puberty — and an equally long list of worrisome chemicals.

Emails from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Endocrine disruptors have been called a “global threat” to people and wildlife, but Wisconsin is lagging behind Minnesota in testing its waters for them.

By Bill Lueders
Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism
One day last October, Sgt. Louise Hackel of the Clark County Sheriff’s Department was summoned to deal with an emergency.
A distraught woman at the central Wisconsin county’s Community Services office was being involuntarily committed for mental health reasons. Hackel, one of four jail workers who arrived on the scene, [...]

To assess the DOA’s performance, the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism analyzed the nearly 200 records requests the agency received in the first six months of 2012. The analysis found the DOA took an average of 24 days to provide records or denials.

More than 4,000 applicants were denied a Wisconsin concealed carry license and more than 400 had their licenses revoked or suspended in the program’s first 14 months, records show. These included dozens of felons, domestic abusers, illegal drug users and “fugitives from justice.”