City Cast Madison

The Madison Public Market has been a dream for decades. Three mayors have tried. With a proposed opening in 2025, it’s now the closest it’s ever been to becoming reality. The city plans to remodel its former Fleet Service building on 200 N. First Street and turn it into a business incubator and mall for food-related businesses. It’s a mix of a food court, a shopping center, and a community event space. They’ve secured the space, hired architects and have building designs in hand. They’ve spent years recruiting and prepping vendors to be ready to fill it. They’ve raised millions in both public and private funds. But now, costly construction bids are threatening to derail the project. We speak with Madison Public Market Foundation Board President Karen Crossley about the vision for the market and where they are in the process. Note: We spoke to Karen Crossley on September 15, 2023, before she had reviewed the project construction bids. Crossley says, on behalf of the Madison Public Market Foundation, “We support the introduction of a resolution at the 10/3 City Council mtg that will address the current construction funding gap and allow the Madison Public Market project to move forward. Our commitment is unwavering. We will continue working closely with the City to fully fund the construction project, and to fulfill the goals and mission of the Public Market.”Read more: 🏗️ High construction bids threaten Madison Public Market [Wisconsin State Journal]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.

A new documentary explores the life of legendary drummer Clyde Stubblefield, often called the most sampled drummer in history. Stubblefield was best known as James Brown’s drummer, and came up with iconic backbeats that changed the course of music. But he wasn’t credited or compensated for his musical innovation and faced mounting medical debts later in life. He was a celebrated musician in Madison, where he lived and gigged for decades. Bianca Martin speaks with filmmaker Trevor Banks about why Stubblefield should get his due.See excerpts of the film at the fundraiser on Sunday, September 24 at the Majestic Theatre. Bianca Martin will lead a Q+A with filmmaker Trevor Banks.Read more: 🎥 “Give the Drummer Some” film website🎶 'Funky Drummer' Clyde Stubblefield documentary still coming; fundraiser is Sept. 24 [Wisconsin State Journal]Also mentioned on the show:💡 The Cap Times Ideas Fest is this week, Sept 17 - 23 [The Cap Times]🐷 Madison to vote on allowing pet pigs [City of Madison]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.

Madison is known as a Tree City for its efforts to care for urban trees. Keeping a diverse mix of healthy trees in the city requires constantly planting new ones every year as well as maintaining those planted years ago. City trees in Madison have to be able to withstand freezing winters, sidewalk salt, power lines above, concrete all around, and the occasional car crashing into them. Not to mention insect pests like Emerald Ash Borer.  For all trees put up with in our urban environment, the benefits they deliver are enumerable: shade, shelter, beauty, fresh oxygen, homes for animals, planet cooling.But who speaks for those trees? City Forester Ian Brown does. City forestry staff advise on what and where trees get planted and how we, as a city, can care for some of the city’s oldest residents.Today, we’re peeking behind the curtain of Madison’s City Forestry department. Also on the show: 🌳 Madison’s Tree Inventory Starts Today! 🍂 Know where to go to peep beautiful fall leaves with Travel Wisconsin’s Fall Color ReportWanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.

The City Cast team is here to round up the news of the week. Bianca Martin and Molly Stentz recap the Madison school bus driver shortage, take a sneak peek of the Madison Public Market, and the discuss the latest in the ongoing tug-of-war between the Wisconsin Supreme Court and state lawmakers over political maps. And thanks for voting us Madison’s Best Podcast!! 💖Read more:Madison schools' bus provider 30 drivers short, has 16 in training [The Cap Times]Check out the Madison Public Market [Madison Public Market Foundation]Wisconsin Republican leader asks former state Supreme Court justices to review impeachment [AP]Republican redistricting proposal not quite what Democratic lawmakers asked for [Wisconsin State Journal]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Sign up for the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads at citycast.fm/advertise.

Qwantese Winters is many things: doula, artist, agriculturist, TV host. When she’s not hosting “Let’s Grow Stuff” on PBS Wisconsin, she’s teaching people all over Madison how to grow and use herbs and vegetables in hands-on workshops… at the library! She’s the Madison Public Library’s Naturalist in Residence for September. With DIY workshops on making digestive bitters and herbal teas, among other things, she’s teaching many ways that food – and a connection to nature – can be healing. 🌱 Join us every Thursday as we explore Madison's food culture, from the brewers and bakers to the chefs and cheesemakers.NOTE: This conversation is not intended to be medical advice. Please consult a doctor if you have questions about medical treatments.Also on the show:🪄 Willy Street Fair is this weekend, September 16 and 17Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Sign up for the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads at citycast.fm/advertise.

For the first time in 15 years, liberals have a majority on the officially non-partisan Wisconsin Supreme Court. But the court’s locked in a power struggle with the Republican-controlled state legislature. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos has threatened to impeach the newly-elected Justice Janet Protasiewicz and change the balance of power. Now, voters have sued, seeking to block any impeachment vote. Meanwhile, tensions are high between the justices on the court. We speak to Jack Kelly, statehouse reporter for Wisconsin Watch, for the latest on how the political divisiveness is playing out behind the scenes.Read more: ⚖️ Wisconsin Supreme Court emails detail chaotic first week of liberal control [Wisconsin Watch] 📧 Read the emails from the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s first week under liberal rule [Wisconsin Watch] Also mentioned on the show:🐘 Road to the 2024 GOP Presidential Nomination [UW-Madison]🫏 WisPolitics Luncheon with U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin [The Madison Club]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.

Wisconsin has long had mixed feelings about America’s largest rodents. Beavers have been hunted, trapped, had their dams blown up, and were generally considered to be a nuisance by many of the state’s human residents. Once hunted for their fashionable pelts, they’re now removed by the thousands across the state for a variety of reasons. Madison Parks says beaver dams could cause flooding in nearby soccer fields, golf courses and parking lots; beavers also chew trees at their base, creating potential safety hazards in public areas. Beavers have also been blamed for making streams too warm for trout. Yet many other states welcome beavers, even importing them for their ecosystem benefits. Among other things, they create wetlands, which can act as fire breaks, reducing wildfire damage. They’re known as a keystone species, because they create habitat for many other animals. So why is Wisconsin an outlier? Susan Lampert Smith gives us the lay of the land (and water). She wrote about Wisconsin’s fight over beaver management for Isthmus. Read more:Leave it to the beavers [Isthmus]Also mentioned on the show:Madison Public Market Open House [City of Madison]DNR Looking to Buy Red Pine Cones [WI DNR]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter.

Political parties have long known that controlling WHO can vote in an election carries a strategic advantage. Pick your voters, win your election. Hence, we fight over maps. Data science has made it easier than ever to create maps designed to ensure political outcomes. We now have fewer political districts that look like odd-shaped creatures and more that come from strategic targeting of voters based on data profiles and algorithms. Princeton University’s Gerrymandering Project calls Wisconsin’s political maps “some of the most extreme partisan gerrymanders in the United States.” The U.S. Supreme Court declined to strike down Wisconsin’s political maps in 2018. But there are two new lawsuits asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to do so now.Jordan Ellenberg, UW-Madison math professor, explains how he can prove Wisconsin’s maps are gerrymandered. Also on the show:🤓 NerdNite MadisonWanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.

The City Cast team is here to round up the news of the week. Dylan Brogan and Molly Stentz discuss what’s being done in the wake of a horrifying attack on a UW student in a downtown neighborhood last week. Also, we’re on impeachment watch as Republicans threaten to oust a recently elected Wisconsin Supreme Court justice. What’s new: Democrats are spending millions to fight it.Read more:Three felony charges filed against suspect of 'horrific' Madison assault [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]Here's what UW-Madison is doing to increase student safety in the wake of 'horrific' assault [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]Download the BadgerSAFE app [UWPD]The WI GOP’s Doomsday Plan for 2024 [The Bulwark] Wisconsin Democrats pledge a $4 million-plus blitz to counter GOP on impeaching Protasiewicz [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Sign up for the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads at citycast.fm/advertise.

Alex Booker, owner of Booker Botanicals, was the only Black farmer from Wisconsin at last year’s National Black Farmers Association Conference. He’s committed to changing that. Not only does Alex run a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program in the Madison area where he provides weekly boxes of fresh produce and herbs to members, he also hosts educational wellness events that connect more Black and brown Madisonians to local agriculture. We catch up with Alex to learn why he’s passionate about teaching Madisonians how to grow their own food. And he dishes on the best basil.Join us every Thursday as we explore Madison's food culture, from the brewers and bakers to the chefs and cheesemakers.​​To attend Alex’s fundraising event on Sept. 24, email bookerbotanicals@gmail.com. Wanna talk to us about an episode? Leave us a voicemail at 608-318-3367 or email madison@citycast.fm. We’re also on Instagram! Want more Madison news delivered right to your inbox? Subscribe to the Madison Minutes morning newsletter. Looking to advertise on City Cast Madison? Check out our options for podcast ads.