January 2022

Once again, the Belleville community went above and beyond in making Christmas a little brighter for families in need. Thirty-four families each received $200 in grocery gift cards and each of the 99 children received gifts and/or gift cards.

Dear Editor,
A group of your Iowa County neighbors is working quietly and tirelessly to ensure that your vote in every election counts. Just like you, they babysit their grandchildren, take care of an elderly parent, commute to work…but then they carve out time to volunteer to protect your vote.
This group, called the Iowa County Fair Maps Team, just wants legislative maps drawn fairly so the true voice of the people can be heard at the polls.

What’s all that digging going on? And those mounds of dirt, brush piles, and torn out trees, what’s up with that?
The half a million-dollar answer is: streambank improvement for phosphorus mitigation and reduction in the Village of Monticello’s waste water treatment system.
And what is so important about phosphorus and all that? Why so expensive?
Questions, questions, and more questions.

In March of 2020, schools mandatorily closed in an effort to reduce the spread of COVID and not risk the lives of our teachers with a virus we knew very little about. However, at the same time, early childcare and education were asked to stay open. Not only were we asked to stay open, but our regulating office, the Department of Children and Families (DCF), also removed many of our regulations, like capacity numbers so that we could take in even more of the school-age children, who now had no school to go to.