Morning Update

Skating to success

Morning update: Thursday, Aug. 25

In this newsletter

Good morning, Madison!

From the Kohl Center to the Beijing world stage, former University of Wisconsin hockey forward Sarah Nurse is leaving her mark on the sports world.

Nurse, who helped the Badgers reach four straight NCAA Frozen Fours from 2014 to 2017, will make history as the first woman to be featured on the cover of EA Sports’ NHL video game, NHL 23.

What a year it’s been for Sarah Nurse! #Badgers #OnWisconsin https://t.co/YsV6hW3XO2
— Zach Hanley (@ZachHanley2) August 24, 2022

The former Badger set the record for most points and most assists in a single Olympics tournament in Beijing while playing for team Canada earlier this year, Channel 3000 reports. Go team!

— Hayley

🎨 MMoCA leaders are standing by their staff.

Following allegations of racism and mismanagement, the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art's Board of Trustees issued a formal apology and voiced its "full support" for executive director Christina Brungardt and her staff.
"We support the staff, artists, and others who helped bring the Wisconsin Triennial to life," the statement reads. "And we remain ready, willing and able to engage in the difficult exchanges that will help us create more social justice in our community and our world and better ways to elevate art as a means to achieving those outcomes."
If you'll recall: A group of artists participating in MMoCA's 2022 Wisconsin Triennial, “Ain’t I A Woman?,” penned an open letter to the museum and pulled their work from the galleries in part over an incident involving artist Lilada Gee's work.
Dive deeper: Artists pull out of MMoCA Triennial, call for director to resign (Cap Times), “It took my breath away:” Beloved Black artist ends MMoCA project after verbal attack by Overture Center staff (Madison365)

🚰 The city wants to raise water rates.

The Madison Water Utility has filed an application increase water rates, citing an increase in operating expenses since the last water rate case was completed in 2020.
If the rate increase request is approved, the average residential customer with a ⅝-inch or ¾-inch meter who uses 4,000 gallons of water a month will see and increase from $29.92 to $34.92, or 16.71%.
The rate increase does not apply to sewer, storms water, landfill, resource recovery or urban forestry services.

🚫 The Dane County YMCA is putting several of its after-school programs on hiatus.

Citing staffing issues, the YMCA of Dane County is putting its after-school programs at Sunset, Sauk Trails, Northside, and Pope Farms Elementary Schools on “hiatus.” The closure will affect roughly 80 families.
The YMCA isn't giving up fully on the sites it had to suspend. Channel 3000 reports the organization is just waiting for the right applicants to step up.

✨ Preserving part of the Greenbush neighborhood.

Owner of Budget Bicycle Shops Roger Charly is spending $400,000 to preserve the bright yellow building that was home to Franco Shoe Repair for more than four decades.
The 600-square-foot yellow Trachte building at 1213 Regent St. doesn't have a tenant yet but Charly wanted to save the space from becoming another "cookie cutter" apartment building on the isthmus, the State Journal reports. Charly is hopeful a barbershop or tattoo parlor can begin operating in the space by the end of the year.

💇🏾‍♀️ Back to school braids.

Local business Binken’s African Braids has been offering its braiding services for free for kids ahead of the new school year. Braiding can be hard to find in Madison and expensive. Binken's owner Ndey Binta Sarr told Channel 3000 she wanted to provide free braids to help alleviate some of the financial stress that comes with starting a new school year.
For information on Binken’s African Braids' free braiding program, check out their Facebook page.

"When I’m working on their hair, we talk about life. Braiding is therapy and I enjoy it." — Ndey Binta Sarr, owner of Binken’s African Braids

🏥 Your lunchtime read: Healing the health care gap in Dane County.

Via Madison Magazine: "It can take on many forms in a hospital room. Dismissive and disrespectful attitudes. Longer wait times. Stereotypes about unhealthy lifestyles and diets. Assumptions about insurance that sometimes affect prescriptions.

It can range from disheartening inconveniences, like not having culturally appropriate personal care items, to dangerous outcomes, like a misdiagnosis or a recommendation for an unnecessary surgery such as a hysterectomy.

These are all examples of responses from a recent National Institutes of Health study. At a place where people go for help — often in times of great illness — racism, racial inequality and health care disparities exist, especially for Black patients."