Two committees of the Dane County Board of Supervisors are meeting tonight to gather information on the performance of the Dane County 911 Communications Center in the wake of the murder of Brittany Zimmermann.

Board Chair Scott McDonell and others have called for an audit of the Center focusing on its procedures and whether its procedures are being followed.

It is suggested that such an audit be conducted by an outside firm, free of political considerations.

Good idea.

To complement this reasonable course of action, Dane County needs the establishment of a paid citizens' committee composed of broad communities of interests, devoid of elected officials, and certainly free of civil servants in Dane County, including those serving in the County Executive's office.

Such a committee ought to have as its deliverables:

- The establishment of specific directives to improve the performance of the 911 Communications Center

Amid the discordant political backdrop, recriminations abound about whether the murder of a 21-year-old UW-Madison woman could have been prevented.

Aside from proposed audits and spirited defenses of the Dane County 911 Communications Center and other Dane County officials, it's worth noting the priorities and policies of local law enforcement agencies here. [I hope not to read the word 'leadership' again; it doesn't exist on this matter.]

As the routine break-up of house parties and the pursuit by police of other frequent illegal college recreational pastimes continues apace here, one wonders if police officers foot-patrolling neighborhoods at night with the objective of protecting property and persons might be a better use of limited police resources vis-a-vis busting a 19-year-old for having a beer or smoking a joint on campus.

And one less parking meter boy (like that pathetic guy who wears the floppy safari hat), and one more officer walking on the street looking out for a female student walking home at night from the library would certainly do.

The Dane County Sheriff's Department endorsed Kathleen Falk when she ran for Attorney General in 2006.

Now, former Dane County Sheriff's Deputy and current Dane County 911 Center Director Joe Norwick has been loudly, and justifiably criticized for the handling of Brittany Zimmermann's call for help. 

It doesn't help that Norwick had no public safety management experience on the level his current position requires. That stands in sharp contrast to this:

“We searched far and wide, and found the best candidate here at home,” Falk said of Norwick.

Is Falk's support of him payback for a past political endorsement?

Progressives are holding Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk’s feet to the fire on the Brittany Zimmerman tragedy.

If Falk decides to run for reelection as Dane County executive in the spring of 2009, she will surely face opponents in a politically charged race, and one gets the impression Falk is abundantly aware of this fact.

From the Capital Times (aggressively on the Zimmerman story now and catching up to the first-rate reporting and insights by Isthmus, the Wisconsin State Journal and the Madison blogosphere):

A former dispatcher that answered a 911 call from Brittany Zimmermann's cell phone before she was allegedly stabbed to death in her West Doty Street apartment committed two different procedural errors in handling the call, according to Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk.

Falk’s statement on the 911 call, "I do not believe, had the (911) errors not occurred, that her murder could've been prevented," amounts to a Bushian I-can’t-tell-you-anything-but-trust-me assurance.

It's nice that Executrix Falk is apologizing to the Zimmermann family a month after it was revealed their daughter called 911 and got no help.  

And now, Dane County Executrix Falk could restore some citizen faith in the 911 Call Center operations, you know, show some political backbone that she presumably had enough of to run for the governor's seat, and throw the State Attorney General's race to J.B. Van Hollen. But, here's what we get instead:

"Falk plans to instruct Dane County 911 director Joe Norwick on Tuesday as to what steps need to be taken to assure that a similar situation does not occur in the future, and has also told Norwick that she expects to be updated regularly on events in the 911 center ..."

They'll discipline someone when the 911 call center finishes its now month-plus long internal investigation of what they did wrong ... ah yes, a report by the same foxes guarding hen houses that never revealed Zimmermann's call for help in the first place.

Did you miss this story in Sunday's WSJ?

"County officials were warned in 2004 to increase staffing, change procedures and put in place a stronger oversight board.

"At worst Dane County faces possible liability and the potential for a catastrophic event," according to the 145-page "strategic plan" from MTG Management Consultants of Seattle."

And here's the money quote from a republican who's advocating more support for important social services!

Mark Hazelbaker, a Republican lawyer who represents the Dane County Towns Association, said solving the issues in the 911 center boils down to a matter of political will.

"I don't know if I blame Kathy Falk so much as I blame a climate in which people are afraid to spend money on vital services," Hazelbaker said.""

A Wisconsin State Journal online op-ed gets it right in noting that secrecy threatens safety.

Here's another secret that demands explanation:

The dispatcher claims she heard nothing on the line.

Madison Police Chief Noble Wray has said "there's evidence in the call that should've prompted the dispatch of a police officer ... County and city officials refuse to describe the content ..."

There's content in the call, or there's nothing. Which is it?

via MAL Contends - Update: Cap Times back on it: See - Falk apologizes to Zimmermann's family, fiance (Capital Times, May 6) and County Board chair wants answers on 911 problems (Cap Times, May 6). 

Expert calls Dane County 911 staffing inadequate (WSJ, May 6) 

I was sorry to see the Capital Times hard copy newspaper go, but I told a friend its online iteration was an innovation that would see it stay on the bleeding edge of technology in bringing Dane County residents the news.

The UW-Madison is looking for a new Chancellor, and some people mistakenly think that salary of nearly one-third of a million bucks a year, plus a house and a car, is not enough to find a new "CEO."

One key UW-Madison booster called the compensation package "an embarrassment."

No wonder fiscal conservatives find the UW an easy target.

Details here.

It seems to have escaped public notice that Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle has added a Republican to his cabinet, with the appointment of Rick Raemisch as secretary of corrections.

 Raemisch is a former Dane County sheriff who was appointed by then Gov. Tommy Thompson, was later elected to the post as a Republican, and ran unsuccessfully for Dane County DA on the GOP ticket, too. (Yes, he’s also a lawyer.) He had been deputy corrections secretary.

Not that there's anything wrong with that, and not that it’s a big deal, but it seems worth a mention, and neither of the state’s two biggest newspapers, the Wisconsin State Journal and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, bothered. So now you know. (WisPolitics did mention it.)

AFTERTHOUGHT: Doyle actually has another R in the cabinet, but he didn't choose him. Veterans Affairs Secretary John Scocus was named by a Republican-heavy veterans board shortly after Doyle took office. Scocos is now temporarily on active duty, but still riling people up. Yet another. I am reminded by a reader that Insurance Commish Sean Dilweg is a former Republican staffer. They're everywhere!

Other random thoughts:

A debate I might watch: Tommy Thompson vs. Michael Moore? My money’s on the fat(ter) guy.

Paul Bucher is being mentioned – probably by Paul Bucher – as a potential Supreme Court candidate. As the Whallah! Blog notes, that would be a great opportunity for the incumbent, Louis Butler, to recycle a slogan from last spring’s campaign” “Not one day as a judge.”

Almost two weeks after the press release, the Journal Sentinel gets around to reporting that Wisconsin’s former US Senator Bob Kasten has been named a foreign policy advisor to the presidential campaign of Everybody’s Mayor, Rudy what’s his name. The story says Kasten runs his own investment banking and consulting firm. Last reports we heard sometime back was that he was an arms dealer. But he and Rudy, we understand, both look good in a dress.