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Major Fundig for In Wisconsin is provided by the
people of a lion's energy who brings safe, reliable
and environmentally friendly energy to keep homes,
neighborhoods, and life in Wisconsin running smoothly,
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Next, in Wisconsin, the icons of Wisconsin's landscape
are torn down and reborn.
Teams judge teams in Winnebago County and their verdicts count,
and forced into battle when he was only 12, this
man is one of the first mong elected to public
office in the U.S., and he's here in Wisconsin.
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Good evening and welcome to In Wisconsin.
I'm Patti Lowe.
Every week, In Wisconsin will bring you stories
from all around the state, fascinating places, the
issues that directly affect your life and community,
and always the people who make Wisconsin unique.
We start this evening with one of those people.
Rick Bot does what he calls recycling on a grand scale,
and preserves part of Wisconsin's heritage
in the process.
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I've always had a passion for these old
barrens as I was a kid.
I have a great deal of respect for the people who originally
built these buildings, and these barrens stand
really as a monument to our ancestors to settle the state.
Unfortunately, many of these buildings are disappearing.
In a lot of cases, they're simply burned for fire practice,
or they're allowed to deteriorate to the point
where they're just basically settled into the landscape.
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What we try to do is reuse this resource,
and we can do anything from salvaging barnsiding that
can be reused as paneling, but we can also re-mill
it, re-sought, we can make it a flooring trim.
We build furniture out of it.
The old wood has a beauty and a quality and a
patina that is unsurpassed by any other material
that you can get.
This was milled from barnsiding off a barn in northern Illinois
that rumor has an alchipote actually, stableed
horses in for a while.
These little holes you see here are from buckshot.
Somebody must have, you know, took out a pigeon or something
up against one of the walls.
We'll pay a numb, we'll feed with salvage
rights to the building, but primarily what we're doing
is we're taking down a structure that is becoming a
danger to our clients.
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Possibly it's the point where it's in liability
because of insurance and because of the tax rolls.
It's not just the case of just going out taking a crowbar to
a building and hauling it away in your pickup truck.
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What you have to do is be able to utilize as much of
the structure as possible, not just the most premium parts.
Jet Lake, guys!
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-Flying through!
-Just one was split already.
All right.
The point is to not produce, Kid Lake.
I got started doing this back in the 70s when I was
working my way through college and we would take a few
bars down and selling material from them.
And gradually we developed techniques for using more
and more of the building.
So it was a learning process.
The closest we'd come to ever really score like a,
there were a couple times when we, it would have built
and picked a little faster than we thought it was going to.
We just barely got out of harm's way.
This is not something that you want amateurs to
do because the learning curve can be quite short
if you don't get it right.
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We'll come in and we'll strip the siding off very carefully
using specialized tools to pry it off so
we don't damage it.
There we go.
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Then we make a series of pre-pots in the structure
with very key places.
Then we chain the building up and we tip it over.
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It comes over just like pulling over a large tree.
It makes big crunch everybody gets a kick out of it.
And if we do it right, we made all our pre-cuts properly.
We damaged very little material.
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Wisconsin as a state was blessed 150 years ago
with some of the finest standing timber in the world.
Particularly some of the old growth white pine.
These are massive trees that grew in the northern
part of the state.
Often they would grow six or eight feet apart and they'd
be six feet in diameter.
And people would speak about them like they were
standing in a cathedral.
These trees took centuries to grow, so often 500 years.
And because they grew so slowly the quality of the wood was
far superior to the lumber that you could possibly get today.
You'll never see lumber like that again.
It's just not going to occur anywhere except
in very remote regions.
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The house is built almost completely out
of recycled materials.
They came out of old birons, old warehouses, all of
it, say from the landfill.
When you work with this kind of wood it just puts everything
else out there in the shade.
This is a good example of posting the beam work.
This is a little more finished than a lot of
the buildings that we do.
We use large power planers that surface the timber.
We take a little bit of the old rough surface off.
And then you could finish the beams with either
an oil or polyurethane or a good quaggish lac.
There's not staying on any lumber in this building.
It's all original patina.
And you can see the deep rich tones that you get from it.
Most of what you're looking at here would be in a landfill.
This is recycling on a grand scale.
And I could achieve this look or this finish if
I was using new lumber.
The only way you could really do this and do
this was effectively is to use the old growth
lumber from the old barns, the old warehouses.
Here, it's going to have another hundred years worth of life.
Whenever we take down one of these old buildings
and we see it come down, we always have a little
bit of regret because it's such magnificent structures.
Wisconsin wouldn't be Wisconsin if we didn't have these
old barns in the landscape such an icon on the state.
But if the building has to come down, it's far,
far wiser to at least use as much of it as we can
and recycle it and give parts of the old barn a new life.
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Here's a sobering statistic.
According to the Justice Department, more than 124,000
juveniles were arrested in Wisconsin in 2001.
And once a young person is arrested, even
for a petty offense, there's better than a
50/50 chance he or she will be arrested again.
It's a cycle of crime and punishment some Wisconsin
counties are trying to break, with a program that puts
a new spin on the phrase "Jury of Your Peers."
Jerry Huffman takes a look at one such project
in Winnebago County.
This is a story about two Wisconsin teenagers who are on
one hand typical young people.
English, the math and then after school.
Wrestling with the challenges of growing up and
learning to make choices.
Okay, what would you like to drink with the first camel?
Megan Hunter of Appleton made a really bad
choice late last year.
The 16-year-old went to school one morning and along with her
books, packed some marijuana.
I asked, does anyone else have any pot?
And a teacher overheard me and brought me to attend them.
And basically from there I got searched and it was all over.
I knew that I was in trouble, that I was in big trouble.
In Manashup, 15-year-old Ashley Belter didn't plan on
getting into trouble one night when she went out
with some friends.
They broke into a storage shed at a house.
They thought was deserted.
What did you think when the police went to show them?
I was like, I didn't really know what to do.
I didn't know how to react and I did lie and
I feel sorry for it.
And if I could take it back, I wouldn't lie.
Both Ashley Belter and Megan Hunter fit the profile
of so many young people who have been in the
juvenile justice system.
Their cases can't be ignored because they're in the system,
but how their cases are handled is another story.
A staple of our legal system is a chance to have your case
heard by a jury of your peers, which in Wisconsin, more
and more is starting to mean its kids deciding what kind of
punishment other kids will face.
Welcome to Winnebago County's Teen Court.
The young man Torra plays the part of a prosecutor.
There's no doubt whatsoever and that's the key fact that she was
that she did have marijuana in her possession.
They're not even disputing that.
In this courtroom, it's the young people who call the shots.
The bailiff's still in middle school.
It's all teenagers on this jury and the defense
lawyer is in high school.
As you will see, Ashley is sorry and realizes her mistakes.
I like the mistake of thinking that just because
this is Teen Court, anyone is going to get off easy.
Every defendant will receive a minimum punishment
like community service.
It's better for them to have a harder punishment
because in the long run, it's going to help them,
you know, overt trouble because they'll realize
that their actions are unacceptable and they won't get
brought into an adult court.
It's only swear or affirm that you will not devote.
There are guidelines for the kinds of cases
eligible for Teen Court.
First offender's only, no violent crimes, and
perhaps most importantly, defendants have to admit the
charge that brought them here in the first place is true.
When you can still work up some tears you
haven't lost a kid yet.
With the 12-year-olds, they are afraid of the
consequences of their actions.
They haven't gotten so jaded that they no longer care.
And they care what their parents think.
That's when we have to catch them before they become
callous to the system.
Please be seated.
The judge in this case is a local businessman.
Adult volunteers don't need a legal background and the
young people who volunteer range from middle school
students up through high school seniors.
The rest of the team, officials, lawyers and jurists
are made up of defendants who have already come through
Teen Court themselves because eventually serving on the court
is part of every minimum sentence.
What kind of punishment did you get at home?
Growning. And having been a pretty
good act of doing that?
Yeah. Both Megan and Ashley's
parents gave us permission to videotape their hearings.
Again, it's up to the young lawyers and their client to
decide the issues that are important in their trial.
Did you take anything?
No. Okay, so the only thing that was destroyed
was the Shen door.
Yeah. So everybody who says
three, raise your hand.
Three? Okay.
Three it is.
All right.
Back in the jury room, Justice happens quickly.
The jury opts for the minimum punishment.
Ashley will eventually serve on three jury panels herself due
ten hours of community service and write a letter of
apology to the homeowner.
A light sentence because this jury believes Ashley is sorry.
You can just sense it in the way a person moves and a person
acts by up there on the stand.
And you can tell about what a person's parents say to them.
So and her parents seem very confident that she would
not make this mistake again.
Back in court, Megan's case is not going well for her.
That shows that they're not really afraid of punishment.
Or we can make her afraid of punishment and help
her by giving her a strong sentence here.
Megan takes the stand in her own defense and misses a critical
chance to say she's sorry.
Do you feel what you've done as well?
Yes, in a way.
The jury is excused by the judge and told to
begin their deliberations.
Again, the only ones allowed to talk are the
jury of Megan's peers.
I'm guessing she said sorry.
Sorry a lot to our parents.
John Breemer is 11 years old.
Someone bringing marijuana to school.
It's worse because if one of her peers, one of her friends, was
actually smoking it than they could have gotten trouble to.
As an observer, what was striking was how seriously these
young jurors take their duty.
An adult caught with drugs in or near a school could
face additional jail time.
These young people hit Megan with a harsher sentence for
bringing the pot to school.
50 hours of community service.
A 1000 word essay for why marijuana is
hazardous to health.
Megan sentence, one of Team Courts toughest.
The maximum of community service allowed.
A lengthy essay on the hazards of smoking marijuana.
And long letters of apology to both her school and her parents.
I think your punishment's fair.
It's a little behered when I thought it would be, but I guess
it's better than having it on my record and paying a fine.
Statistically, there is proof Team Courts works,
meaning only about 10% of these young offenders will
ever be in court again.
Compare that to the national trend, where more than half
of the juveniles arrested are repeat offenders.
Rich Van Benchotten tracks the numbers for the
University of Wisconsin and says it's the young people
who make Team Courts work.
Probably about control.
An adult's threat is something that's antagonistic to youth.
They want to be in control of their own environment
with their own peers.
But if a fellow youth tells them that, you see the
results, they respond to that.
And that message of don't do it again appears
to be getting hurt.
What's the lesson you're going to take from all of this?
Just not do it again.
Because I don't want to be back here.
One final note.
There are currently 30 counties in the state that
have Team Courts programs.
Next tonight in Wisconsin, we head west from Winnebago
County to O'Claire.
That's where I met Joe B.
Jean. Joe B is the first among
American elected to public office in Wisconsin.
He's had a major impact on his adopted hometown, but his
story begins half a world away.
On the cusp of adolescence, when American boys are armed with
attitude and sinking fastballs, 12-year-old Joe B.
Jean was armed with an M-16 rifle.
In the 1960s and '70s, the CIA recruited among farmers
in the mountains of Laos for a secret war in Vietnam.
Joe B.
Jean's father was one of them.
Joe B reflects back on his decision to take his
father's place so that he could come back to Joe B's
mother and nine siblings.
He's the oldest one, and I feel that I already know to
be there to replace him so he can be with my mom and
with the rest of the family.
Only child, but back then, 12-year-old Joe, you have
a lot of responsibility.
And to be the oldest child of the family, you have
a lot of responsibility.
You act like a dog and parents already for the
brother and the sister.
His childhood behind him, Joe B became a soldier.
In 1978, when the CIA pulled out of Laos, they evacuated
high-ranking military officials to Thailand.
Soldiers like Joe B.
Jean, they simply abandoned.
So we used the hand grenade that we got left, the
ammunition that we got left.
In 1978, we had a very big casualty that the North Vietnam
and the communist troops fight were heavy against us.
And then until our village all wiped out, and then I decided
to took off from my village.
And then I took about 3,000 people, I lived in from
the village and walked from my village to Thailand.
That walk from Joe B's village to the safety of Thailand
was more than 150 miles over mountains across rivers
and into enemy ambushes.
We got many people die on the way.
At the Meikong River, Joe B, now 15, told the refugees to wait
while he and several others crossed into Thailand to clear
the way for the group's arrival.
And when I got crossed to the Meikong River
and the Thai authority would not let me go back.
And the waiting there about a week, and they
cannot wait any longer.
So they all separate and find their own way to Thailand.
And that's why many people got killed.
Many people went back and many people surrendered
to the communist.
Somehow, Joe B's mother and father, along with his sister
and brothers, made their way to safety and joined him.
After spending about 8 months in a refugee camp, Joe
B'song arrived in America and eventually settled in a Claire.
He came to the United States in first experiments on
the electric store, the hot water, the cold waters,
the drinking fountains.
All those, anything is new experiment for you.
And then the skills that you have, that you farming,
or you use to the machine guns or the guns are not
able to find a job here.
So it's like your life, it's totally reborn again.
Like many of the mong who settled here, Joe B spoke no
English, but learned and then graduated from high school
and earned a bachelor's degree from Mount Scenario College.
But even as he embraced his new American community,
he clung to the music and culture of his homeland.
The gang, or bamboo pipes, is one of a dozen
mong instruments, Joe B plays.
The jaw is another.
Well, pretty much on this as-pressure feeling to other
people and pretty much this kind of instrument we use
to communicate for culture and all kinds of things.
I may give the whole thing to her and I said, "Well, I give
you these instruments and then I come back to visit you again."
But if you don't want to go back there and then she asks
you to see the instrument, you give her the instrument
but you hold by the hand.
I love to tell them they're not playing that you can
pull her back.
I did a fact.
I mean, he played a very important role in one
sense as a role model for the other mong people.
Eric Linquist, a reporter for the O'Claire Leader
Telegram, has followed Joe B's journey from immigrant to
citizen to community leader.
He's involved in everything.
I mean, he's for years he's been a landlord, I believe.
For a lot of mong families, he's rented two people
that maybe had troubles with other landlords, had
communication issues so he gave them comfort in that way.
Can I have to know how association?
He has been the president of the board of directors at
the mong association here in O'Claire and now he's serving
as the stepped in and a gap and been the acting director.
He owns property that he rents to mong gardeners so that they
can supply food for the farmers market and have an extra income.
In 1996, residents elected Joe B.
Jean to the first of two terms on the O'Claire
City Council, making him the first mong and Wisconsin
elected to public office.
I feel great and honored but it's not as much as the
second time.
In my second time I feel much better and
I feel proud and more honored because I believe that I
can do the jobs and that's why they re-elact me again.
For Joe B.
Jean who became a citizen in 1986,
being an American means serving the public good.
I do what I can do to help myself, my family, my community
and my country.
That means to be the Vietnam War and when
I came here I still feel like if any war out there that it's
neat me, I still willing to serve and to protect my country.
He says the events of 9/11 made a powerful impression
on him and brought back memories he'd rather forget.
That's what we've been through and not just one time
but many many times.
You have many good friends and
suddenly just one minute or a few seconds you lost all.
Interestingly, in the mong language the word mong
means being free.
Each year at festivals like this one
the mong celebrate their survival and their freedom.
I'm glad that we came here at the right time and then we
have the opportunity to go to school.
We have the opportunity to do business that you capable
of or you be able to do it.
I see that we jumping 150 years ahead when we live
in the house, from the people living in the house.
And I feel confident that if we continue the way we do
it now then we probably will be successful in the future.
Like JoBee Zhang, Leah Sater was looking for a successful
future when she decided to make a major career
change. Sater went from bookstore manager to Therrier.
She's from Milwaukee but producer Andy Soath and
his mini DV cam caught up with her in Monomony Falls.
The foot belongs to Tally, a retired Arabian showhouse.
The hands are Leah Sater's a Milwaukee Farrier.
I got into this because I really love horses and that was what
I wanted to do and I think that shows a lot of the time.
Yeah, you especially.
And I do, I feel for them.
Being a Farrier makes you part blacksmith, part
podiatrist and part manicurist.
Horses feed are like your nails, they grow continuously.
The shoes protect the horse's feet from being
worn down too much.
So their shoes have to be reset every six to eight weeks.
Tally was donated to the ranch in Monomony Falls to a program
for disabled riders.
As an older horse he has special problems.
He has two completely different front feet.
His legs are even a little different
length up front so he wears a very bizarre shoeing job.
This wedged shoe called an egg bar will keep Tally
comfortable on his feet.
When you can actually fix one all by yourself with a shoeing
job it feels really good.
That desire to help out horses is what drew Leah
Sater to horseshoeing.
I got accused of being too soft ones.
I'm caring too much about the animal but I feel
like that's part of my job.
There are a couple of hundred people horseshoeing
professionally in Wisconsin but only three
women make it a career.
I wasn't sure that I could do it.
I wanted to try though.
I figured I could.
I'd been raised a very ardent feminist so I figured
I could try anything.
You're silly.
I was very lucky the guy that I apprenticed
with the one time that I was very frustrated and
couldn't get something done and said I can't do this.
He grabbed the tool away from me and said of course
you can do this and I think that was the nicest thing
anyone ever said to me.
This is called hoof packing to keep her foot moist and
to keep her disease out.
This is oakum.
It's waterproof.
Another attribute Sater brings to her job is perhaps more
unusual. She majored in English.
And the English degree has been very helpful in communicating.
Sometimes you need to be able to talk to a person and really
get across the idea of what it is that their horse needs.
And as a former bookstore manager she understands
customer service.
I get so many compliments because I'm always on time.
So a bookstore never offered this kind of excitement.
I got kicked in the face.
Otherwise I got a nail ripped through my finger and so
it can be very dangerous.
A couple guys die every year doing it.
I try and be very careful.
And I think I might say no a little more than some
people do because I don't have any macho to deal with.
Nope that looks like it's going to hurt me.
That's my definition of a good day when
nothing tries to kill me.
So today was a good day.
By that standard I'd say I've had a good day too.
Thank you for joining us for In Wisconsin.
We'll be back again next week with another
look at life in our state.
Meanwhile we leave you this evening with a look at spring
emerging at McGilvra Woods in Sauc County.
Good night.
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Major funding for In Wisconsin is provided by the people of
Alliance Energy who bring safe, reliable and environmentally
friendly energy to keep homes, neighborhoods and life in
Wisconsin running smoothly.
Alliance Energy offering energy saving ideas on the web.
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