1410 WIZM

But plans for a high-voltage line through western Wisconsin are moving ahead. A company from Pewaukee wants to place a 345-kilovolt line between La Crosse and Madison...saying it will be a more efficient way of providing energy than existing electric lines. Public hearings will be conducted, to help the A-T-C company decide a precise route for the power line. Opponents of the Cap-X power line project through Minnesota have warned that the eventual goal of the Cap-X planners is to bring their high-voltage wires through the La Crosse area.  A-T-C says its La Crosse to Madison line is independent of the Cap-X project.

But Baldner also has been placed in hospice care, as complications have developed in recent weeks. Baldner has been hospitalized at Gundersen Lutheran since late May. He received severe brain trauma while on a visit to Florida, when the boat he was riding in crashed into the shore. His family posts on the 'Caring Bridge' website that Jason is able to open his eyes and listens to family members who visit his hospital room. A fund for the Baldner family has been set up at Wells Fargo in La Crosse.

The emptying of the Lake Delhi dam In Iowa has caused repercussions downstream. Locks on the Mississippi south of where the Maquoketa river empties in are closing because of the sudden release of water that happened after a failure of the dam on Saturday. Hundreds of buildings were damaged or destroyed and people were evacuated after Lake Delhi let loose its waters. The dam failure has been blamed on the torrential amount of rain that northeast Iowa has received in the last week or so. Meanwhile, the Army Corps tells us locks on the Mississippi above Guttenberg, Iowa will operate normally.

Some unusual thumping in a motel room in La Crosse just didn't sound right for one guest this week-end. Maybe lucky cops checked it out. They say a woman was strangled to the point of blacking out twice by her boyfriend. Apparently 34 year-old Gregory Coleman got a little angry with his woman for questioning his flirtatious ways at a downtown bar. An argument led to her on her back on the floor at his hotel room and his hands around her neck. Cops say she apparently passed out after the first round of choking, then woke up only to be choked until unconsciouness again by Coleman.