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All shorts are available to stream free November 21 (5 PM ET) to November 28, 2025 (5 PM ET).
The National Museum of the American Indian’s Native Cinema Showcase is an annual celebration of the best in Native film. This year, the museum highlights an array of film shorts featuring a diverse range of Indigenous stories and perspectives.
Natalie Heneghan (she/her)
Community Outreach Director
Habitat for Humanity of the Greater La Crosse Region
What is it?
The LFIS Friendship Family Program, in cooperation with UW-La Crosse, Viterbo University, and Western Technical College, is not a live-in program but rather to promote cross-cultural understanding by fostering relationships between international students and La Crosse area residents. You, as a member of the local community who are familiar with how things function in the U.S., will be able to cultivate relationships with students from other countries, enabling you to expand upon your personal experience by learning more about the ways of life in other countries and vice versa. Friendship families may help make the student’s transition into American life go more smoothly. This is often an enjoyable and rewarding experience for both families and students.
What Is Expected?
You should contact your student(s) after you are matched and invite them to your home for a meal or on an outing (shopping, touring, et cetera). You may invite them to spend American holidays with you, birthday celebrations, outings to historical sites, occupational and professional experiences, sports events, and elementary, middle and high school programs.
MORE DETAILS HERE: https://lfis.info/family-apply
Please Note:
From Sierra Club
Learn more about data centers and those pushing back
Join us on Monday to learn more about the risks data centers pose and what communities are doing in response. Wisconsinites are ramping up their fight against unchecked data center expansion—from DeForest to Port Washington. Learn about the environmental and health impacts of data centers, how to inform your neighbors, and how to get involved.
November 24, 2025 at 6:30 PM
RSVP to attend the Zoom here.
Want to do even more? Announcing our new Action Nights!
Starting in December, the Wisconsin Chapter will host monthly Action Nights where you can gather with others and take action on some of the most pressing issues. Data center protections will be one of the topics at our first-ever Action Night.
Action Night
Tuesday, December 9, 2025
5:30–6:30 PM
RSVP here for the Zoom link.
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For more about how data center fever threatens to undo climate action and environmental protection gains, read Future data centers are driving up forecasts for energy demand and U.S. Data Centers Could Consume as Much Water as 10 Million Americans by Decade’s End
Will it do any good? Isn't this demockracy where all the decisions are MADE and THEN they have a public hearing?
Still, there's a chance to make some changes.
If you want to speak, show up by 5:45 p.m. to sign in.
Call for Nominations: 2026 Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Award
• For questions, information, and nomination forms, reach out to Anouk Goreta, goretaa@westerntc.edu.
• Click here to retrieve a nomination form.
• Deadline is Friday, December 5, 2025, at 11:59 p.m.
Criteria:
Do you know someone who embodies Dr. King’s legacy? This award was established in 2009 and honors individuals who demonstrate outstanding leadership and commitment to building community, enhancing diversity, and working for justice in the Greater La Crosse area in the following:
• Building inclusive communities and celebrating diversity
• Advancing justice, equity, and systemic change
• Championing social justice, peace, and nonviolence
• Empowering future generations
• Going above and beyond their professional roles
• Making a difference locally—and beyond
Invitation:
Join us for the MLK Community Celebration featuring Rev, Adam Russell Taylor, president of Sojourners, Monday, Jan. 19, 2026, 7 p.m. Viterbo University Fine Arts Center Main Theatre, La Crosse.
Rev. Adam Russell Taylor is president of Sojourners, and author of A More Perfect Union: A New Vision for Building the Beloved Community. Sojourners is a Christian organization that promotes justice and a multiracial democracy. Rooted in Jesus’ teachings and the vision of the Beloved Community, Taylor seeks to replace fear and division with a vision that uplifts the vulnerable, promotes the common good, and enables all communities to thrive. www.viterbo.edu/ethics
Learn more about Coulee DSA here https://coulee.dsawi.org
Also on Saturday from noon to 2:30 at or around Burns Park, there will be a picnic with free food, bring some if you can, and a collection of non-perishable food items.
If at all possible, please show up to support the 3rd and 4th Street bike lanes NOVEMBER 13 at City Hall at 6 p.m. There is no public input allowed at this meeting (if you haven't yet emailed and/or called your council rep about this, please do it Thursday before 6!!)
Signs are not allowed at council meetings, so PLEASE WEAR YOUR BIKE HELMET whether you bike there or not. Some council members are apparently waffling. We need all the advocacy we can get!
WisDOT will be reconstructing 3rd and 4th Streets, both state highways, and have given the city two options. One would remove one lane of car parking to give enough space for a parking protected bike lane on each street. The other option would keep all car parking, narrowing the parking lanes a bit in order to widen the sidewalks with zero bike infrastructure.
The La Crosse City Council will vote on which option to recommend. They should recommend Alternative 1.
The La Crosse Climate Action Plan calls for increasing and improving safe-for-all-ages-and-abilities bike infrastructure in order to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from Vehicle Miles Traveled. This is an opportunity to invite more people to bike to shopping, events, and social engagements, paid for by WisDOT.
Thirteen years' worth of studies have proven that ONLY protected bike lanes (not paint, not sharrows) provide actual safety for bike riders AND for all other road users.
Studies also show that better bike infrastructure increases business at bike lane-adjacent businesses. It slows traffic and makes it easier for those walking and biking by to stop and check out stores and restaurants on the route. In fact, when a Toronto politician tried to remove a bike lane from a shopping street, the business owners fought back.
There are some concerns from those with disabilities, but there are models and examples of best practices to take special needs of those with mobility and vision impairments into consideration.
Please contact your council member and come to the City Council meeting Thursday night at 6 p.m. at City Hall! Wear your helmet!!
From Opportunity Wisconsin:
Congressional Republicans, including Congressman Derrick Van Orden, shut down the government just because they refused to lower health care costs for Wisconsin families. Republicans would rather shut down the government, which is going to cause real pain for Wisconsin families, than reverse their harmful health care cuts or prevent premiums from skyrocketing. Earlier this year, they acted quickly to make tax breaks for billionaires and big corporations permanent - now they’re sitting on their hands while the government is shut down because of the crisis they created.
Join us on Thursday, Nov 13th, from 4:00-5:30 outside Rep. Derrick Van Orden’s La Crosse office to call on Congressman Van Orden to take action to keep health care costs down.
Feel free to bring signs and make your voices heard! (No electoral signs please!)
Event site: https://www.mobilize.us/owi/event/870002/
Last night, Senate Republicans slipped something into the government funding package that should set off alarms for every taxpayer.
Tucked away in the continuing resolution is a provision allowing certain GOP senators — whose phone records were seized during the Jack Smith Jan 6 investigation — to sue the federal government for $500,000 or more each time their communications were accessed without notice.
Let that sink in:
A measure financed by your tax dollars—
Written into a spending bill you pay for—
Designed to give handouts to the very lawmakers who just enabled it.
House Republicans were furious. Not because it’s corruption—it’s because they were left out of the deal. This means we have leverage. They’re exposed.
This is our moment to hit the system when it’s vulnerable.
🔍 What to Know
The rollover bill to end the shutdown now heads to the House.
If this clause stays in — the bill passes — the government reopens with the payout intact.
That means: a corrupt precedent, billion-dollar distractions, and people still suffering while lawmakers get sweet deals.
📞 What You Need to Do Today
The House reconvenes at noon ET. A vote is expected soon after.
Find your representative at house.gov/representatives
Call them. Tell them: “If this payout-provision stays in the bill, I expect you to vote NO on the continuing resolution.”
Share this message. Make noise. Flood those lines. This afternoon matters.
From The Peoples Sick Day: No work. No School. No Purchases. No streaming. No feeding the system.
From La Crosse Area Transit Advocates:
There is one more opportunity to speak, on Monday Nov. 10 at 5 p.m. Though the odds are not good, there's still a possibility to change minds and hearts.
Especially if you live in La Crosse County and/or work with clients, students, patients who use the SMRT in the county, please come if you can.
This is a final budget public input meeting so people will be there to talk about all kinds of budget issues. Doors open at 4:30 to sign up to speak. Each speaker gets just two minutes.
Please come if you can. Please share.
If you can't, write to CountyBoardSupervisors@LaCrosseCounty.org and say, "I cannot come to the November 10 budget hearing, but here is what I would say."
Ironically, a bill is now being circulated in the state legislature to enable Regional Transit Authorities. It will be introduced next month. Please contact our representatives and ask them to co-sponsor the bill being circulated by Rep. Bare and Sen. Roys. Contact us for more infomation - LaCrosseTransitAdvocates@proton.me.
Fokus Photo in the Rivoli Arts District is offering a free professional individual or family studio portrait on Saturday, November 15 from 2 to 5 p.m. in exchange for a food or money donation to What I Need Now. The most needed donations are things that don't need cooking plus money and food gift cards.
Learn more at Fokus-photo.com
Tuesday, November 18 from 5 to 9 p.m. in La Crosse
Join Pete Buttigieg for a town hall discussion about what’s at stake in the months ahead, but also about the everyday challenges people are facing: the cost of housing, child care, health care, and the need for leadership that actually listens.
This event will take place in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Location and arrival instructions will be sent the day before.
SIGN UP HERE: https://www.mobilize.us/wintheera/event/868212/
From SDS
Join SDS at Riverside Park at 3 p.m. Friday for a National Day of Protest
You do not need to be a student to come and protest with us. We will be protesting against Trump's higher education compact and for La Crosse to be a sanctuary city! We will have some signs and water, so don't worry if you don't know what to bring. Otherwise, if you do have signs (anything anti-MAGA is fine), feel free to bring them!
Science advocates like you will have the opportunity to speak directly with elected officials, share your story, and advocate for affordable energy, clean air and water, and an actionable climate plan that puts people first.
Wisconsin Climate Day of Action at Capitol
Tuesday, November 11
9:30 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. CT
Wisconsin State Capitol, 2 E Main St., Madison
RSVP now for the day of action!
The day will be centered around energy accountability and affordability, specifically these three key priorities:
All lobby day attendees will have a preparation session and then a scheduled visit with their elected officials in both the House and Senate. The day will include a light breakfast, briefings and lobby training, testimony prep time, a press event with guest speakers, scheduled lobby visits, and lunch.
Don't wait—take a minute to RSVP now! We hope to see you there.
Library Director Dawn Wacek recently appeared on WIZM to discuss the issue. Listen hear. According to the WIZM summary, "One of those options is to close the north side library branch. Other options include cuts to staff, services and hours — all of which may likely happen, regardless of the fate of the north branch library." [emphasis added]
The North Side Library may serve fewer people than the main branch, but it is an important community "third space" that helps strengthen the neighborhood. This area of La Crosse is also a high non-driver area (in some block groups, 40% or more are non-drivers) meaning if the neighborhood space closes, chances are good people will not use the far away alternative. With hourly evening bus service the transit "time tax" would be too great.
Many individuals and some groups have offered to volunteer to keep this space open if personnel costs are an issue (they are). Some of us grew up during a time when there were only one or two librarians and some volunteer helpers who shelved books, helped you find something to read, and checked you out. For many, that is preferable to having no library or one that is not accessible.
Of course if you work or have no car, Tuesday at 4 p.m. is not the greatest chance to give feedback. This library is accessibke using the MTU at least.
If you can't attend the meeting, please email using the Library Board's feedback form and/or sending emails to the director and board members. Find that information here: https://www.lacrosselibrary.org/about/boards
From League of Women Voters:
Issues surrounding immigration are much in the news and producing a wide spectrum of public responses. The LWV has identified Immigration as a social issue to impact through education and advocacy. Please join us for November’s Lunch and Learn when we welcome Ben Sonsalla, Immigrant Advocate for Catholic Charities. Ben will present an overview of immigration in the US, current issues in the Coulee Region, his work with Catholic Charities, and suggestions for actions we can take to support our neighbors who are immigrant workers.
Registration will reserve lunch and provide a Zoom link for virtual attendance. The public is welcome to join us for lunch or at no cost to attend the 12:00 p.m. program only. A recording of the program will be posted on our website a few days after the live event.
Lunches must be reserved and paid for by the end of the day Wednesday, 11/5. Pre-paid lunches are nonrefundable.
From La Crosse Area Transit Advocates:
We believe the proposal to end the SMRT has been made without enough concern for these riders and the far-reaching benefits of the service and without enough research into how the system could be improved to address the issues outlined. We strongly urge the County Board to fund the SMRT in 2026.
We encourage everyone who understands that public transportation is an essential right to sign our petition, contact our County Board, and, if possible, attend a public hearing to speak for the SMRT.
Information about SMRT
You can listen to the audio of the September 8 County Board planning meeting where the plan to stop the SMRT at the end of 2025 was presented (starts at 31:09). The minutes of the meeting are here; they include a summary of some of the numbers mentioned in the audio. The presentation slides are here. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vEkG_8xSI7dHoNZ_bD66BhyGuDjqRX26/view?usp=sharing
If you haven't yet, please sign the petition at https://tinyurl.com/savethesmrt
Please contact - meeting, phone call, or email - your county board representative. Your personal SMRT story will have an impact. If you can't meet with your rep. in person or by phone, please email CountyBoardSupervisors@LaCrosseCounty.org
Ask your organization, club, faith group to send a letter supporting the SMRT, too!
Learn more about the issue at https://tinyurl.com/savethesmrtpage
Here are a few online opportunities for learning, connecting, supporting.
Native American Heritage Month resources from the American Writers Museum.
Gather (2020) - GATHER follows the stories of natives on the frontlines of a growing movement to reconnect with spiritual and cultural identities that were devastated by genocide.
Alaska's Vanishing Native Villages (2025) - A look inside Alaska Native villages fighting for survival against climate change. With the Howard Center at ASU, FRONTLINE examines why communities are relocating and why they’re struggling to preserve their traditions.
In celebration of Native American Heritage Month, award-winning historian Kathleen DuVal discusses her new book, Native Nations: A Millennium in North America, tracing a thousand years of Native history—from the rise of ancient cities and the arrival of Europeans to today’s ongoing fights for sovereignty. Thomas Donnelly, chief scholar of the National Constitution Center, moderates.
Register for link: https://constitutioncenter.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DfZUJxoZQ1u8OCNKXcEdpA#/registration
Menominee Agriculture from Past to Future. Thursday, Nov 13 at Noon. Miranda Wasinawatok will share archaeological insights shaped by both personal experience and academic training to highlight the significance of Menominee agriculture in Wisconsin. While earlier narratives framed ancestral Menominee as primarily hunter-gatherers, archaeological evidence has supported a long-standing agricultural tradition, which Miranda has been fortunate to witness in reshaping understanding. Miranda will discuss how the archaeological record informs strategies for food sovereignty and strengthens connections to ancestral knowledge. Register: https://www.wiwic.org/event-details/native-american-heritage-webinar-series-menominee-agriculture-from-past-to-future
Also, donate to pantries and food drives. Do you belong to a church? Can they host daily or weekly soup & bread meals?
CALL DVO and demand that SNAP funds, already allocated, be spent. This should not be another Irish "potato famine," where the resources are available but the powerful choose who is important and who is NOT. This has been part of the plan. Don't let them.
List of food resources in La Crosse county.
From Opportunity Wisconsin
CANCELED due to illness
Protest at 5 pm, 210 S. 7th St.
Congressional Republicans, including Congressman Derrick Van Orden, shut down the government just because they refused to lower health care costs for Wisconsin families. Republicans would rather shut down the government, which is going to cause real pain for Wisconsin families, than reverse their harmful health care cuts or prevent premiums from skyrocketing. Earlier this year, they acted quickly to make tax breaks for billionaires and big corporations permanent - now they’re sitting on their hands while the government is shut down because of the crisis they created.
Join us on Thursday, Oct. 30th, from 5:00-6:30 outside Rep. Derrick Van Orden’s La Crosse office to call on Congressman Van Orden to end the government shutdown and take action to keep health care costs down.
Feel free to wear costumes, bring signs and make your voices heard! (No electoral signs please!)
Upcoming Public Input Sessions on the city's zoning update process:
October 2025
Community Input Meetings to review Draft Zoning Code Recommendations
October 29 – Noon - 2:00 pm at Black River Beach Neighborhood Center 🚌 #6
5:00 pm - 7:00 pm at South Side Neighborhood Center 🚌 #1 + circulators
November 2025
Nov 10 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of La Crosse, 401 West Ave. S. 🚌 #2 + circulator
Nov 17 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm at 5th Ward Community Room, 1221 Hagar St 🚌 #5
Nov 24 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm at First Congregational Church, Main St & Losey Blvd 🚌 #4
https://forwardlacrosse.org/
AND
October 30 at 5:30 A panel conversation about city planning at Oolala Consign, 1006 19th St S (Jackson Plaza). There will be snacks. 🚌 Circulator
