“Officials Approve $8 Million for Housing for Immigrant Dairy Workers in Wisconsin. Sheriff’s Office Will Try to Close Language Gaps”

County officials in Wisconsin approved reforms this week meant to respond to a ProPublica report on the flawed investigation into the 2019 death of a Nicaraguan boy on a dairy farm. They include an $8 million fund for farmworker housing and measures to improve access to government services for people who don’t speak English…

Separately, the sheriff’s office in Dane County — which investigated the boy’s death — has drafted its first-ever written policy on how to respond to residents with limited English proficiency.

The changes come in response to a February report by ProPublica that detailed the flawed law enforcement investigation into the death of Jefferson Rodríguez, an 8-year-old boy who had lived in a barn above a milking parlor on the farm where his father worked about a half-hour north of Madison…

In a recent interview, Rodríguez said he was glad to learn that the story of what happened to his son has led to changes that could help other immigrants. “Perhaps if all of this had happened five or six years ago, my situation would have been entirely different,” he said..