EAU CLAIRE â The COVID-19 pandemic made 2020 a difficult final year of service for all three of west-central Wisconsinâs outgoing state legislators, but the frustration felt by Sen. Patty Schachtner was intensely personal.
Not only did Schachtner, a Somerset Democrat, see the dark side of the pandemic daily in her other job as medical examiner for St. Croix County, but this fall the virus hit her family hard.
The toll began with a sister-in-law, brother-in-law, sister and niece testing positive and ended when her father, Richard Rivard, came down with the virus. The 88-year-old U.S. Air Force veteran, who was a resident at Hammond Health Services, died from COVID-19 on Nov. 14.