After receiving an apparent bomb threat Tuesday morning, police evacuated the Capitol for several hours as a safety precaution.
A statement released by the Department of Administration said Capitol Police were notified of the threat by a media outlet, which had received a bomb threat directed toward the Capitol.
Police evacuated those inside and closed the Capitol beginning at 10 a.m.
Julie Laundrie, spokesperson for Democratic Senate Minority Leader Jon Erpenbach, was among those evacuated and said they were given very little information.
“We could tell it was a bomb threat, but it wasn’t confirmed,” Laundrie said.
People in the Capitol at the time of the threat were asked to move beyond Capitol grounds, at least one block away, Laundrie said.
The statement said Gov. Jim Doyle was inside the Capitol at the time of the threat and was evacuated as well.
The Dane County Sheriff K-9 Unit and other police forces teamed up with the Capitol Police to search the building’s interior and perimeter.
The areas in and around the Capitol are still being monitored by Capitol Police, and investigation of the threat is ongoing, the statement added.
Laundrie said incidents similar to the evacuation happen somewhat often at the Capitol.
“We hope the person is caught and it puts everyone’s business to rest,” Laundrie said.
The statement also said the Capitol is now open to the public again.
The Capitol bomb threat comes after a series of other recent scares near prominent downtown facilities.
The threat is the third recent bomb threat in the downtown area. In August Madison police responded to a call regarding a suspicious device near the University of Wisconsin Charter Street power plant.
After the incident, a Madison-area woman said her van had been broken into and afterwards she found a strange pipe attached to the rear of the vehicle.
A similar scare came with packages of unknown origin on Monona Terrace and the 100 block of State Street earlier this month.
Madison Police said the two previous scares were coincidental, and neither turned out to be serious threats.
