In This Issue:
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1. Bailout 911
2. America's Waiting
Room
3. Have Taxpayer
Funds, Will Travel
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Bailout 911
 In the most brazen and cynical power grab of his Administration to date, Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle has created a new 15 person state agency to dole out $3.5 billion dollars in federal stimulus funds.
In order to avoid legislative oversight and public debate over how the money is spent, Doyle created the agency by Executive Order and appointed Utility Executive Gary Wolter and Al Fish, UW Madison Associate Vice Chancellor for facilities planning and management to run it. Wolter’s company, Madison Gas and Electric, is regulated by Doyle’s Public Service Commission, and Wolter and his wife Mari have donated more than $21,000 to Doyle’s campaign. Al Fish is married to Doyle’s long time political confidante and Chief of Staff, Susan Goodwin.
In recent weeks the Governor has appeared before Congress asking for more than $3.5 billion, to ease what he claims is the effect of the recession on Wisconsin's state budget. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, $1.2 billion of Wisconsin’s share of the government bailout is eligible to be spent on plugging budget holes. In essence, Doyle is being rewarded for six years of irresponsible budgeting and incompetent administration of state government.
Doyle says his new agency will “work to understand how state and local projects can qualify for the most federal aid possible; recommend changes in purchasing and procurement rules so the federal money can be used as quickly as possible; and to identify rules and regulations that must be changed to qualify for the money.”
In other words, the agency will be used to usurp the legislature’s power to appropriate funds, and to circumvent state civil service and procurement laws. Doyle will say these moves are necessary to expedite projects that will stimulate the economy and create new jobs. But the real reason Doyle chose to use political cronies to dole out contracts without the legally required procedures is that it will grant him complete control over the appropriations process, making it easier for him to extort campaign contributions from special interests and their lobbyists without fear of reprisal.
The only "emergency" is that Doyle and company may not be able to shovel the money out the door fast enough to avoid public scrutiny and criticism.
Doyle and his top aides came under scrutiny in 2006 after several questionable contracts were awarded to major campaign contributors. In one case, a contract that had been awarded to Prism Developers to build UW Milwaukee’s Kenilworth dormitory was rebid after Janesville Developer J.P. Cullen & Associates complained to a top Doyle official and made a sizeable contribution to his campaign. During the rebidding process, Administration Secretary Mark Marotta met with yet another developer, Doug Weas, whose company was eventually awarded the contract worth $68 million. Weas and his partners gave Dole’s campaign $51,000.
The role of the legislature is to appropriate funds, and Doyle has taken usurping the legislature's power of the purse to an art form. In 2005 when Republicans controlled the legislature, Doyle used his veto pen to transfer over $400 million dollars from the state transportation to pay for schools. The veto was viewed as legally tenuous at the time, but legislative Republicans and transportation interests decided not to challenge the veto in court. Legislators feared voters would punish them for "opposing" education funding, and transportation interests feared that Doyle would cut them off from state contracts. The result is we have gaping holes in the transportation fund, exacerbated by excessive bonding to fund ongoing transportation projects. To make matters worse, Doyle now wants to put state and local taxpayers on the hook for billions more in borrowed funds for projects they don’t need or want.
Doyle’s veto power has been curbed by voters in a statewide referendum and both houses of the legislature are controlled by Democrats. So, Doyle has decided to replace them with a 15 person agency over which he has complete control. Will legislative Democrats be as accommodating of Doyle’s power grab as Republicans were in 2005?
Call or write your state legislators now. Tell them stop Doyle‘s latest power grab.
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America's Waiting Room
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In early January, Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Russ Decker announced plans to re-introduce “Healthy Wisconsin,” a $15.2 billion government-run universal health plan. The plan was originally introduced by Senate Democrats as part of the 2007-09 state budget. However, it became a political liability for many candidates during the 2008 elections when voters learned the plan uses taxpayer dollars to fund health care for illegal immigrants and non-residents.
This week, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute released a study that estimates 143,000 sick people from other states will move to Wisconsin to take advantage of this "free" health care plan. As a “health care magnet,” Wisconsin taxpayers would shell out $550 million more annually to accommodate the influx of sick people from other states.
According to a recent study by Princeton University, Wisconsin already has a strong in-migration of low income residents.
At low income levels, there is strong net in-migration into
Wisconsin; however, at higher income levels, in-migration is
small or negative. Hence, one can say that Wisconsin is more
attractive to low-income individuals than high-income earners.
To understand that Wisconsin will become a magnet, one need look no further than the mid-1990’s, when it was widely reported that a massive influx of welfare recipients into Wisconsin was occuring due to our generous benefits. As a result, Tommy Thompson became the first governor to reform welfare. This time, no reforming is necessary. Citizens merely need to let their legislators know that they don’t want to pay higher taxes to fund health care for families in Georgia.
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Have Taxpayer Funds, Will Travel
Across the nation, the slumping economy has forced ordinary citizens to delay retirements as well vacation plans until they can rebuild their savings again. Just last week, 1100 workers at Milwaukee based Harley Davidson learned they would lose their jobs.
But County supervisors Elizabeth Coggs and Toni Clark had no such concerns when they booked their recent trip to Washington DC to attend President Barack Obama’s inauguration, because taxpayers picked up the tab. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, expenses included $931 for round-trip airfare and hotel bills for Clark that cost up to $644 a night.
Clark and Coggs, who claimed they were in Washington, D.C. on business, apparently never made it to several of the meetings they scheduled. As a result, both supervisors have been shamed into reimbursing the county for their D.C. joyride. Ironic that in order to see a President that promises “hope” and “change,” the supervisors resorted to stealing money from taxpayers – something that has been the status quo in Milwaukee county government for decades.
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