Those wishing to carry a concealed weapon in Wisconsin would have to obtain a permit and meet training requirements, under a compromise bill advanced Thursday by the Legislature?s Joint Finance Committee.
The Wisconsin Legislature will take up Gov. Walker?s first budget starting Tuesday.
The proposed state budget could end up denying Internet access to many Wisconsin residents, because if it is passed as currently written, four rural communities around the state could see their Internet disconnected.
lawyer for the University of Wisconsin System says there are ways for its colleges to offer tuition breaks to illegal immigrants even if state lawmakers approve a provision to end the practice.
There are ways for universities to reduce tuition for illegal immigrants, even if state lawmakers vote to stop offering them in-state tuition, according to a lawyer for the University of Wisconsin System. Chancellors have wide discretion in offering students lower tuition rates, UW System General Counsel Tomas Stafford said Thursday. For example, schools have access to a pool of institutional aid that could be used to reduce tuition for illegal immigrants.
A lawyer for the University of Wisconsin System said there are ways for its colleges to offer tuition breaks to illegal immigrants even if state lawmakers approve a provision to end the practice.
University of Wisconsin System officials said Thursday they can offer significant tuition breaks to illegal immigrants even if lawmakers approve provisions in the state budget designed to curtail that practice.
The University of Wisconsin would have to return nearly $40 million in federal funds – money intended to pay for community networks and improve broadband service for public entities – if a state budget provision aimed at protecting rural telecommunications providers becomes law. UW officials say the proposal also would prevent research universities in the state from participating in a high-speed system that connects them with research universities nationwide. “The consequences would be catastrophic,” said Paul DeLuca, provost at UW-Madison.
Wisconsin?s economy is faring pretty well in the short term, but the long-term outlook looks shakier. At the Wisconsin Real Estate and Economic Outlook Conference at the Fluno Center in Madison Thursday, University of Wisconsin Foundation president and CEO Michael Knetter said Wisconsin has been swimming too slowly as global tides shift to technology-based economies. ?Our economic growth outlook as a state is not great in terms of the long-term fundamentals,? Knetter, former dean of the Wisconsin School of Business, told WisBusiness.com after his speech. Controversy has raged over the past few months over Walker?s efforts to curb collective bargaining for public employees, give the UW-Madison control over its own spending and policies and cut government services.
The Walker administration says it?s getting ready for large crowds of protestors next week, when the full Legislature takes up the proposed new state budget. About 60 people protested against the new state budget outside a building at UW-Madison where Governor Scott Walker was speaking yesterday.
“That?s opportunity knocking for all of us now.”
Gov. Scott Walker got his biggest applause line for that off-hand remark, made midway through his keynote address Thursday at an annual housing conference at UW-Madison. It came right after four hard, booming knocks ? clearly audible over Walker?s words in the packed Fluno Center auditorium ? as protesters opposed to the governor?s budget-cutting policies pounded their disdain on the outside walls of the building.
The UW Board of Regents vowed Thursday to fight legislation that would force the University of Wisconsin System to return millions in federal grant money and cut off support for a statewide Internet provider.
“This is the largest threat I?ve seen to our enterprise since I?ve been here,” UW-Madison Provost Paul DeLuca told the Regents.
On June 3, the state Legislature?s Joint Committee on Finance slipped several policy items into the state biennial budget that would change the way the Internet service provider WiscNet operates and require the University of Wisconsin to return more than $32 million in federal grant money awarded in August 2010 for a broadband expansion project.
The proposed changes to WiscNet could result in schools, libraries and institutions of higher education paying two to three times more for Internet access from for-profit providers. Actually, it?s more accurate to say that taxpayers would foot the increased bill, or library patrons and students would no longer have the access they need and want. The policy changes would also disrupt the ability of the UW to pursue its research and education mission.
A dozen silent demonstrators wearing zombie makeup and protest T-shirts were arrested early Wednesday afternoon after lying down on the floor of a legislator?s Capitol offices and refusing to leave.
A budget approved by a legislative committee last week would force the University of Wisconsin to return $39-million in federal grants awarded to expand high-speed Internet access across the state, state education officials said.
A battle is brewing over internet connectivity after the legislature?s budget committee approved legislation late last week that would return a big federal grant for broadband and end the UW System?s support of a public service internet provider.
UW System support for a statewide high-speed network that supplies schools, hospitals and municipal governments across Wisconsin with necessary bandwidth would be severely curtailed under a proposal approved by the Republican controlled Joint Finance Committee.
Elizabeth Warren, the leader of President Barack Obama?s controversial new mortgage industry watchdog, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, will not speak at a UW-Madison conference on real estate and the economy this week. But she is sending an official from her agency, Patricia McCoy, to give a short presentation about the CFPB?s new mortgage disclosure program. Other speakers include Gov. Scott Walker, U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan and Michael Knetter, former dean of UW-Madison?s School of Business and now president of the UW Foundation.
The news that Republican legislators plan to send back $37 million in funding for broadband access should come as no surprise, since Republicans have made it clear they want to replace everything from Medicare to public education with privatized voucher systems, while forbidding local governments to provide services available in the for-profit market.
Madison city officials and housing advocates are reeling from a one-two punch delivered by new GOP legislation that threatens to erase several decades worth of renter protections enacted here and Mayor Paul Soglin has come out swinging in response.
The Joint Finance Committee slipped into the budget bill an attack on rural Internet access which will kill a federally funded UW-Extension program to expand broadband service in underserved areas and cripple WiscNet, a public-private partnership that helps school districts and libraries get online…The amendment saves no taxpayer dollars and prevents Wisconsin from using a major federal grant.The UW System was built on the notion that public universities should use their resources to benefit the public. I urge the Legislature to remove this provision.
Wisconsin state Superintendent Tony Evers is blasting a decision by the Legislature?s budget-writing committee to reject about $39 million in federal money to extend broadband Internet access across the state. The Joint Finance Committee voted Friday to force the University of Wisconsin System to return the money and no longer support WiscNet, a non-profit cooperative that brings high-speed Internet services to about 75 percent of public schools in Wisconsin and nearly all public libraries. Evers said Tuesday that the move would likely mean WiscNet could no longer provide Internet services and if that happens schools and libraries will have to pay double or three times what they do now. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald says the issue may be revisited before the budget is voted on next week.
The term “you?re killing me” will take on a whole new life in Madison on Wednesday, as college students from across Wisconsin protest what they call anti-student legislation. The students will be “dying” and then dragging their returned-to-life zombie bodies around Capitol Square at noon Wednesday in a protest planned by the United Council of University of Wisconsin Students.
It is accurate to say UW Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin did not get everything she wanted with her New Badger Partnership proposal. And that?s too bad because, in fact, she is right
UW-Madison will remain a part of the University of Wisconsin System. However, UW schools are expecting massive cuts in the state budget.
Wisconsin state Superintendent Tony Evers is blasting a decision by the Legislature?s budget-writing committee to reject about $39 million in federal money to extend broadband Internet access across the state.
A provision put into the state budget bill late last week could have wide-ranging affects for the University of Wisconsin and public schools around the state.
The state budget package approved last week at the committee level contains no plan to split the University of Wisconsin-Madison from the UW System, a wise move at this juncture.
The University of Wisconsin System would be forced to return about $37 million in federal funds intended to extend broadband Internet across Wisconsin, under a provision passed by the Legislature?s budget committee Friday. The legislation would also prohibit UW System campuses from supporting WiscNet, a cooperative that brings high-speed Internet to most schools and libraries across the state. Campus leaders say they fear the change could cripple the network.
The state supreme court had a long day, nearly 7 hours of questions, answers and arguments about the collective bargaining bill.
The state Supreme Court heard arguments Monday on whether to take up a lawsuit over the state?s polarizing collective bargaining law.
The state Supreme Court will hear arguments on Monday morning on whether to take up a lawsuit over the collective bargaining law.
The University of Wisconsin?s flagship Madison campus would receive more flexibility in how it operates but it would also remain part of the university system under changes to Gov. Scott Walker?s budget approved by a legislative committee Friday. Funding to all campuses would be cut 11 percent, the same level Walker proposed. The Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee voted along party lines 12-4 to reject Walker?s proposal to break Madison off from the 13-campus system before completing work on the budget shortly after midnight early Saturday morning. While Madison would remain in the system, it and all the campuses would have more flexibility in how they spend state money and make decisions related to personnel and other areas.
The Legislature?s powerful budget committee has finished its work on Gov. Scott Walker?s two-year spending plan. The budget now heads to the full Legislature, where debates in the state Assembly and Senate are expected to begin in about a week. The GOP-controlled Joint Finance Committee finished soon after midnight Saturday morning. The budget balances a projected $3 billion budget hole. It does not raise taxes overall, but makes sharp cuts to public schools and the University of Wisconsin.
Legislators officially killed plans Friday to turn UW-Madison into an independent authority, opting instead to give more flexibility to every campus in the University of Wisconsin System. The new plan would give all of the state universities and two-year colleges greater freedom over personnel and property decisions and provide university leaders a block grant that would allow the individual schools to keep money saved through cost-saving measures. The proposal unveiled Friday would also create a panel of experts to study ways to add even more flexibility to the university system.
MADISON, Wis. — Republicans have voted to ban using state money to pay for abortions at a Madison medical facility where they aren?t being performed. The GOP-controlled budget committee of the Legislature voted on Friday to ban using state money for abortions at the Madison Surgery Center, which is operated by the University of Wisconsin Hospitals and Clinics Authority.
Wrapping up its work Friday amid more protests, the Legislature?s budget committee voted to cut taxes for manufacturers, keep the state?s flagship university as part of the University of Wisconsin System and open up a possible Milwaukee-style school voucher program in Green Bay.
Mentions a 2010 report written by Donald A. Nichols, a retired University of Wisconsin-Madison economics professor.
Dear Editor: Gov. Scott Walker decreased state employees? take-home pay and their ability to meet their personal budgets and keep their homes. This clearly caused chronic heightened stress.
….Media reports regarding medical excuses written by physicians missed this key information, which more accurately answers the ?why? question for those stories in terms of the Hippocratic Oath.
Quoted: Peter Rickman, a University of Wisconsin-Madison law student and Teaching Assistants? Association member.
The state has also been home to a highly charged fight — now reaching its climax — over whether to grant autonomy and administrative flexibility to the University of Wisconsin at Madison. The debate has been closely watched in other states where college officials and lawmakers are questioning assumptions about the relationship between state governments and their public institutions of higher education, particularly flagships, as public funding continues to dry up.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison campus remains part of the entire UW System, under the budget passed through the Joint Finance Committee early this morning. Amid several disruptions by protesters, the Republican-controlled panel continued its work, opting against consideration of Governor Scott Walker?s proposal to split the system and give the flagship campus individual authority.
The University of Wisconsin?s flagship Madison campus would receive more flexibility in how it operates but it would also remain part of the university system under changes to Gov. Scott Walker?s budget approved by a legislative committee Friday. Funding to all campuses would be cut 11 percent, the same level Walker proposed.
As the Wisconsin Idea has long been a model for public higher education in this country, it is a propitious time to at once reaffirm and replenish our public commitment. Just over a half-century ago, Helen C. White reaffirmed Wisconsin?s motto of public higher education, calling again for a “continual and fearless sifting and winnowing in the pursuit of truth.”
Now is the time to reaffirm that creed, seize the moment and re-imagine public higher education both in Wisconsin and across our nation. [A column by Geoffrey Mamerow, a doctoral student in higher education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; and Clifton Conrad is professor of higher education at UW-Madison.]
University of Wisconsin System campuses will be granted some freedoms from state oversight on budgeting, personnel, construction and purchasing when the Legislature?s Republican-led budget-writing committee meets later Friday.
The Madison campus will remain a part of the University of Wisconsin System under changes to be approved by the Legislature?s budget committee, but it and other campuses will be given new flexibilities.
The state’s flagship university will remain part of the University of Wisconsin System, with all public universities receiving deep cuts but also new flexibilities from state rules, under a proposal coming before lawmakers Friday.
The Legislature?s budget committee re-opened the fight over collective bargaining rights shortly after midnight on Friday, proposing that newly hired police and firefighters be forced to pay more for their health insurance and pension benefits. The change, approved by the Republican-controlled committee on an 11-4 party line vote, would force police and firefighters to make the same level of contributions as other public workers as required under a bill pushed by Gov. Scott Walker and passed by the Legislature in March.
Quoted: Peter Rickman, a leader in the University of Wisconsin-Madison?s Teaching Assistants Association.
Now that an ill-conceived plan to cleave the Madison campus from the rest of the University of Wisconsin System is dead, state lawmakers need to take a deep breath and carefully consider the best options for UW. Unfortunately, there still seems to be a rush to make changes as part of the state budget.
A better idea: Consider these matters as a separate bill.
When the Legislature?s Joint Finance Committee finally gets around to taking up the University of Wisconsin System?s budget, faculty, staff and administrators at campuses across the state will be holding their collective breath. Leaders within both UW-Madison and the UW System have been spending seemingly every waking moment since mid-February pushing their proposals for how to break public higher education free from state oversight so campuses can operate more efficiently and effectively. The problem is that UW-Madison and UW System officials have been unable to get on the same page to pitch a unified message.
Yet another budget battle is looming in Madison. The Joint Finance Committee is finishing up its work on the two-year budget.
Recent events in Wisconsin draw into sharp relief the dilemmas faced by systems — particularly where land grant institutions are involved. While independence for the University of Wisconsin at Madison is now unlikely, a key fact has been overlooked. Whether the current structures in Wisconsin and elsewhere are ideal or seriously flawed, they have not been historically set in stone, and in fact reflect significant changes in mission and governance in most states.
Protesters disrupted a meeting of the Legislature?s budget writing committee, shouting down lawmakers and chanting “Shame!”
It was chaos at the Capitol Thursday night when protesters erupted as lawmakers worked on final changes to the budget they?ll start debating next week.
Just when you think things can?t get any more bizarre in the UW-Madison vs. UW System family feud ….UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin emailed leaders across the UW System Wednesday night to say she was “dismayed” by a press release put out earlier in the day by the Badger Advocates, a privately funded group of more than a dozen lobbyists advocating at the Capitol on behalf of Martin and her vision for a new business relationship between the state and Wisconsin?s flagship higher education institution.
With lawmakers gearing up for a vote on the state budget, a ?Walkerville? camp similar to the one that sprang up during the protests at the state Capitol earlier this year may be returning this weekend ? this time to the terraces of Mifflin and Carroll streets.
We Are Wisconsin, an alliance of community groups, labor unions and others, has asked the city for a permit to set up the camp across from the Capitol to provide information about Gov. Scott Walker?s budget proposals and efforts to recall Republican legislators who voted to eliminate bargaining rights for most public employees.
As I watch many valued colleagues leave the University of Wisconsin-Madison for other institutions, I react with dismay. Not at them, but at the lack of any substantive educational vision that now seems to pervade the governor?s officer and the Legislature.
We do a disservice to any serious understanding of the importance of education if we simply see it as a vocational path to more money and jobs. When the governor said that he didn?t need to finish college because he already had a job, he demonstrated how limited was his view of education as a self-making process.
Gov. Scott Walker?s priorities of balancing Wisconsin?s budget without raising taxes while also buying down the state?s debt remain largely intact under the two-year state spending plan expected to be forwarded to the full Legislature by the end of the week. Republicans who control the Joint Finance Committee have agreed with Walker?s general approach to eliminating the state?s $3 billion budget shortfall. Republicans have signed off on a roughly $800 million cut in aid to public schools and are expected to approve a $250 million cut to the University of Wisconsin System later this week.
The University of Wisconsin?s athletics department begins its Badger Days tour on Wednesday with a stop in Milwaukee. The event at the Harley-Davidson Museum includes many of Wisconsin coaches and administrators, including athletic director Barry Alvarez, football coach Bret Bielema, men?s hockey coach Mike Eaves and women?s hockey coach Mark Johnson. Similar stops will be made on Friday in Wisconsin Dells and Tuesday in Green Bay.
