Category: State news

The state Assembly voted 58-37 Thursday to advance a Republican bill aimed at limiting property tax increases.

Little debate accompanied the controversial proposal, which majority Republicans were sure they could pass and the minority Democrats counted on the Democratic governor vetoing.

The Assembly on Thursday passed a plan that would freeze December property tax bills but wouldn’t earmark any more state aid to public schools next year – an omission that drew a veto promise from Gov. Jim Doyle. Story quotes UW-Madison economist Andrew Reschovsky.

One of the issues that gets raised in almost every legislative session is the disparity between college tuition for cross-border students in Minnesota and Wisconsin. The University of Minnesota’s Peter Zetterberg was at the Capitol on Tuesday and, we think, made a good case for changing the system. (Registration required.)

Wisconsin’s dairy farmers received record prices for milk last year, thanks to a combination of weaker supplies and more consumption, but 2005 isn’t expected to be quite as rosy, dairy economists predict in a new report. “For many farmers, 2004 was a very good year,” according to Status of Wisconsin Agriculture 2005, an annual report published by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s department of agricultural and applied economics.

After nearly four decades of granting reciprocity agreements with nearby states, the University of Minnesota is asking the State Legislature to change the system.

Since 1968, Minnesota has had agreements with Manitoba, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Republican legislators were told Tuesday that Gov. Jim Doyle’s property tax limits would lower the December bill on a median-valued Wisconsin home by $3 – a drop that gave the governor the political high ground on the issue.

(MADISON) Some Republican state legislators are criticizing Governor Doyle�s plan to spend $1 million on insurance benefits for the partners of gay and lesbian University employees. But supporters say the benefits are crucial to attracting and retaining top-notch faculty. (Second item.)

Gov. Jim Doyle’s plan to control December property tax bills tightly has at least slowed the march of Republicans to out-freeze the Democrat. But Doyle’s surprise rush to embrace a top goal of Republicans – strict controls via limits on the levies of local governments – has also created a dangerous political expectation for a first-term governor up for re-election in 21 months.

Capitol politics took a sharp turn last week when Gov. Jim Doyle outlined his budget proposal for a “freeze” on government spending.

A group of University of Wisconsin System administrators is pushing for a new look at how financial resources – including tuition and state-appropriated tax dollars – are distributed among Wisconsin’s public universities.

An Oklahoma educator will take over at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls as the highest-paid chancellor in Wisconsin outside of Madison and Milwaukee.

The Board of Regents selected Donald Betz, the provost at the University of Central Oklahoma, to succeed the late Ann Lydecker. Betz will make $175,000; Lydecker, who died last spring, earned $156,600 at the time of her death.

BOULDER, Colo. � University of Colorado professor Ward L. Churchill has come under fire recently for comparing the Sept. 11 victims to Nazis and for questionable claims of Indian ancestry. Now, fellow academics are accusing him of fraud. (Login required.)

DENVER – Academic freedom has never completely protected professors who make unpopular statements.

The state Department of Administration has paid a private consultant more than a half-million dollars to suggest ways it can save money on building management, yet it says one key initiative was already in the works before the study was assigned and another is not being actively pursued.

Despite a few pointed criticisms, the UW Board of Regents agreed Thursday to get behind Gov. Jim Doyle’s proposed budget for the University of Wisconsin System, a proposal members described as not perfect but probably the best they could get.

UW-Whitewater Chancellor Jack Miller knows he can’t please everyone. And he knows some people will find his decision Thursday to allow a controversial professor to speak on campus “repugnant.”

Dear Editor: The article detailing Gov. Doyle’s plan to trim public relations staff lacked some key information on the critical role PR professionals play in building relationships between state government and its citizens. Those of us who work in this profession feel strongly that cutting PR staff would be a mistake.

UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley says wholesale job cuts at the university are unwise and unrealistic in the effort to balance the state budget.

On Tuesday, Gov. Jim Doyle unveiled his executive budget, in which he told the university to cut $65 million in administrative and purchasing positions. The money would be reallocated to other areas of the university.

Chancellor John Wiley on Wednesday said UW-Madison may be stretched too thin for further cuts envisioned in Gov. Jim Doyle’s budget proposal.

For students of the humanities, “paid internships” can be a nearly oxymoronic phrase-it is no wonder UW-Madison competition for them is so fierce.

Gov. Jim Doyle’s proposed budget doesn’t cut the number of people who can receive health benefits from Medicaid, BadgerCare and SeniorCare.

Gov. Jim Doyle will present his second budget to state lawmakers tonight, aiming not only to balance the books amid a projected $1.6 billion deficit, but balance scores of competing interests and priorities for the next two years.

Doyle plans to balance the budget without making the kind of large-scale cuts he did two years ago, according to Administration Secretary Marc Marotta.

….For the UW, Doyle is expected to reverse two years of major reductions.

In an attempt to bring UW-Madison up to par with other Big Ten schools, Gov. Jim Doyle will present a controversial proposal to the state Legislature Tuesday to fund domestic partner benefits for all University of Wisconsin employees.

Gov. Jim Doyle will recommend cutting 1,800 state jobs when he submits his budget plan for the next biennium.

State agencies, universities and colleges spend more than $12 million on salaries for more than 200 people employed as public relations and public information specialists last year.

Gov. Jim Doyle will set an optimistic tone Tuesday when he outlines a biennial budget plan full of big numbers and policy changes. But state employees will be searching for hints to the eternal question of “where’s mine?”

About half of the state’s classified employees have gone nearly two years without a pay increase – their unions are operating under 2001-2003 contracts.

Is the public information provided by state public relations professionals vital information that the public needs? Or is it “spin” that builds the images of state agencies and colleges and elected officials?

Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, a nonprofit agency that keeps a close eye on state government, says the extent and purpose of public relations activities generally depend on the person doing them and the head of the agency or institution where they work.

As the state of Wisconsin axed jobs and closed service centers amid a fiscal crisis during the past four years, state departments, universities and colleges kept an extensive list of public relations employees, who provide information to the media and state residents.

Annual salaries and benefits for public relations and public information positions in state agencies, the University of Wisconsin System and the Wisconsin Technical College System came to more than $12 million for 208 people as of Dec. 1, 2004, the date of a Capital Times survey.

Gov. Jim Doyle today ordered all state office buildings to be totally smoke free and suggested the Legislature enact a law doing the same for all local government buildings.

The executive order gives Cabinet secretaries 30 days to make all state buildings “completely smoke free,” meaning that designated smoking areas now allowed under current law will have to be eliminated.

Gov. Jim Doyle announced Sunday the doors of the Wisconsin Historical Society Museum, located on Capitol Square at 30 N. Carroll St., will remain open.

Gov. Jim Doyle will propose cutting 1,800 state jobs when he proposes his budget to the Legislature Tuesday night, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

This is just one step in Doyle’s long-range goal of eliminating 10,000 government jobs.

The jockeying has already begun over the spending plan for the University of Wisconsin System, even before Gov. Jim Doyle fills in a big piece of the puzzle on Tuesday. He will unveil his proposed 2005-’07 state budget, which will specify the allotment UW will get in general funds.

Gov. Jim Doyle will recommend abolishing about 1,800 more state jobs over the next two years when he gives the Legislature his proposed budget Tuesday, taking one more step toward his long-range goal of eliminating 10,000 jobs.