The bitter political standoff in Wisconsin over Gov. Scott Walker?s bid to sharply curtail collective bargaining for public-sector workers ended abruptly Wednesday night as Republican colleagues in the State Senate successfully maneuvered to adopt a bill doing just that.
The legacy of the Wisconsin Covenant may be as much about helping students develop aspirations for college as it is about funding them. While it?s unfortunate Gov. Scott Walker intends to end state support for the program, after making good on aid to students already enrolled ? we think it has held a laudable ? if far from perfect, place in Wisconsin?s educational landscape.
Gov. Scott Walker?s office released documents Tuesday showing he?s willing to give on some points of his union bargaining bill to break the Capitol standoff and bring Senate Democrats back from Illinois.
The e-mails showed ideas and counteroffers – panned Tuesday by state labor leaders and some Democrats – that were made by the Republican governor?s aides and two Democrats as they sought some resolution that would allow Democrats to come back to Wisconsin. Senate Democrats have been holed up in Illinois since Feb. 17, when they left the state to block a vote on Walker?s budget-repair bill.
Dear Editor: The Wisconsin budget repair bill (AB 11) gives the secretary of the Department of Administration sole power to sell the state-owned power plants for any price without hearings, bids or oversight. Moreover, the bill would preclude the Public Service Commission from overseeing and approving the services and prices of the new owners. Such a sale exposes each of the 37 University of Wisconsin campuses, prisons, and health service facilities to great risk.
If you have camping equipment, sleeping bags or other materials on the State Capitol grounds, remove it or the state will dispose of it. The latest update from the Department of Administration?s blog said camping gear has been collected and moved to the outside of the ground-level Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard entrance.
“Any camping materials not removed from this area by 6 p.m. Wednesday will be considered abandoned and will be hauled away and discarded,” the blog said.
Catching up on a couple higher education-related items …** Campus Connection needs to correct a mistake and set the record straight on a budget-related issue.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has offered to keep certain collective bargaining rights in place for state workers in a proposed compromise aimed at ending a nearly three-week standoff with absent Senate Democrats, according to e-mails released Tuesday by his office.
What a difference 100 years make. While 2011 finds Wisconsin government embroiled in what seems to be eternal chaos, with our governor pitting the rich against the poor, it also marks the 100th anniversary of what is still known as the most productive and progressive legislative session in the history of Wisconsin, if not the nation.
….Our state was seen as championing honest government while expanding democracy and promoting what became known as the ?Wisconsin Idea,? a partnership between our great university and the citizens of Wisconsin.
A two-part series by McClatchy Newspapers examines public- and private-sector pension plans and delivers this conclusion: “There?s simply no evidence that state pensions are the current burden to public finances that their critics claim.”
The showdown over collective bargaining rights for public employees is just the first step in a contentious debate over how to solve Wisconsin?s budget woes, with newly elected Republican Gov. Scott Walker also seeking to dismantle an array of social policies enacted under his Democratic predecessor. On the chopping block is a policy allowing in-state college tuition for the children of illegal immigrants. Walker?s budget plan would ax a Democratic initiative approved under former Gov. Jim Doyle that grants in-state college tuition rates to children of illegal immigrants, so long as the students have graduated from a Wisconsin high school and lived in the state for at least three years. The students also have to sign an affidavit promising to pursue legal residency or citizenship. Fewer than two dozen of the 182,000 students in the University of Wisconsin system have used the program, said university spokesman David Giroux.
Two of the 14 Senate Democrats who fled Wisconsin to block a vote on stripping most bargaining rights for public workers say Republican Gov. Scott Walker?s proposed compromise isn?t enough to bring them back to the Capitol, although they?ll keep talking. One proposed concession was that University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics Authority employees would not lose all union bargaining rights.
Quoted: Ken Goldstein, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said, “The state is phenomenally polarized. Democrats are lined up in lockstep against the governor, Republicans are lined up in lockstep behind him.”
Quoted: But University of Wisconsin-Madison political science professor Charles Franklin said that while it certainly shows the group was ready to go right out of the gates, it doesn?t mean Walker?s administration is working with them.
It?s hard to imagine any team in the state capable of matching up with the new starting 11 representing the University of Wisconsin-Madison. No, we?re not talking about the Badger football team.
A UW-Madison political scientist says the recall efforts launched against 16 state Senators are unlike anything ever seen before.
At the second New Badger Partnership forum this month, Chancellor Biddy Martin answered questions and provided more specifics concerning the proposed public authority status for UW-Madison Tuesday.
Maintaining her pledge for transparency as the public continues to deliberate the New Badger Partnership, Chancellor Biddy Martin hosted another forum Tuesday and said improved control in human resources issues will prove beneficial to University of Wisconsin faculty and students.
Noted: Fewer than two dozen of the 182,000 students in the University of Wisconsin system have used the program, said university spokesman David Giroux. The Wisconsin Technical College System did an informal survey last fall of how many undocumented immigrants were paying instate tuition, “and there were virtually none,” said spokeswoman Morna Foy.
As I?ve been discussing recently, Gov. Walker?s budget contains some radical changes for the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It would separate the Madison campus from the rest of the UW System, making it a public authority, meaning it would operate more independently of the state, similar to the UW Hospitals and Clinics.
Dear Editor: As a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, I would like to express my support for the New Badger Partnership, Chancellor Martin?s principles to provide the university with the means to navigate through difficult times. The New Badger Partnership aims to readdress the relationship between the state government and the university, freeing it to focus on its primary missions.
Wisconsin Democrats who fled the state nearly three weeks ago asked Monday for a meeting with Gov. Scott Walker to talk about changes to his plan to eliminate most public workers union rights, a request the governor dismissed as “ridiculous.”
The rapidly-shifting estimate of tape residue removal costs and the “Wisconsin 14” were just too tempting for The Daily Show to resist. On Monday night, the show took on the controversy over tape goop left by protest signs at the state Capitol and went on to smoke out the 14 Democratic state senators who have “found safe harbor” in Illinois for weeks.
When it comes to improving public understanding of tax policy, nothing has been more troubling than the deeply flawed coverage of the Wisconsin state employees? fight over collective bargaining.
Some faculty on campus are more willing than others to hitch UW-Madison?s future to a new public authority model spelled out for Wisconsin?s flagship institution in Gov. Scott Walker?s proposed 2011-13 biennial budget.
But after hearing from supporters, listening to concerns and fielding questions on this issue for more than an hour during Monday afternoon?s Faculty Senate meeting at Bascom Hall, UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin was generally upbeat with how the campus community is warming to a potential new relationship between the university and state.
A Democrat?s offer to meet with Gov. Scott Walker to break the budget impasse produced no agreement or even progress Monday, only a burst of accusations on both sides that some said could set back negotiations.
Walker lashed out at Senate Minority Leader Mark Miller (D-Monona), saying Miller?s request to meet with him was ridiculous because Miller hasn?t delivered a deal with Republicans despite several meetings between the two sides. Democrats remained holed up in Illinois to block action on Walker?s budget-repair bill and fired back that the governor had given little on the proposal, which would end most collective bargaining for public employee unions in the state.
Quoted: Charles Franklin, a University of Wisconsin-Madison political science professor and founder of pollster.com.
A state agency that manages retirement and health insurance plans for public workers is reporting an increase of as much as 600-percent in questions from public workers about benefits and early retirement.
Although University of Wisconsin faculty members expressed support for increased flexibility in human resources as a result of the New Badger Partnership during Monday?s Faculty Senate meeting, members raised concerns about the availability of financial aid to help students cope with impending tuition increases.
Education seems to be under attack from all sides these days, both from the state government and from within the University of Wisconsin administration. Gov. Scott Walker has been painted to be an archenemy of schoolteachers, but if you ask me, Chancellor Biddy Martin isn?t any better. Her New Badger Partnership represents the most radical change to the UW model since the merger of Wisconsin schools in the 1970s, and it represents a complete departure from the idea of a public university.
I thought it?d be interesting to look at Scott Walker?s influence on Board of Regents (the current, UW System-wide board) and the proposed Board of Trustees (UW-Madison specific.) Here is a Google Spreadsheet of the makeup of the two boards through 2022.
By now if you?re on twitter you?ve probably seen the satirical ASM PR Committee account created by some unknown person. I first saw it a couple of days ago and thought the tweets were too often and not funny enough to warrant following. Today another tweet sent be back browsing their twitter feed to see what I had missed and I stumbled across this particular tweet:
In case you don?t keep up on the ramblings of Max Love over at his blog, he recently has been tossing allegations around that a number of students and former students, including the authors of this blog, are part of Biddy Martin?s propaganda machine and that we have all been bought off through various means including football game tickets, letters of recommendation and free trips to LA in exchange for our support. When he initially made that post I chose not to respond to the absurd and unfounded allegations against myself, but now that he?s back at it I think it?s time for a response. Let?s make a list of all of the students that Max is alleging have been ?bought out? by Chancellor Martin:
Recently, a coalition of students was formed to educate students on the Budget Repair Bill and then teach them how to combat it. The Badger Impact group has now moved into a new field. Their new website declares they are ?Students United in Stopping Biddy Martin?s Plan to Ruin the UW System.? For being a group that was so rooted in education for SB-11, there seems to be a lot of misinformation on their website. Let?s go down their list of what their vision of the New Badger Partnership is, and then see what it actually is.
Gov. Scott Walker?s bitter standoff with Democrats and labor unions in Wisconsin has turned the newly elected Republican into a deeply polarizing figure, eroded his standing and left him struggling to win the battle for public opinion, a flurry of recent polls suggests.
The leader of the 14 Senate Democrats in Wisconsin who fled to Illinois wrote to Gov. Scott Walker Monday morning to request an in-person meeting near the border between the states.
Senate Minority Leader Mark Miller, D-Monona, wrote to Walker and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, to ask them “to meet, in-person, as soon as possible to resume discussions on how we reach a bipartisan solution to our differences” on the collective bargaining and budget repair bill controversy.
Dear Editor: I need to know a lot more about the idea of separating the UW-Madison from the rest of the UW System and having an entirely separate board that will apparently be controlled by the governor. As an alumnus who actually graduated from the UW-Madison, I have a serious reservation about putting control of the UW-Madison into the hands of someone who did not. This governor has shown that he cannot be trusted and it seems likely that any deals with him are likely to contain traps to allow him to advance an agenda that would put an end to sifting and winnowing.
….Many of the students who enroll in our master?s program and serve us as teaching assistants are from diverse working class backgrounds and are struggling to make ends meet and stay in school right now. Like the UW-Madison, in general, the department of Afro-American studies relies on the high-quality performance of our teaching assistants.
It is with dismay and disappointment, therefore, that we greet Gov. Scott Walker?s plan to deny collective bargaining rights to Wisconsin?s public employees. This will certainly have a detrimental effect on these students? welfare and a negative impact on their ability to maintain the superior service that they currently render to the hundreds of undergraduates who take our courses.
It is hard to know who is pulling the strings on the Walker/Fitzgerald puppet show, but someone other than Gov. Scott Walker and Family Fitzgerald has cooked up a radical agenda that just doesn?t seem like a ?Wisconsin idea.?
I would really like to know who drafted the manifesto. Seems more like the Koch brothers and the CATO Institute than Lee Dreyfus, Warren Knowles or Mike Ellis.It just doesn?t seem like it fits the definition of this ?special place? called Wisconsin as Bob La Follette described us. It isn?t John Muir, Aldo Leopold or John Bascom.
….Let us join together and declare they do not have the right to dispose of the great state university of Wisconsin. This is not a power plant ? it is the font of ideas and dreams. It is us. The real stakeholders are the people of this state and students of the future. Not David Koch.
A Wisconsin Democratic lawmaker says negotiations have stalled with Republicans over controversial legislation that would strip most public workers of their collective bargaining rights. Sen. Tim Cullen said Saturday that talks broke down Thursday but lines of communication remain open. Cullen says it?s difficult for either side to compromise, since Democrats don?t want to lose their base support and Republican Gov. Scott Walker doesn?t want to appear weak by backing down.
Liberal filmmaker Michael Moore urged Wisconsin residents Saturday to fight against Republican efforts to strip most public workers of their collective bargaining rights, telling thousands of protesters that “Madison is only the beginning.”
Quoted: Hernando Rojas, an assistant professor of journalism and mass communication at UW-Madison, explaining the tendency to hold conflicting political beliefs, and Andrew Reschovsky, a UW-Madison professor of public affairs and applied economics.
Quoted: UW-Madison political science professor Ken Goldstein, who was hired to conduct the poll.
Gov. Scott Walker?s budget proposal calls for deep cuts in most areas of public education with one notable exception – public school choice programs. Meanwhile, Milwaukee?s 20-year-old voucher program would receive $22.5 million more to accommodate 1,300 additional students. The growth would result from Walker?s proposal to remove the program?s income requirements and enrollment caps. And independent charter schools would receive $18.4 million more over the biennium. Walker is projecting 600 additional students as his proposal would lift the state enrollment cap on virtual charter schools, allow the UW System?s 13 four-year universities to establish charter schools, and allow independent charter schools in any district in the state.Independent charter schools are currently limited to Milwaukee and Racine counties. Education historian Diane Ravitch, a New York University professor and former assistant U.S. secretary of education who is speaking at UW-Madison on Tuesday, say choice programs have drained resources from the traditional public school system without producing conclusive evidence that they are any better at educating students, particularly low-income ones.
The long-range question now becomes: Will this eventually break the historical ties that the people of Wisconsin have with UW-Madison? One of our System chancellors said that spinning off Madison meant the “flagship was sailing away.” More likely it will be a drift away over the years. It will still be a great school. But will it still be the state?s school?
Protesters in Madison have “aroused a sleeping giant” in the national fight for workers? rights, filmmaker Michael Moore told thousands at the Capitol Square on Saturday, as rallies opposing Gov. Scott Walker?s budget proposals wrapped up their third week. Leland Pan, of UW-Madison?s Student Labor Action Coalition, criticized Walker?s plan to split the campus from the University of Wisconsin System, a move that UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin supports.
Some people have taken issue with a provision in Governor Scott Walker?s budget proposal that allows pounds to transfer stray dogs to University system research facilities. The problem with turning this into a “Gov. Walker hates dogs” story is that it simply isn?t true. The statute currently exists in Wisconsin, Walker is simply making a small amendment to the wording due to the proposal to break the University of Wisconsin-Madison off from the rest of the University system.
“In a time of austerity, we must be creative in seeking ways to cut back on expenses without cutting into the quality of the educational enterprise.”
Those words could fit the plan by Gov. Scott Walker to split the flagship University of Wisconsin-Madison campus from the rest of the state university system. In fact, they were spoken by former Gov. Patrick Lucey in 1971, when he proposed creating the present unified UW System out of the two state systems which existed then.
Gov. Scott Walker has talked tough about the state financial problems ? and his 2011-13 budget proposal follows through on it.
The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay is expected to see its state funding drop by $4.5 million, according to preliminary estimates from the university.
Noted: Some aspects of Gov. Walker?s proposed budget plan could mean a move toward more privatization. Critics say they?re worried about a trend toward privatization, and what it means for the state.But UW-Madison professor Andrew Reschovsky says privatization isn?t necessarily a good or bad thing, depending on the job.
If you have any doubt that now is the time for the New Badger Partnership, turn to the Wisconsin Idea.
University of Wisconsin faculty and members of the campus community gathered Saturday to question the fate of shared governance and representation on the new governing body for the university under the New Badger Partnership.
MADISON, Wis. AP ? Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said Thursday that he will issue layoff notices to 1,500 state workers on Friday if his proposal forcing them to pay more for benefits and taking away nearly all their collective bargaining rights isn?t passed by then.
As a Friday deadline for layoff notices looms, Republicans and Democrats caught up in the state budget crisis are talking about ways to break the stalemate and showing signs of movement from their entrenched positions.
According to a GOP source familiar with the talks, the discussions with Democratic senators holed up in Illinois include removing or changing a provision from Gov. Scott Walker?s budget repair bill that would limit unions? bargaining over wages to the rate of inflation.
A judge?s ruling that the public must have open access to the State Capitol opens the door for more people to get into the building on Friday, but it won?t be without limits, the state announced.
Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch issued access procedures Friday morning after Dane County Circuit Judge John Albert ordered on Thursday that the Capitol be cleared at night and that the access restrictions were too strict and must be relaxed.
If you like burning fossil fuels – hey, aren?t those Koch brothers in the pipeline business? – then you?ll love Gov. Walker?s proposed budget. The 1,345-pager takes a whack at scores of environmental efforts, from nixing the state Office of Energy Independence to actually encouraging state vehicles to use more gasoline.
Seriously, you can?t make this stuff up. And with pump prices marching toward $4 a gallon, you wonder if any thought went into the long-term fiscal impacts.
Any politician who still thinks it?s a keen idea to go after the collective bargaining rights of public employees ought to come over to Ohio. You know the old saying: As Ohio goes, so goes the nation. It doesn?t take much of a stroll through the Buckeye State to see that somebody sorely underestimated regular Americans? fondness for the freedoms of regular Americans.
Written by Robert Hamers, a small business owner and professor at UW-Madison.
Quoted: UW-Madison emeritus professor Dennis Dresang.
If Gov. Scott Walker and the Legislature want to sell off state-owned power plants, taxpayers deserve a fair price. That means state officials absolutely should use a competitive bidding process for sale of these significant public properties. He did pledge an open process, should the sale of the 32 heating and cooling plants proceed. The plants for sale would include the Charter Street plant, which provides service to UW-Madison.
