News flash: Budget written in secret!!!
The Journal Sentinel's Capitol team reports today, at great length, that the state budget passed by the legislature was written largely in secret, with little participation by citizens or even minority Democrats, and passed in the middle of the night.
To anyone who's followed the budget process, that's not exactly a bombshell.
I, for one, have complained regularly about it, but have felt like a voice in the wilderness. Here are a couple of my half dozen previous posts:
"Walking quorum breaks the law."
"No sunshine on the budget."
But today's story raises the obvious question: If this was going on, and everyone knew it was going on, why didn't anyone complain? If there was a single editorial about budget secrecy in a Wisconsin newspaper, I missed it. Even the Democrats didn't make any noise. Nor did the good government groups.
Prospects this will change for the next budget go-around? Slim and none.
posted by xoff @ 9:05 AM
2 comments
2 Comments:
I assume that you are including the Governor in your indictment, insofar as he ALSO writes a budget away from public eyes and ears.
Come to think of it, so did Chvala---
Sunshine for one and ALL!!!
dad29 is wrong. The budget requests that agencies make to the Governor are actually public. The larger issue is one of public deliberation. That is most important in the legislative branch. No one is saying that an individual senator can't have a private meeting with his own staff -- and of course the Governor should be able to have private meetings with his own staff. The issue becomes when a public debate, related to the outcome of a public vote, is hidden from public view.
Why are Republicans from the last decade so focused on partisanship above values of good government?
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