01/30/07 Toughest Ethics Bill In The Country' Set For Approval
Toughest Ethics Bill In The Country' Set For Approval
Senate And Assembly Are Expected To Pass Reform Bill Today
Wisconsin State Journal
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
RYAN J. FOLEY Associated Press
Wisconsin lawmakers said Monday they would approve the state's most significant ethics reforms in 30 years, creating a new watchdog to scrutinize the conduct of public officials.
Legislative leaders reached a compromise on a bill to create a Government Accountability Board with an unlimited budget to investigate corruption. The Senate and Assembly are ready to approve the plan today before Gov. Jim Doyle delivers his State of the State address.
"It's going to be the strongest and toughest ethics bill in the country," said Senate Majority Leader Judy Robson, D-Beloit.
Lawmakers aim to restore Wisconsin's reputation for clean government after a string of corruption convictions against their former colleagues by creating the nonpartisan board to enforce ethics, campaign finance, election and lobbying laws.
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Doyle, a Democrat, made the plan his first priority after a successful re-election campaign that was marred by a swirl of ethics allegations against him and his opponent. He summoned lawmakers to a special session to hammer out an agreement.
"I'm encouraged," said Doyle, who was expected to sign the bill into law as early as this week. "I want to get this done."
With five former lawmakers convicted in the past two years after an investigation into illegal campaigning and polls showing the public losing faith in their honesty, lawmakers agreed to a stronger watchdog to replace boards that had been criticized as weak and partisan.
The new board would come from a merger of the Ethics and Elections boards -- the biggest change since the boards were created in the 1970s.
The legislation had been bogged down between the Democratic-controlled Senate and Republican-led Assembly over a clause that would have wiped out the entire bill if one part was found unconstitutional.
Robson and Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem, said they agreed to remove the clause so other reforms would remain if one part was thrown out. Huebsch had said the clause was needed to preserve a compromise, but he said Monday that he agreed to drop it because "it was becoming an impediment to the passage of the legislation."
"It's a great step forward," said Mike McCabe of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign. "If there is some element that ends up being invalidated by a court, that doesn't make the whole thing fall."
The leaders also said they agreed to:
Keep a provision allowing lawmakers charged with corruption to choose whether to be tried in their home counties or where the crimes allegedly occurred.
Dane County District Attorney Brian Blanchard, who prosecuted four lawmakers on corruption charges, said the provision would make it harder to try public misconduct cases and would give those defendants an option available to nobody else. "That is the opposite of reform," he said.
Blanchard and other district attorneys warned this provision is probably unconstitutional, but Huebsch predicted it would stand up to a challenge.
Revise an anti-leak provision to make clear that prosecutors can share information with each other during investigations. That compromise keeps in place penalties of up to nine months in prison and a $10,000 fine against employees who leak details of an ongoing investigation.
Media organizations and other groups had called the penalties draconian and said they would deter whistleblowers, but lawmakers said they were needed to protect the integrity of investigations.
The governor would nominate and lawmakers confirm six former judges to run the new agency, which would prosecute civil infractions and refer criminal cases to district attorneys. The judges would serve six-year terms. Current employees would keep their jobs except for the Ethics and Elections boards' executive directors, who could apply for top jobs in the new agency.