09/13/07: Move To End Budget Impasse - with Frank Boyle

Move To End Budget Impasse

The Capital Times :: EDITORIAL :: A10

Thursday, September 13, 2007

For some legislators, there is no sense of urgency with regard to the unfinished state budget. Despite the fact that the budget is the blueprint for state government, state Sen. Neal Kedzie, R-Elkhorn, actually went so far as to release a press release hailing the benefits of not having enacted a budget.

Kedzie claims that taxpayers should celebrate because "more delay means more money in their pocket."

That's a little like someone who fails to make necessary repairs on their home and then brags about all the money they are saving as the house crumbles into disrepair.

At the opposite end of the spectrum is state Rep. Frank Boyle, D-Superior, an engaged legislator who recognizes the consequences that Kedzie chooses to neglect.

"We should all be embarrassed," Boyle says of members of the Legislature. "State citizens are suffering as a result of the budget impasse. Students need financial aid. School districts need to set their levies. Municipalities need to set their budgets. Highway projects throughout the state are at risk. The list could go on and on. It's time for a change to resolve the budget impasse."

Boyle is not just complaining. He is proposing a new approach.

If the budget impasse is not resolved by Tuesday, the Superior Democrat says he will propose a joint resolution to replace the current eight members of the Conference Committee - which is charged with pulling together a workable compromise - with new members.

Boyle is not naive. As a veteran legislator who has served in the Assembly majority and minority, with Republican governors and a Democrat, he knows that replacing the current eight members with eight new Democratic and Republican members from the Senate and Assembly will not necessarily end the impasse. With that in mind, Boyle proposes to bring in a neutral mediator for a sort of binding arbitration.

"Time is wasting," said Boyle. "The citizens of Wisconsin deserve better than this. We ought to engage the professionals, putting the combatants in separate rooms where they don't have to look at one another and will not shout political barbs at one another. The professional mediator would sort through the process."

Give Boyle credit for approaching the budget process with a seriousness that marks him as something that is rare in this Legislature: an adult. His "no excuses" approach is the right one.

As Boyle says, "It's way past time to get the job done."