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Speed and Secrecy Kill Democracy in Wisconsin

Posted by Kathleen Vinehout, State Senator 31st District
Kathleen Vinehout, State Senator 31st District
Kathleen Vinehout of Alma is an educator, business woman, and farmer who is now
User is currently offline
on Tuesday, 12 January 2016
in Wisconsin

walker-senate-signingAs the Republican leadership in Madison rush to move complex and controversial bills through the legislative process, legislators and the public don’t have access to changes in proposals offered until just before committee hearings. Thoughtful and meaning dialog on the impact of complex legislation is compromised when speedy passage becomes more important than open debate.


MADISON - “How can we digest all your work in this short amount of time?” Senator Bewley asked the Chair of the housing committee and author of the bill before her. An amendment replacing the bill was released just before the hearing on that bill.

“How can we have a thoughtful and intelligent discussion...we just got this stinking thing a few hours ago.”

The bill, SB 464 (which has an Assembly companion - AB 582) was complex. The bill’s author said he wanted to avoid “moving the goal post” on a development project. Among other things, the bill froze in place laws on an industrial development once a minor approval (like a driveway permit) was granted even if the project would not be completed for years.

The Towns Association called the legislation, “One of the most damaging bills to local control in recent memory.”

The committee Chair said he negotiated with local groups to remove the most egregious parts of the bill. It was impossible for anyone at the hearing, including the Senators on the committee, to say what was actually in or out of the twenty-page bill they just received.

After 5:00pm, the committee finally took up SB 464. It was the last on the agenda and many people had waited since 11:00am to testify.

Citizen after citizen who testified shared their concerns about the bill and offered some version of “I don’t know what’s in the bill and I don’t know if you’ve fixed the problem.”

People who waited all day in the Capitol hearing room to speak said they had no way of knowing a new version had been posted on a website. They gave up a day of work, used a vacation day and left home early to travel to the Capitol. No one told them about the revised bill or offered to give them copy.

During that day, in another hearing room, people testified against removing the effective ban on nuclear power plants. In a third hearing room, people waited to testify against a bill that would make extensive changes to protections for lakes and rivers.

All were controversial making big changes to public policy. There were six hearings happening at the same time. Twenty-two bills were voted out of committee. Many were introduced over the Holidays and rushed to public hearing right after the New Year.

That day the Senate Sporting Heritage, Mining and Forestry Committee, of which I am a member, heard a bill on fish farming. I asked the Chair why the bill was not assigned to the Ag Committee and he said, “It deals with water.” You’d think it would sent it to the Natural Resources Committee.

Knowing what was in the bill and how it interacted with existing laws related to water and agriculture was important for understanding the consequences of the bill.

Again, I received the bill just before the committee hearing. Supposedly, the bill was introduced the day before the hearing. Details of its exact impact were scarce.

Again, the bill was complex. It changed protections of streams and springs, altered water flow over dams (which affects streams) and interwove state and federal rules.

Again, the Chair was also the author of the bill. He and I were the only legislators at the hearing. All other Senators had two or more hearings at the same time.

I like fish. I keep two large aquariums and fiddle with water chemistry for fun. In full disclosure, the fish farmers named me their Legislator of the Year several years prior. I want fish farmers to succeed, but not at the expense of our Wisconsin waterways.

The homework needed on the bill was not possible with members pulled to other committees and the bill rushed so fast no one had a chance to read it. I sat in the public hearing, I was pretty opponents did not even know the bill existed.

Speed and secrecy have become all too common in the Capitol. Democracy suffers. Public interest suffers.

The process works best when – to use a fish analogy – we treat legislation like fish – open it up, set it on the table, let the sunshine in and see if the fish smells.

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President, Critics Connect at CNN's Town Hall on Guns

Posted by Bob Kiefert, Green Bay Progressive
Bob Kiefert, Green Bay Progressive
Bob Kiefert is the Publisher of the Northeast Wisconsin - Green Bay Progressive.
User is currently offline
on Friday, 08 January 2016
in Wisconsin

pres-obama-town-hall-2016President Barack Obama, trying to do something about gun violence, and critics who believe he's determined to confiscate their weapons came face-to-face Thursday in a CNN town hall televised nationally. The President fielded tough questions from gun owners in a rare respectful and reasoned interlude in one of America's most poisoned political debates.


FAIRFAX, VA - President Barack Obama, who has vowed to do something about our nation's blight of gun violence, and critics who believe he's determined to confiscate their weapons came face-to-face here Thursday in a rare respectful and reasoned interlude in one of America's most poisoned political debates.

The President fielded tough questions from gun owners in the CNN town hall moderated by Anderson Cooper and televised nationally. For once, the nation's bitter, polarized politics failed to swamp a conversation on gun violence.

President Obama faced off against critics of his new executive actions, including expanded background checks for gun sales, but both sides listened carefully, referred to shared concerns and avoided histrionics. One absent voice was the National Rifle Association, which declined CNN's invitation to participate.

The event at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, came as Obama rededicates himself to an effort to reduce gun violence following a string of mass shootings and his own failure to get expansive reform efforts through Congress.

Obama fielded questions from supporters of his actions, including a priest, gun violence victims and a Chicago schoolboy who fears being shot, as well as critics ranging from a gun executive to a sheriff, a rape survivor and a murder victim's widow.

The meeting of about 100 people invited by CNN on all sides of the debate was an unusual forum for the President. While Obama has conducted hundreds of town hall events as a candidate and president, it's rare for him to hear so directly from ordinary Americans who oppose his policies.

While the President respectfully conversed with those who questioned him in person, he did not spare his foes in the gun rights debate, accusing them of spouting "imaginary fiction" about his motives and evoking the partisanship that typically encompasses the issues.

"The way it is described is that we are trying to take away everybody's guns," Obama said. "Our position is consistently mischaracterized ... If you listen to the rhetoric, it is so over-the-top, it is so overheated."

He dismissed the notion that he was behind a plot to take away everybody's guns "so we can impose martial law". And he tried to dispel it by pointing out that he lacked the time remaining in office to take away the nation's 350 million firearms.

The President had sought tougher laws after the Newtown massacre that killed 20 small children and 5 teachers, but said he was foiled by the NRA. He has made his changes this time using his lawful executive powers, enraging Republicans who say he has overstepped his authority.

"All of us need to demand leaders brave enough to stand up to the gun lobby’s lies," Obama had wrote in column in the New York Times that was published on Thursday.

It is not clear if Obama's efforts this time will cut through the wall of suspicion that has been built up over many years by the gun lobby and their Republican allies in Congress. But it is clear that the President has not given up the fight.

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Out of progressivism’s ashes

Posted by Mike McCabe, Blue Jean Nation
Mike McCabe, Blue Jean Nation
Mike McCabe is the founder and president of Blue Jean Nation and author of Blue
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on Thursday, 07 January 2016
in Wisconsin

progressive_partyALTOONA, WI - We live in crazy and unpredictable times politically. The Republican Party descends into madness in so many respects and grows more self-destructive by the day, yet for now remains the majority party in America both nationally and at the state level. That says a lot about the Democratic Party’s weakness and lack of appeal.

In most statehouses across the country and most of the time in Congress, liberal or progressive ideas do not have the upper hand in policy debates and haven’t for quite some time. Progressive advocacy groups are regularly losing in the political arena, watching helplessly as right-wing forces successfully chip away at old progressive policies and programs or dismantle them altogether.

In searching for explanations, many rightly point to the corrupting influence of money in politics. Indeed, the exponential growth in money’s role in election campaigns and lobbying – and, just as importantly, the fact that so much of that money is supplied by so few – does cripple efforts to advance policies that promote the common good or serve the broad public interest.  A privileged few pay for politics, and a privileged few benefit from politics.

But here is modern-day progressivism’s great dilemma….

Ideas favoring the commoners among us instead of the royals don’t stand much of a chance of becoming the law of the land as long as the vast wealth of a few holds policymakers in such an iron grip. For there to be a chance of progressive values being reflected in government actions, something clearly needs to be done about money in politics. But campaign finance reformers aren’t faring any better than any other progressive policy advocates. They too are watching helplessly as old safeguards against government corruption are stripped away and the floodgates are opened ever wider, allowing more and more money to flood into elections and lobbying. They are powerless to stop political inequality from breeding still more political inequality. Growing political inequality then produces greater economic and social inequality. And the more government is seen working for just a few at everyone else’s expense, the more the masses despise government. The more government is despised, the easier it is for a wealthy and well-connected few to control.

This vicious cycle is the progressive quandary.

The recipe for breaking the cycle is undoubtedly a complicated mixture, but three ingredients are required for sure.

Repair the broken bonds between rural and urban people and their communities. When elected officials put policies and programs in place in the past that promoted greater equality and broadly shared prosperity, they did so with the support of both city and country folks. Rediscovering common ground that now-estranged rural and urban populations once stood on together starts with examining the reasons rural-urban political unions have fractured and rural and suburban interests have coalesced around a right-wing agenda. Then new counteractive measures for the 21st Century that both rural and urban voters can get behind have to be cooked up.

Weaken and eventually break the grip of the political industrial complex that strangles our democracy. Our political system has been commandeered by professionals. Now more than ever, the involvement of people with a life outside politics is needed. It’s quite possibly never been harder in our nation’s history for people who don’t practice politics for a living to gain a foothold in the public arena. But given how Americans are feeling about politics and politicians and government these days, there probably hasn’t ever been a time when such a rich reward awaits those willing to swim against the powerful currents of political professionalization.

And to do that….

Put non-monetary political currencies that have been largely forgotten back into circulation. One such currency is organized people. Another is provocative ideas. Those who call themselves progressives have been playing defense for more than a generation. They have become America’s true conservatives. They need to start playing offense. They need to start thinking big again.

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Corrections Reform Measures Proposed To Improve Public Safety

Posted by Bob Kiefert, Green Bay Progressive
Bob Kiefert, Green Bay Progressive
Bob Kiefert is the Publisher of the Northeast Wisconsin - Green Bay Progressive.
User is currently offline
on Wednesday, 06 January 2016
in Wisconsin

boy-in-docA high-profile investigation into claims of child abuse at the Lincoln Hills Juvenile Detention Center and serious assaults on correctional officers this year at Green Bay, Racine, Columbia and other correctional facilities across Wisconsin have prompted Democratic legislators to take action.


MADISON - Amid growing concerns with the rise in assaults at Wisconsin’s correctional facilities, Democratic legislators here are urging immediate action to strengthen worker protections and improve public safety.

A high-profile investigation is currently looking into claims of child abuse and assaults at the Lincoln Hills Juvenile Detention Center. In addition, serious assaults on correctional officers have been documented this year at Green Bay, Racine, Columbia and other correctional facilities across Wisconsin.

While Republican leaders have known about these serious safety concerns for more than a year, conditions have deteriorated as a result of additional state budget cuts and worsening staff shortages.

In an effort to improve safety in correctional facilities, Sen. Jon Erpenbach (D-Middleton), Sen. Dave Hansen (D-Green Bay) and several Assembly Democrats are putting forward a package of legislative proposals. The bills aim to improve worker training, limit the use of forced overtime, increase workplace safety, strengthen reporting requirements and ensure appropriate staffing levels for first responders.

jon-erpenbach“Safety in our Department of Corrections institutions in not a new issue. The staffing shortages that were a direct result of Governor Walker’s Act 10 have never been resolved by the administration or the DOC. The burden for staffing shortages continues to fall solely on the backs of officers working in our institutions. They are the ones who have to live with more consecutive days of overtime because of inadequate staffing levels,” said Senator Erpenbach in a statement released this morning.

dave_hansen“Safety within our corrections institutions should be a top priority in light of the growing number of incidents we have seen take place, in large part due to the inability of Corrections officials to recruit, properly train and retain staff,” said Senator Hansen, noting that 500 positions are currently unfilled in the department putting public safety at risk. “As a result we are asking fewer officers to take on more shifts and more responsibility to the point that it is putting their safety at risk.”

Hansen has announced he will join Senator Erpenbach and corrections officers at a press conference at the Brown County Courthouse at 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, January 7th to discuss the growing crisis in Corrections and to announce his support for the package of bills.

Currently seeking co-sponsors, Erpenbach and other authors of the proposals expect introduction of the bills next week. To receive a copy of the draft legislation, contact Senator Erpenbach's  office at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 608-266-6670.

jennifer-shillingAs part of the Corrections Reform package, Senate Democratic Leader Jennifer Shilling (D-La Crosse) and Rep. Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) are introducing the Correctional Officer Workplace Safety Bill (LRB 4225). The proposal will restore the right of correctional officers to collectively bargain over workplace safety issues.

“The lack of urgency by Gov. Walker’s administration and the Republican majority to address complaints of child abuse and assaults in our correctional facilities is appalling,” said Sen. Shilling. “In the past two months, serious assaults and nearly-fatal suicide attempts have shocked families and communities who had been told not to worry about safety concerns in our correctional facilities. Wisconsin children, families and public safety officers can’t afford to continue waiting for action. It’s time to address the serious safety issues in our correctional facilities before this dangerous situation spirals further out of control.”

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Whose Property Rights Are Most Important?

Posted by Kathleen Vinehout, State Senator 31st District
Kathleen Vinehout, State Senator 31st District
Kathleen Vinehout of Alma is an educator, business woman, and farmer who is now
User is currently offline
on Monday, 04 January 2016
in Wisconsin

sand-mining-wiWhen does your neighbor’s property right limit your own rights? What if your neighbor built a fireworks factory next door? Or a large hog operation? Or an industrial sand mine?

A new bill introduced in Madison just before Christmas could take away local control over land use ordinances and zoning rules that protect our communities and the individual rights of neighbors to protect themselves.


ALMA, WI - “My neighbor likes to expand his lot,” Kelly told me. “First he put up a stone fence on our property and then he built a jungle gym for his kids on his other neighbor’s property.” The fence stayed but the jungle gym came down.

Laws and fences help make good neighbors.

Often these “laws” are ordinances passed by local communities. We decide collectively what works for our neighborhood, and what works in some areas will not work in other areas. You can’t have roosters in most cities. But in some cities, you can keep a few hens.

Moving at warp speed in the Capitol is legislation that would change what your neighbor could do on his/her property and would limit your local community from taking a position to protect you and your other neighbors.

When does your neighbor’s property right limit your own rights? What if your neighbor built a fireworks factory next door? How about a large hog operation? Or an industrial sand mine?

In a bill, introduced just before Christmas and due to have a public hearing before you read this, the simple action of applying for a driveway permit or a state culvert permit could “freeze in place” any local ordinance or state law.

For example, on the date a person applies for a driveway permit and discloses a proposed project, the ordinances and rules of all levels of local and state government could be frozen in place on that date provided the driveway is constructed within a stated deadline – even though some aspects of the project may not be completed for many years.

Expanding a little known part of the law related to housing developments, the bill (Senate Bill 464 and its companion Assembly Bill 582) creates a loophole so big that the approval of a culvert permit in Kenosha could affect a development in Eau Claire.

In addition, if the developer first sought permission from the state for a minor permit, locals might not even know the granting of that state permit would mean the entire project had become a “vested right” of the developer.

“Vested Rights” is a common law idea that means some version of – because I have the property, I have an absolute, unconditional complete right to do what I want on the property. Obviously, I can’t build on your property, as in my first example. But what if what I do affects you? What if I create an industrial site that pollutes your water and air? What if I create a new activity (like sand mining six years ago) that effects your enjoyment of your land?

The bill is written so broadly that an action in one part of the state could affect land owned by the same company in another part of the state. The bill also gives “vesting rights” retroactively. Meaning, if the bill is passed into law, the new law would apply to any project that has not yet been finally approved by the time the bill passes. The bill could also affect any pending court cases.

The provisions related to projects not yet approved and pending court cases make me think there are many unknown implications.

One consequence of the bill is to create a race between a developer, builder or contractor against a local community. If the developer can get the project started before the local community takes final action, an inappropriate “non-conforming” use is created and may be continued indefinitely.

Other parts of the bill stop a county from taking a “breather” (development moratorium) while a comprehensive zoning amendment is considered. In addition, non-conforming structures on a lake or river could be torn down and a new (probably much larger) non-conforming structure built in its place.

Land use ordinances, zoning, subdivision and shoreland zoning rules all came about to protect our communities. We, collectively through local elected leaders – want nice places to live and raise our families.

This bill is just one of several bills that take away the collective rights of a community and the individual rights of neighbors to protect themselves. Lawmakers should reject this bill and others like it.

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