Wisconsin Republicans Vote on Budget Bill With Capitol on Lock-Down

Following a surprise, and possibly illegal vote, by Wisconsin Republicans to pass a revised version of Governor Scott Walker’s draconian budget bill, protesters, reporters, and even some Democratic representatives are being denied access to the Madison Capitol Building.

As reported by the Madison Cap Times, Rep. Joe Parisi said he and the Rev. Jesse Jackson were denied entrance to the Capitol at both the King Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard entrances.

“We were told the building is closed to everyone right now,” Parisi told a large crowd outside the King Street entrance. “I’d like to be let in so I can at least vote on this bill.”

The vote may have violated open meetings and other laws:

Shortly after Senate Republicans’ surprise vote Wednesday to eliminate most collective bargaining rights for most public employees, protesters started collecting signatures from citizens in preparation for filing an open meetings complaint.

It is not yet clear where these complaints will be filed, but former Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager said they can be filed with either the Dane County District Attorney’s Office or the Attorney General’s Office. But, she added: “Frankly I don’t know how either of those men would need a complaint to file an action in this. It’s clear that the conference committee’s meeting on its face violated Wisconsin’s open meetings law.”

Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca, D-Kenosha, said at a news conference after the Senate vote that he had received notice of the conference committee meeting in an e-mail at 4:09 p.m. The meeting was at 6 p.m.

“I honestly do not believe this action will stand. We will seek every recourse available. Clearly what they did was improper and illegal,” Barca said.

The 18-1 vote in the Senate on Gov. Scott Walker’s budget repair bill and the earlier conference committee vote with Assembly members mark a new phase in a standoff that has lasted almost three weeks. On Feb. 17, all 14 Democratic state senators left the state to block a vote on Walker’s bill, which has generated massive protests.

Twenty members of the Senate are required for a quorum to vote on fiscal matters, and up until Wednesday, the collective bargaining provisions had been treated as fiscal. The contention that they are not was an abrupt about-face by GOP leaders, but that is what paved the way for Wednesday’s vote. The conference committee separated items identified by the GOP leaders as non-fiscal and voted on them; the Senate approved the measure shortly thereafter.

The conference committee action was necessary to reconcile the bill with what the Assembly has already passed. That body will take up the legislation again Thursday.

Attorney Bob Dreps, an expert in open meetings and open records law, said the state’s open meetings law requires 24 hours notice before any government meeting can be held. It allows for shorter notice for “good cause” only when it would be “impossible” or “impractical” to wait 24 hours. But even in those situations there must be a two-hour notice for an emergency meeting, he said.

Dreps said from what he could see, the Senate Republicans “didn’t give valid notice.”

Tom Spellman was at the Capitol most of the day Wednesday but he, too, was caught by surprise. “There was no notice for Pete’s sake,” said Spellman, a protester from Lake Geneva who added his name to the list of people willing to be witnesses for a formal open meetings complaint.

Spellman said the hasty moves by Republicans will ultimately backfire. “Scott Walker is going to go down in history as one of the greatest union organizers there ever was.”

Jeff Hamm, associate dean with the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Education, was also outraged. “The whole process was slimy,” he said. “There was insufficient notice, no public knowledge or oversight. It’s an embarrassment for our state.”