Walker Flack Confirms UW System-Audit Bureau Link in Forbes Mag. Online

Updated - A Scott Walker spokesperson confirmed yesterday that Walker intends to remove all references to the University of Wisconsin System from the Wisconsin statutes.

It is noted at this site that the Wisconsin legislative Finance Committee's proposed abolishment of the Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB) also would have the effect of nixing academic freedom guarantees contained in a section of the 1965 statute creating the Legislative Audit Bureau.

Hence, the assertion Walker's objective of destroying academic freedom would explain the bizarre call for the proposed demolishment of the LAB.

This assessment is confirmed yesterday by Scott Walker's spokesperson, Laurel Patrick, in comments made to Forbes Business online in a piece by Steven Salzberg.

Said Ms. Patrick to Forbes in an email: "... the Governor’s original budget proposal removed all references to the UW from state statute in order to allow for the proposed authority to create its own policies. This would allow the UW Board of Regents to address the issue of tenure going forward."

But Walker missed one huge reference in the LAB statute. Surrogates in the Joint Finance Committee took care of the omission.

Abolishing the Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB) and removing the statute does remove a major reference to the UW from state statute, one that specifically protects academic freedom, and gives previously statutory guarantees to the heavily Scott Walker-appointed and politically vetted UW System Board of Regents and of course politically vetted inspectors general.

Author of Abolish-the-Audit Bureau Bill Refuses Comment on Academic Freedom Guarantee

Omnibus Motion 521 regarding the UW System
authored by Sen. Harsdorf and Rep. Schraa

Updated - Following the proposed abolishment of tenure as guaranteed by Wisconsin statute, Republican Party attacks on academic freedom at the University of Wisconsin System continue. (Vanness, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel)

This morning State Rep. David Craig (R-Big Bend), the author of the bill to abolish the Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB), declined to comment through an aide when asked if Craig would offer his assurance his bill would retain the section of the LAB statute guarding academic freedom for the UW System in the operations of the LAB. (Mal Contends)

In a related development, Rep. Craig's office also told a Capital Times reporter that his "proposal to abolish the Legislative Audit Bureau ... didn’t have anything to do with scathing audits of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation," and is simply a good government move to prevent "spending abuses." (Elbow, The Capital Times)

The LAB proposal is directly related to the proposed restructuring of the UW System though the dissolving of the LAB guarantee of academic freedom at the University of Wisconsin System, a freedom codified in several statutes of Wisconsin.

Omnibus Motion 521

The budgetary Omnibus Motion (motion 521) regarding the UW System restructuring is authored by State Senator Sheila Harsdorf (R-River Falls) and State Rep. Michael Schraa (R-Oshkosh) both of whom are members of the powerful Joint Committee on Finance.

The Joint Committee on Finance's "primary responsibility is to serve as the principal legislative committee charged with the review of all state appropriations and revenues," as described on its webpage.

Reads the Omnibus Motion introduced by Harsdorf and Schraa.: "Suspend current law…requiring the Legislative Audit Bureau to conduct an annual financial audit of the UW System. Instead, require the UW System to contract with an independent accounting firm." (Vinhout, Uppity Wisconsin)

Item 12 of the Hardorf-Schraa-Scott Walker initiative reads in part: "12. Tenure: Approve the Governor's recommendation to delete the definition of a 'tenure appointment' and language establishing the conditions under which the Board of Regents may grant a tenure appointment to a faculty member. Delete current law specifying that a person who has been granted tenure may be dismissed only for just cause and only after due notice and hearing."

University faculty tenure guarantees and limitation are codified in state statute.

Under the GOP-Walker scheme, these guarantees which attract world class researchers and faculty would transfer to the whim of the politicized UW System Board of Regents, most of whom have been vetted and appointed by Scot Walker.

Contract Employees or Tenured Faculty

This raises the question that without statutory protection, without Board of Regents support, how does the UW embed tenure in the appointments of 'tenured' faculty? An employment contract?

Does 'come to the UW System as a contract employee' really seem appealing to lure world-class researchers and faculty?

No, and that's Scott Walker and the GOP's point.

One can only hope public support for the University of Wisconsin System kills the project of Scott Walker and Republicans.

Items 26, 27 of GOP Omnibus Motion 521 regarding the UW System

Audit Bureau Attack Is Sucker Punch to Academic Freedom of UW System

Political Payback in Proposed Audit Bureau Dissolution Is Cover for Assualt on Academic Freedom

Updated - The proposed abolishment of the Legislative Audit Bureau following the Bureau's revelations of incompetence and corruption in Scott Walker's Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC), Walker's flagship 'jobs' agency, has another policy objective. (Elbow, The Capital Times)

Abolishing the independent, 50-year-old agency would also nullify a major statutory protection of academic freedom of the University System, and under current GOP policy aims give massive power to the Walker-appointed UW System Regents. (Schneider, The Capital Times)

Reads the relevant section of the 1965 statute creating the Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB) (13/IV/94/1):

In performing postaudits under this subsection, the legislative audit bureau shall not examine issues related to academic freedom within the University of Wisconsin System. A postaudit shall not examine into or comment upon the content of the various academic programs, including degree requirements, majors, curriculum or courses within the University of Wisconsin System, nor shall any such postaudit examine into the manner in which individual faculty members or groups of faculty members conduct their instructional, research or public service activities. This subsection does not preclude the bureau from reviewing the procedures by which decisions are made and priorities set in the University of Wisconsin System, or the manner in which such decisions and priorities are implemented within the University of Wisconsin System, insofar as such review is not inconsistent with s. 36.09. [UW Board of Regents] (emphasis added)

This embedded statutory protection for the University System and academic freedom in the LAB statute would be eliminated, replaced by the analyses of proposed (and ideologically vetted) inspectors generals who would be free to proactively examine academic programs, courses within the University of Wisconsin System, instructional methods, research and public service activities and then make audits that could be used by the Walker-vetted Board of Regents for the purpose of breaking up UW-Madison, for instance, and replacing or eradicating academic programs ideologically unpopular with the GOP and political donors under the rubric of proactive fiscal action.

Notes Karen Herzog:

Currently, tenured faculty can be dismissed only for just cause or if a campuswide financial emergency is declared. Both are difficult to prove.

The GOP's proposed language deletes 'when a financial emergency exists' as a justification for laying off or terminating tenured faculty and replaces it with different conditions: 'due to a budget or program decision regarding program discontinuance, curtailment, modification (or) redirection.' (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel)

In the absence of academic freedom protections in the LAB statute, easy to contemplate a Walker or Dept of Administration, or GOP-dominated Legislative Committee-appointed inspector general conducting an ideologically charged audit giving a policy rationale for the Walker-appointed UW Regents to act against academic programs, professors without tenure protection, courses within the University of Wisconsin System, instructional methods, research and public service activities.

Seen in this light, Walker's move earlier this year to remove the Wisconsin Idea from state statutes, along with other attacks on the UW System, reveals a broader effort to diminish Walker's most potent political foe, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, UW-Extension Centers , Dane County and other Wisconsin college towns.

One wonders if UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank really regards the attack on faculty tenure as not a "disaster" in light of this further effort to destroy another statutory protection of academic freedom. (Sommerhauser, Wisconsin State Journal).

This is not a move to merely frighten or upset the Wisconsin people, as Blank has said, (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel) it's another move in the GOP project to destroy the UW System.

Is it not clear that Walker and the GOP's objective is to eliminate the University System as Wisconsin knows it?

"The university’s Faculty Senate plans a special meeting Tuesday to discuss the legislative [tenure] proposal," notes Sommerhauser.