MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – The Wisconsin Legislature’s finance committee has endorsed a revamping of the state’s troubled job creation agency.
Majority Republicans voted Thursday night to remove Governor Scott Walker as chairman of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation’s board of directors.
They eliminated a $55 million revolving fund for regional loans. They also ordered a major cut in the WEDC’s reserves to one-sixth of its annual administrative expenses, and the finance panel would control most of those reserves.
The committee did not take up the governor’s recent request to end direct business loans from the WEDC. That came after a 2011 loan to a governor’s campaign donor created no jobs before the donor’s company folded.
Earlier this month, Walker scrapped plans to merge the WEDC with the state’s major housing loan authority, following a second critical audit of the jobs’ agency. Walker’s original budget would have removed the governor as the board chair, and prevented 4 lawmakers from holding seats on the board.
The lawmakers will stay, and Republicans on the finance panel took issue with Democratic claims that Walker was being “fired” as the WEDC board chair.
The minority Democrats voted against the GOP’s changes, saying they were not enough.
Republican finance co-chair John Nygren said he expects more changes to the state’s economic development programs this fall.
(Story courtesy of Wheeler News Service)