With a new two year spending plan now 107 days overdue, the state Senate considers a revised budget from Governor Jim Doyle. Majority Leader Judy Robson urges compromise on her Republican colleagues: their chance, she says, to fund schools and other state priorities. "Unfortunately there are some in the building who have advocated all or nothing," says Robson. "They either get their way entirely, or it's no deal. No budget."
But Minority leader Scott Fitzgerald, on crutches from a recent motorcycle accident, urges rejection of this budget revision. "There's only one thing that can truly be accomplished here today, and that it is to pass the bill that the Assembly has already passed on K-12 funding," says Fitzgerald. River Hills Republican Alberta Darling claims the revised bill from Doyle is really no compromise at all: "where's the give and take? The taxpayers are giving and government is taking." And, says Neenah Republican Mike Ellis, "this budget is not even close to a compromise.
It's unclear how this special session called by Governor Jim Doyle will actually break the deadlock between the Senate and Assembly. he Senate passed the revised budget plan from Doyle this afternoon.