A state lawmaker criticizes the governor's budget proposal for raiding yet another segregated fund.
Republican Senator Rob Cowles (R-Green Bay) wants the Joint Finance Committee to remove a provision in the two-year spending plan that takes $25-million from UW system student fees and places it in financial aid programs.
"Taking the fees from the students in our university … students pay fees for various things, for dorm activities, for student life, there's a whole variety of things. This is their money."
Cowles calls the raid on a "shell game" the governor is playing with someone else's money in order to create the illusion of having a balanced budget.
"The governor swipes $25-million of that money and puts it in the state treasure and uses that for tuition grants. Well that's like the students paying for their own tuition grants."
Student fees vary from campus to campus, but Cowles points out each school uses that money for a specific purpose.
"And they're put in what's called an auxiliary student fee fund at the UW. And now the governor's reaching in and grabbing that money. Not unlike what he did with the patience compensation fund, or the highway fund raid, or the energy conservation fund. Just about everything's been raided."
Cowles' beef seems to fall on deaf ears, but he's hopeful that the members of the Joint Finance Committee will put an end to this practice.