Stephanie
Diamond Member
- Jul 11, 2004
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All together now...........Aaawwwwwwwwwwwwww
SNIP:
Escape to Illinois to avoid vote on budget leaves lawmakers short on essentials
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee By Dawn Rhodes, Hailey Branson-Potts and Erin Meyer, Tribune reporters
8:05 p.m. CST, February 21, 2011
Some senators left Wisconsin with little more than the clothes on their backs. Others came to Illinois equipped with an Urban Essentials pack: clothes, toiletries, cell phones, smart phones Facebook and Twitter ready.
Since they skipped across the state line Thursday to block a Republican budget plan, the 14 Wisconsin Democrats have gone into survival mode in Illinois, doing small loads of laundry and eating "whatever we can get our hands on." Whatever they don't have, they buy nothing on the state's dime, they insist or they get from relatives and staff who trek across the border.
"Each day brings its own challenges," said Sen. Spencer Coggs, D-Milwaukee, by telephone. "Somebody will need an electric shaver or somebody will need provisions."
Coggs has had to purchase underwear, socks and T-shirts. His wife brought him more clothes over the weekend. Sen. Julie Lassa, D-Stevens Point, needed more contact lens solution.
"It's just roughing it, like staying in a college dorm all over again," Coggs said. "It's sort of like being a refugee."
The "Democratic 14" fled so that the Senate would not have a quorum to vote on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's budget bill, which they say tramples on the rights of public workers. Sen. Jon Erpenbach, D-Middleton, said the group is staying outside the state so that Wisconsin police won't have jurisdiction to bring them back to the Senate.
Erpenbach said that under Wisconsin law, the state patrol can "compel" them to vote. But it's not clear under what circumstances the police would have the authority to detain them for such a vote.
Neither the Illinois nor the Wisconsin constitutions allow for the arrest of a member of the state legislature during the session unless the lawmaker is being charged with a felony, treason or a breach of the peace.
"Gov. Walker has said in the last few days that he has no intention to order police to arrest lawmakers," said his press secretary, Cullen Werwie.
Mordecai Lee, a professor of government affairs at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and former Democratic state senator, said that on several occasions during his Senate career, the sergeant-at-arms came to his office to tell him it was time to vote, escorting him to the floor.
In a "Call of the House," the sergeant-at-arms locks the doors to the Senate chambers with the lawmakers inside while searching the Capitol to make a quorum, Lee said.
Lee said Wisconsin police have no power to take the lawmakers into custody as long as they remain out of the state.
Even so, the senators remain mum on their exact locations in Illinois.
"There's no point in issuing a press release about where I am," said Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison. "I'm not necessarily in one place."
Sen. Jim Holperin, D-Eagle River, said they don't want protesters showing up at their doors.
read it all a try not to cry here.
Wisconsin senators in Illinois, doing the laundry - Chicago Breaking News
SNIP:
Escape to Illinois to avoid vote on budget leaves lawmakers short on essentials
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee By Dawn Rhodes, Hailey Branson-Potts and Erin Meyer, Tribune reporters
8:05 p.m. CST, February 21, 2011
Some senators left Wisconsin with little more than the clothes on their backs. Others came to Illinois equipped with an Urban Essentials pack: clothes, toiletries, cell phones, smart phones Facebook and Twitter ready.
Since they skipped across the state line Thursday to block a Republican budget plan, the 14 Wisconsin Democrats have gone into survival mode in Illinois, doing small loads of laundry and eating "whatever we can get our hands on." Whatever they don't have, they buy nothing on the state's dime, they insist or they get from relatives and staff who trek across the border.
"Each day brings its own challenges," said Sen. Spencer Coggs, D-Milwaukee, by telephone. "Somebody will need an electric shaver or somebody will need provisions."
Coggs has had to purchase underwear, socks and T-shirts. His wife brought him more clothes over the weekend. Sen. Julie Lassa, D-Stevens Point, needed more contact lens solution.
"It's just roughing it, like staying in a college dorm all over again," Coggs said. "It's sort of like being a refugee."
The "Democratic 14" fled so that the Senate would not have a quorum to vote on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's budget bill, which they say tramples on the rights of public workers. Sen. Jon Erpenbach, D-Middleton, said the group is staying outside the state so that Wisconsin police won't have jurisdiction to bring them back to the Senate.
Erpenbach said that under Wisconsin law, the state patrol can "compel" them to vote. But it's not clear under what circumstances the police would have the authority to detain them for such a vote.
Neither the Illinois nor the Wisconsin constitutions allow for the arrest of a member of the state legislature during the session unless the lawmaker is being charged with a felony, treason or a breach of the peace.
"Gov. Walker has said in the last few days that he has no intention to order police to arrest lawmakers," said his press secretary, Cullen Werwie.
Mordecai Lee, a professor of government affairs at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and former Democratic state senator, said that on several occasions during his Senate career, the sergeant-at-arms came to his office to tell him it was time to vote, escorting him to the floor.
In a "Call of the House," the sergeant-at-arms locks the doors to the Senate chambers with the lawmakers inside while searching the Capitol to make a quorum, Lee said.
Lee said Wisconsin police have no power to take the lawmakers into custody as long as they remain out of the state.
Even so, the senators remain mum on their exact locations in Illinois.
"There's no point in issuing a press release about where I am," said Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison. "I'm not necessarily in one place."
Sen. Jim Holperin, D-Eagle River, said they don't want protesters showing up at their doors.
read it all a try not to cry here.
Wisconsin senators in Illinois, doing the laundry - Chicago Breaking News
