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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

WI DNR Fight Hits Gov.'s Desk

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Thursday, November 12, 2009   

MADISON, Wisc. - The legislative effort to change the way the secretary of the state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is appointed faces a block by Gov. Jim Doyle, who is threatening to veto the bill. Currently, the governor appoints the DNR secretary, but the majority of legislators, former DNR secretaries and environmental groups believe the appointing authority should be returned to the independent Natural Resources Board, where it was for 67 years.

Kerry Schumann, executive director of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters, is among those who supports taking this decision away from the governor's office, and says it's not too late for the governor to change his mind and be remembered as a champion of conservation.

"Whether the governor follows in the footsteps of Aldo Leopold, or he does the bidding of the polluting industries -that's the question he has to face. What is his heritage going to be? What is his legacy?"

Aldo Leopold was a forester and environmentalist who died in 1948, and is often hailed as one of the pioneers of wilderness conservation.

An independent board appointment of the DNR secretary, says Schumann, would remove the political pressure from this important long-lasting decision.

"The DNR secretary is not beholden to one person who has to get reelected, and that, I think, makes an enormous difference in how they can behave as a secretary."

This political issue sparks a passionate response, she adds, because it's tied to environmental protection.

"This is an unbelievably popular issue, and it's also more than almost any issue. There's an intensity to how much people care about having an independent DNR secretary."

The governor's decision on whether he will sign or vetor the bill could come as early as today.

The hiring, firing and supervision of the DNR secretary had been performed by a board from 1927 until 1995 when the legislature and then-Gov. Tommy Thompson successfully shifted control to the governor. Supporters of the move to change it back to the former process say an override of a Doyle veto is possible. Those hoping to maintain the current system say the DNR shouldn't be in a different class than other state agencies whose secretaries are also currently appointed by the governor.





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