Although it appeared Wisconsin's lawmakers were at a standstill in the struggle for ethics reform last week, both Democratic and Republican leaders announced a ""historic"" compromise Monday.
State Senate Majority Leader, Judy Robson, D-Beloit, and Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem, said in a joint statement. ""They expect a bi-partisan package of ethics reforms to win approval from both houses and be on the governors desk this week.""
According to Joshua Wescott, communications director for Robson, the state Senate and Assembly will consider the ethics reform package at the Capitol when the two bodies reconvene today.
""If all goes well ... it should be on the Governor's desk very soon."" Wescott said.
Robson said after several meetings, amendments and feedback, the ethics package is ready, and is one of ""the strongest ethical reforms seen in any state in the country.""
The compromise reached by the GOP and Democratic Party, includes the removal of the ""non-severability"" clause, which caused controversy in several committee meetings.
The clause stipulated that if any part of the ethics reform bill was found unconstitutional, the whole bill would have to be thrown out and completely started from scratch.
Under the Elections and Ethics Board will merge into a non-partisan Government Accountability Board, compromises six retired judges.
According to McCabe, the compromise reached still has weaknesses, but the biggest concern, the non-severability clause, was adequately addressed.
"" There is a lot of good stuff in it and then there are a few warts. We've succeeded in getting some of the warts removed, but not all of them,"" he said.
""The non-severability clause would have thrown the good out with the bad if just one thing had been successfully challenged in court,"" he said. ""It was very important to get rid of the clause because that was essentially a self-destruct mechanism. ... That was unacceptable to us.""
Jay Heck, executive director of Common Cause Wisconsin, echoed McCabe's stance on the non-severability. He said he was ""cautiously optimistic"" but that removing the ""big obstacle"" was encouraging.
Both critics said they were still concerned about where government officials would be tried.
If an investigation suggests wrongdoing any wrongdoing by a government official, the evidence will be referred to district attorneys or Attorney General, J.B. Van Hollen.
Heck said Assembly Republicans pushed to have government officials tried in their districts, rather than in liberal Madison.
