Wisconsin’s state finance committee voted early Wednesday in favor of ejecting an independent, non-profit investigative journalism organization from its current home on University of Wisconsin-Madison’s campus, a decision UW-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication Director Greg Downey said infringes on innovative professional research and academic freedom.
The Joint Finance Committee, which is made up of 12 Republican and four Democratic state lawmakers, approved the 2013-’15 budget amendment along party lines, forcing the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism out of its two offices on the fourth floor of Vilas Communication Hall, where the UW-Madison’s school of journalism also resides.
The amendment, co-sponsored by JFC co-chairs state Rep. John Nygren, R-Marinette and state Sen. Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, would “prohibit the Board of Regents from permitting the Center for Investigative Journalism to occupy any facilities owned or leased by the Board of Regents.”
It would also prohibit UW employees from working with the WCIJ in any university-related capacity, according to the amendment.
The center operates on a $400,000 budget made up of donations from private foundations, individuals and news organizations, according to its website. Upon its founding in 2009, the center agreed to provide journalism students paid internships, offer career connections and provide guest lecturers and ethics training to students in journalism classrooms in exchange for rent-free office space.
Downey said forcing the center to start paying for an off-campus headquarters “means that those professionals and their expertise are that much more removed from the daily life of the department,” which he said would threaten the “intellectual and professional collaboration that we were trying to put together.”
The partnership is an award-winning innovation and an “ongoing experiment” into the future landscape of “high-quality journalism [production]” that would end if the measure were to pass through the state legislation process, according to Downey. He also said the measure raises important questions about “academic freedom” and the Legislature’s role in everyday university affairs, which he hopes Gov. Scott Walker will consider.
“[Walker] has to see that this is an inappropriate addition to the budget,” Downey said. “Not necessarily because the journalism school and the center are doing great things together, but because it’s just on principle wrong to micromanage the university in that way.”
Andy Hall, founder and current head of the WCIJ, said if the JFC’s move were to stand, students who “have benefitted immensely from the training and experience they receive at the Center” would be the primary benefactors to suffer.
According to Downey, several departments across UW-Madison have contracts with outside organizations to share facilities, however the Legislature is only concerned with terminating the specific “facility sharing agreement” between UW-Madison’s journalism school and the WCIJ.
Downey said the particular group of individuals supporting the proposal have not fulfilled their responsibility to explain their reasoning, so he can only speculate. However, he pointed to the center’s “equal opportunity” record and overall transparency of reporting methods and funding to respond to concerns that the Legislature is targeting the institution for its “liberal media bias.”
Nygren had not returned messages to comment on the issue as of Wednesday evening.
Hall said the center received an “overwhelming number” of messages from journalists and journalism educators across the country Wednesday “who see this as an attack on journalism, as an attack on academic freedom and as a threat to the public’s ability to receive essential information about the performance of their democracy.”
Downey said he hopes students supporting the mission of the project will stand behind both the journalism school and the WCIJ in their efforts to stop the legislation from being passed into law.
A group of former WCIJ student employees, all UW-Madison graduates, expressed their opposition to the JFC’s decision Wednesday afternoon in a letter to state Senate and Assembly members, urging them to strike down the provision.
In the letter, they said they consider the WCIJ “fundamental” to kick-starting their journalism careers.
“A core mission of the center is to train the next generation of investigative journalists,” the letter said. “It meets this mission in large part by collaborating with UW faculty in the journalism school.”
Although Hall said he is unsure whether the center would be able to operate elsewhere under its current budget, he said he is “confident” it could raise the additional funds if necessary.
“No matter what happens in the legislature, the center will survive and thrive,” Hall said.
Walker’s full biennial budget will have to pass through both houses of the state Legislature before receiving final approval from Walker.
