YOU WANT FUZZY MATH? Head to Madison

From the Capital Times:

In introducing his budget last week, Gov. Jim Doyle said he had “identified” $25 million for a state program aimed at ensuring a college education for students who stay straight and study hard. But what the Democratic governor’s budget proposal doesn’t do is either spend that money or set it aside for the Wisconsin Covenant program. Instead, the money in the phantom appropriation for the college guarantee program would be returned, unspent, to the state’s main account at the end of the two-year budget in June 2011.

Why do that?

Doyle budget director Dave Schmiedicke said the line item is intended to serve as a placeholder until the fall of 2011, when the first of thousands of Wisconsin Covenant scholars will be entering college. Over the past two years, 35,000 students in two grades have signed the Covenant, which guarantees a place in a Wisconsin college and adequate financial aid to any eighth-grader who keeps a pledge to do well in school and keep out of trouble. Department of Administration spokeswoman Linda Barth said that the state will start deciding how many students are eligible after they finish filling out their federal student financial aid forms in January 2011.

Budget committee member Rep. Robin Vos, R-Caledonia, wasn’t buying the administration’s earmark explanation. A placeholder of $25 million in the current budget won’t guarantee students get anything in the next one, when the money will actually be needed, he said. “I thought I had seen everything, but this phony Covenant thing is one of the most egregious things I’ve ever heard of,” Vos said.