Apparently, others are not happy with the way Joint Finance crafted the budget

It seems I am not the only one who thinks the way the Joint Finance Committee worked its budget magic the past week was wrong, NOT a conspiracy, just wrong:

SOURCE: MILWAUKEE JOURNAL-SENTINEL
Hiding out in Madison
For those who like to compare making laws to making sausage, we've got news for you: We really would like to see how it's made. But the Legislature exempts itself from the state Open Meetings Law to go into closed-door sessions, where the real business of the state is hashed out. The powerful Joint Finance Committee is notorious for this tactic.

On Wednesday, the budget-writing committee met for hours in private, never convening publicly. At 10 p.m., a co-chairman emerged to promise that the committee would reconvene in public at noon Thursday. It didn't. Such backroom deal-making is the enemy of accountability, and it has spawned an overstuffed document that squeezes many of the most controversial items into one package for a single vote with almost no public debate. How is this good government?

The committee is dominated 12-4 by the Democrats, who must bear responsibility for this fiasco. But the act of hiding from the public is nothing new. When Republicans controlled the Legislature, they were just as eager to do the work of the state away from the prying eyes of press and public. "If a majority of a local government body, a school board, a village board, met like this . . . they would be violating the state Open Meetings Law," said Peter D. Fox, executive director of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association.

There are a couple of new attempts to put an end to these secret societies. Rep. Cory Mason (D-Racine), a member of the Joint Finance Committee, along with colleagues Dean Kaufert (R-Neenah), Gordon Hintz (D-Oshkosh), Jeffrey Wood (I-Chippewa Falls) and Terese Berceau (D-Madison) have introduced Assembly Bill 143 to end the exemption that allows party caucuses to be held in secret. State Sen. Alan Lasee (R-De Pere) is the co-sponsor in the Senate. State Reps. Leah Vukmir (R-Wauwatosa) and Rich Zipperer (R-Pewaukee) are authors of a bill that would require disclosure of who made motions or suggested earmarks during Joint Finance Committee meetings.

These are both good ideas. The Legislature should do its work - all of its work - in public. Let's see how they're stuffing this sausage and with what.