Thousands of students
Bills offer different ideas for Lincoln Hills’ future
march on the Capitol, demonstrating for gun control, school safety.
MADISON - Republicans in the Legislature split Wednesday over a plan to close a troubled teen prison as one senator claimed that the FBI had completed its three-year investigation of Lincoln Hills School for Boys.
Rep. Michael Schraa (R-Oshkosh), a lead author of the bill to close Lincoln Hills, said Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) was taking steps that would likely doom the legislation. The Senate changes gutted the bill, he said.
“It’s just mind-boggling to me that he would play these kinds of games and really risk a piece of legislation that could have been historic and transformational,” Schraa said.
The sharp differences over Lincoln Hills came as state Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) said the FBI told him in December that it had finished its investigation into the facility and turned over findings to U.S. Attorney Scott Blader.
Spokespeople for Blader and the FBI issued statements saying the investigation was ongoing but would not say whether the FBI portion of the probe was done. Prosecutors from Blader’s office have been presenting evidence about the prison to a federal grand jury.
About a month after Wanggaard said he learned the FBI had completed work on the investigation, GOP Gov. Scott Walker unveiled his plan to close Lincoln Hills. Wanggaard said the push to close the prison was not related to the developments in the criminal investigation.
Walker spokeswoman Amy Hasenberg said the governor had not been informed about the status of the investigation.
Walker and other officials have long known about problems with the facility, which is the subject of multiple lawsuits and a criminal investigation into child neglect and prisoner abuse.
Plans to close Lincoln Hills are in peril.
The Assembly last month unanimously approved a bill to close Lincoln Hills and replace it with smaller, regional facilities, some of which would be run by counties.
Republicans who run the Senate unveiled a plan Wednesday that would also shut down Lincoln Hills by 2021 but does not spell out what would replace it. Instead, a task force would spend the coming years studying where to house juvenile criminals.
The differing plans raised the prospect that nothing will get done this year as Walker has wanted.
A Senate committee chaired by
Wanggaard on Wednesday approved the new version of the bill 3-2, with all Republicans for it and all Democrats against it. The vote sets the stage for the Senate to take up the modified bill Tuesday.
Wanggaard, who is a former police officer, told reporters after the committee meeting that based on his conversations with the FBI he did not believe anyone who works at Lincoln Hills now would face criminal charges. Former employees may, he said.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in December reported that prosecutors had sent letters to two former guards warning them they could face charges.
“The investigation as far as Lincoln Hills goes has been completed I understand by the FBI and is in the U.S. attorney’s hands with potential action for that,” Wanggaard said.
A Wanggaard spokesman said the senator had told multiple lawmakers about the status of the FBI investigation. Those lawmakers disputed that they’d been told that or said they did not have a complete recollection of it; no one fully corroborated the claim that he had shared the information.
Sources said GOP Attorney General Brad Schimel had not been told about the status of the FBI investigation. FBI spokesman Leonard Peace did not say why someone from the FBI would give details to Wanggaard, but not to Walker or Schimel.
Wanggaard helped write the Lincoln Hills bill the Assembly passed in February but said the measure doesn’t have support from Senate Republicans. He said he was offering his alternative so the plan to replace Lincoln Hills could be studied more carefully.
“We are committed to closing Lincoln Hills,” he said.
Sen. Lena Taylor (D-Milwaukee) said Wanggaard’s proposal gutted the Assembly’s work.
“I’m completely saddened, disgusted, frustrated by what’s going on,” she said as the committee prepared to vote on Wanggaard’s proposal.
“I want you to know blood is on your hands in the Senate.”
The Senate is meeting for what is supposed to be its last time this year as part of its regular session Tuesday.
Assembly leaders have repeatedly said they have finished their regular session.
If the two houses don’t agree on identical bills, nothing will get to Walker’s desk. Wanggaard said it would be the Assembly’s fault if that happens.
Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke (R-Kaukauna) said he believed the Assembly version of the bill could easily pass the Senate given its bipartisan support. He said the Senate — not the Assembly — would be to blame if the measure doesn’t get to Walker’s desk.
“They were notified by us early on we weren’t planning on coming back,” Steineke said.