Is this really the Reform we were looking for?

So now we see what the legislature has been up to in their quest to replace the Government Accountability Board (GAB) with the following bill: GAB Reform Bill
They want to separate the Elections from the Ethics - As it was prior to the GAB
They want the members to be political appointees - As it was prior to the GAB
They want to put in place all the things that they railed against only eight short years ago.
Here is what they think the legislation is:

This board will be bipartisan - yes! Much better than the current "non-partisan" GAB...but the State Elections Board was bipartisan and it was a train wreck!
This board will be transparent - um, not sure how it is any more transparent then the current GAB OR the State Elections Board since it is comprised of appointees! The good part of this bill is the removal of most of the "investigative" abilities that the GAB had.
This board will be accountable - Not sure how they think they can claim this. The closest you can come is the fact that there will be more budget constraint which was lacking in the current GAB format. And once again this is a board (sorry Commission) that will be loaded with political appointees. The voters are EXCLUDED from holding this board accountable.

So the remaining question is, who will lead the State Elections Commission as the Chief Elections Officer for the State?
Well that will be up to the appointed board to nominate one of its members and that person must be confirmed by the State Senate - or to put it another way - it will be an individual that is unelected and unaccountable to the voters and taxpayers of Wisconsin.

What we need is to ELECT our Chief Elections Officer for the State of Wisconsin as we do our Chief Law Enforcement Officer (a.k.a. Attorney General). This would allow the voters and taxpayers of the State to ensure that our elections are fair and managed correctly.
The election duties at the local level are handled by the County and Municipal Clerks and in 71 of 72 Counties we entrust our partisan elected County Clerks to handle the job. So why can't we do this at the State level?
Thirty-nine (39) states put their State elections process in the hands of their Secretary of State as we did until 1974 when the State Elections Board was created. Maybe the legislature should consider this prior to sending our elections back into the hands of political appointees.

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