Assembly Speaker Said He Won’t Back Plan To Dump Legislative Audit Bureau

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said he would never support a bill that would eliminate the Legislative Audit Bureau.

State Rep. David Craig, R-Big Bend, circulated a plan in the Legislature this week that would end the nonpartisan agency. Craig’s proposal would replace it with inspectors general at every state agency who would answer to legislative leaders.

Vos said the proposal wasn’t written with his input and won’t pass in its current form.

“The way that the bill was drafted is not something that I could support,” Vos said. “I am open to working with Rep. Craig to see if there are other ways to accomplish his goal of trying to get at fraud before it is actually perpetrated on the taxpayer. And I think that’s the goal of where I just heard him describe it. The Audit Bureau does a fantastic job. I would never support a proposal to get rid of the Audit Bureau.”

Craig said on Tuesday he’d be open to maintaining the audit bureau while also adding inspectors general.