Wisconsin - Governor's Mansion (click here)
Associated Press ... direct feed | November 27, 2002
Posted on Wednesday, November 27, 2002 12:15:25 PM by NYer
KENOSHA, Wis. (AP) _ State Sen. Robert Wirch is asking Governor-elect Jim Doyle to sell the governor's mansion as a way to address the state's projected $2.6 billion budget deficit.
Wirch said selling the $1.3 million mansion would be more of a symbolic gesture than a way to save a significant amount of money. ``Considering the budget deficit and talk about borrowing money against the pension fund, we need to cut all extravagances, and the governor's mansion is more an extravagance than a necessity,'' said Wirch, D-Pleasant Prairie. Doyle spokesman Thad Nation said he would not comment until he had seen Wirch's letter.
The governor's mansion sits on the shores of Lake Mendota and is worth about $1.3 million, according to the Legislative Fiscal Bureau. But Wirch said that the value of the land the mansion sits on and the costs of running the house amount to around $4 million.
Wirch said he got the idea from other candidates in the governor's race and that he would have suggested it regardless of who won the office. In his letter to Doyle, Wirch notes that at least six states have either sold their executive residences or have never offered an executive residence. Wirch also mentioned that Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura refused to live in the governor's mansion in St. Paul.
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