Two Republican legislators want to remove all lawmakers from the board that oversees Gov. Scott Walker’s troubled job creation agency. Four lawmakers — Sen. Rick Gudex, a Fond du Lac Republican; Rep. Rob Hutton, a Brookfield Republican; Sen. Julie Lassa, a Stevens Point Democrat; and Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca, a Kenosha Democrat, currently sit on the 12-member board. Lassa and Barca have been vocal critics of WEDC, which has been plagued by mismanagement and a failure to track past-due loans. But Gudex says he believes that is now in the past. Gudex and Hutton introduced a bill Friday that would remove all four legislators from the board and replace them with people from the private sector. They said in a memo seeking co-sponsors that representatives from the private sector can provide better firsthand experience in economic development initiatives.
