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Jensen a cut above soon-to-be prison pals

Posted: May 24, 2006

Cary Spivak & Dan Bice E-MAIL

If being a heavy-hitter in the Capitol, a Harvard grad and pal of ex-Gov. Tommy Thompson isn't enough to set former Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen apart from his soon-to-be prison chums, here is one more distinction.

How many other guests of the state can say they brought in a six-figure income - and we're talking clean money here - in the year before they donned a prison jumpsuit?

Scooter can, thanks to the Alliance for School Choice, which paid him $114,035 last year - double what the conservative school choice advocacy group paid Jensen in '04 and more than twice his legislative salary.

Apparently, the alliance wasn't too bothered by the Brookfield Republican's legal troubles.

The board for the $7 million non-profit met last week to discuss Jensen's future with the group in light of his three felony convictions earlier this year for directing legislative staffers to campaign on state time. Afterward, Clint Bolick, the group's president, put out this statement:

"The Alliance for School Choice will continue to employ Scott Jensen so long as he is eligible to work and has not exhausted his right to appeal the verdict against him."

Unsure whether that means he will stay on the payroll once he is locked up - he is scheduled to begin his 15-month prison sentence on July 15 - we rang up Laura Devaney, the flack for the Phoenix-based group, which promotes charter schools and private school vouchers. She told us to call back when Jensen is officially in the slammer.

"You'd have to ask me when that happens, only because honestly I don't have an answer," she said. "It's up to the courts if he is eligible (to work)."

Jensen, once considered a likely gubernatorial candidate, took a job with the group in June 2004 as director of state projects, essentially pushing choice and charter programs in states outside Wisconsin. Some critics suggested that Jensen had divided loyalties by working full time for the lobbying group and the state Legislature, but the ever-accommodating state Ethics Board signed off on the deal.

Tax records show the alliance paid Jensen $54,423 in 2004 for 40 hours a week of work. Last summer, he was promoted to the six-figure job of national director of state projects for the group. Combined with his lawmaker salary, Jensen's pay was nearly $160,000 last year.

Sure beats making license plates or office furniture for a few pennies an hour.