Monday, November 18, 2013 - The Daily Cardinal

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Run-J.M.C.

Changin’ the game

A look at how LL Cool J’s Radio pushed the hip-hop envelope

UW trio overwhelms Indiana’s ground defense +SPORTS, page 8

+ARTS, page 4

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Monday, November 18, 2013

Audit finds UW has no formal plans for funds UW-Madison holds millions in ‘undocumented’ revenue balances An audit of the University of Wisconsin System released Nov. 15 revealed that no documented plans exist for 40.7 percent of UW-Madison’s 2012 program revenue balances. These balances are funds held by universities that draw from sources such as tuition after expenditures are subtracted. The majority of this money is committed in some way to future uses. The audit, conducted by the Legislative Audit Bureau, focused on $755.4 million of the $1.05 billion in the 2012 system balances. This came from sources such as tuition revenues that did not have restricted uses. At UW-Madison, $112.4 million of the $276 million in revenue balances are undocumented, meaning either the plan for its use is unavailable or no plan currently exists. System-wide, 18.8 percent of

funds are labeled as undocumented. These funds come from academic student fees, such as tuition, and federal money used to administer research grant programs. In a letter responding to the report, UW System President Kevin Reilly said UW-Madison had accumulated the federal funds “as a hedge against potential declines in federal research revenue” and would need to use them to compensate for the recent decline in federal funding. Many legislators were angered by the April 2013 revelation that the UW system held over $1 billion in program revenue balances, especially because the UW System Board of Regents had voted consistently to raise tuition for years. In response, the state Legislature mandated the annual audit of program revenue balances along with sanctions including a two-year tuition freeze. Initial analysis of 2013 balances show program revenue balances have increased by 16.3 percent, but the bureau was unable to examine how the money is committed because the report was compiled before data was available. A second phase of the report will look at 2012-’13 financial statements. —Tamar Myers

Mark kauzlarich/cardinal file photo

Gov. Scott Walker sent a letter Friday to the US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew and US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius seeking to extend BadgerCare.

State, federal legislators respond to possible BadgerCare extension Several state and Wisconsin federal legislators have reacted to Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to extend BadgerCare coverage three months in light of technical glitches in the implementation of the Affordable Care Act online health insurance marketplaces. Walker said he would call a special legislative session to extend the BadgerCare deadline from Jan. 1 to March 31, which would allow enrollees to sign up for ACA insurance plans by the March 31 federal deadline. U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson,

R-Wis., commended Walker in a statement Friday for acting “quickly and swiftly” to protect Wisconsinites’ interests. “The governor is doing whatever he can to spare citizens of our state from the consequences of the Obama administration’s failure,” Johnson said in the statement. In a letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Walker said only 877 Wisconsinites have

STUDENT PROFILE

Melberg matched for bone marrow donation By Megan Stoebig THE DAILY CARDINAL

When University of WisconsinMadison junior Cal Melberg attended a bone marrow registry drive at his girlfriend’s request, he had no idea he would soon be making a donation that could hopefully save a woman’s life. Melberg attended the drive hosted by UW-Madison organization Student Emergency Medical Services in May 2013, and four months later he received a call from a man in New York notifying him his bone marrow was a potential match for a woman with a condition known as preleukemia. He added Melberg would have to go through a series of injections in the coming months and asked whether he was still interested in donating. Despite the painful medical procedures he

would endure, Melberg decided he was definitely still interested in moving forward. Later, he was told he had about a 10 percent chance of being a perfect match. Once the program that sponsors the registry drive, Delete Blood Cancer DKMS, identifies someone as a match, they then double check that nothing in the donor’s marrow could cause the recipient to reject it, Melberg explained. About a month later, he heard back from DKMS and discovered he was a perfect match. He also said there is an opportunity a year after the donation, if both are healthy, to exchange contact information with the recipient. Melberg said he would “love to meet the person he was matched

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COURTESY OF CAL MELBERG

UW junior Cal Melberg started a blog after finding out he was a perfect match for a woman with a life-threatening condition.

been able to sign up for plans on the federal online marketplace, and the deadline to enroll by Dec. 15 puts too much pressure on Wisconsin residents. Approximately 70,000 people are currently covered under BadgerCare. “We warned you about the problems with your opaque and cumbersome regulatory approach, and now, Wisconsinites are paying the price through high premi-

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New John Doe case to probe Walker team Gov. Scott Walker’s recall campaign and more than two dozen conservative groups received subpoenas for documents regarding the 2011 and 2012 recall from a Milwaukee special prosecutor, according to a Wall Street Journal opinion editorial Friday. The investigation is taking place under Wisconsin’s John Doe law, which bars subpoena targets from disclosing the court order’s contents to anyone but his or her attorneys. The prosecutor is requesting records of email correspondence and other communications between the subpoena target and the conservative groups, according to the Wall Street Journal. Wisconsin Club for Growth Director Eric O’Keefe confirmed he received a subpoena, accord-

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“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”


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