By Cary Spivak and Dan Bice of the Journal Sentinel staff

March 09, 1999

Gov. Tommy Thompson is proposing that a major campaign contributor be allowed to fill up to 15 acres of wetlands in western Wisconsin -- over the objections of the state Department of Natural Resources.

The proposal, tucked away on page 1,151 of Thompson's budget plan, would exempt Ashley Furniture Industries Inc. from some state environmental regulations so it can add a commercial building to its 1.6 million-square-foot manufacturing complex in Trempealeau County.

Ashley is among the largest furniture makers in the U.S.

The governor's decision to include the item in his budget plan was not well received by DNR officials opposed to the project.

"This is not something the department would have proposed," said Susan Sylvester, administrator of the Water Division. "There is an opportunity for permitees to apply for a variance. . . . This is not the way to do it."

But a spokesman for the governor said the move was necessary to create up to 400 jobs in Wisconsin.

"This company wants to create jobs. If they don't create them there, they'll create them elsewhere," said Kevin Keane, adding that the issue had nothing to do with campaign money.

The governor and Ashley's owners go back more than a decade.

In 1988, the firm was threatening to expand its operations in North Carolina, but the governor persuaded Ashley to stay in Wisconsin by pledging state grants and infrastructure improvements.

Since then, Ashley executives and their spouses have contributed $40,750 to the governor, including $10,000 from the two top executives, Ron and Todd Wanek, and their wives last year.

They have been known to give to other prominent lawmakers, contributing $1,500 to Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen and $1,000 to Assembly Majority Leader Steve Foti in October.

Their latest donations to Thompson's campaign fund were sent last March, at the same time DNR officials were reviewing Ashley's informal proposal to construct a building. The plan originally called for filling in nearly 14 acres of wetlands, but that was later cut in half.

On March 16, a DNR official informed Ashley that the state probably would not approve the proposed expansion. The agency believed it would harm the environment and wildlife habitat.

In internal agency documents, two DNR staffers allege that Ashley officials destroyed the trees and shrubs on the site in hopes of eliminating the wetlands designation. Despite the changes, the DNR report concludes that the area remains home to amphibians, reptiles and invertebrates "important for food chain support."

After the DNR frowned on the proposal, Ashley CEO Ron Wanek fired off an angry letter to state officials, saying the building needed to be near the firm's other manufacturing facilities.

He even threatened to expand elsewhere if Ashley did not get its way.

"For export and service to the mass market, Wisconsin is not the best location," he says in the letter. "If our operations cannot be contiguous and efficiencies gained from the super plant concept, then they will not happen here. Competition will take care of that."

Ashley never submitted a formal application for the project.

The Waneks were unavailable for comment this week. An attorney for the firm declined to comment.

Thompson's budget bill does not specifically name Ashley Furniture because that would be unconstitutional.

But the legislation is so narrowly written that Ashley would be the only business affected by it, said Ed Bourget, DNR water team leader for the Black-Buffalo-Trempealeau basin.

Bill Gerrard, the firm's powerful lobbyist, reported to the state Ethics Board that he spent nearly 12 hours last year trying to get an amendment to the 1997-'99 budget letting Ashley construct a commercial building in a wetlands region.

Gerrard, who was paid $36,000 by the furniture maker in 1998, is a friend of the governor's.