Posted at: 11/11/2009 9:11 PM | KSAX.com
By: Becky Nahm
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"Bonehead Decision" Benefits Minn. Vets

Minnesota veterans will benefit from what Governor Pawlenty called a "bonehead decision."

The decision was the purchase of expensive 50-inch, plasma televisions for the Moose Lake Sex Offender Treatment Center.

The state originally spent nearly $60,000 on 26 $1,500 televisions and $700 mounting brackets.

Now instead of going to Moose Lake, the televisions will be sent to National Guard and veterans facilities around the state.

Camp Ripley will get six. The Guard's Minneapolis and Duluth airbases will also each get one.

Fourteen will go to veterans home. The home in Hastings will receive two.

Pawlenty said, "I talked to a couple of them here and they're very excited about getting the TVs. It is a window or a portal for them to see the outside world."

Veterans said they're grateful the governor ordered the televisions removed from the sex offender treatment center.

Veteran John Steen said, "I think good behavior should be rewarded rather than sending it to a treatment center for pedophiles."

One of of the flatscreens at the Hastings home will fill a wall in a workout facility that currently has no tv. The other will replace an old big screen in a recreation room that's popular on football Sundays.

The veterans homes promise to install them for less than the $700 installation at Moose Lake.

After Pawlenty learned of the televisions he called for discipline for whoever authorized the purchase.

The director of the sex offender program, Dennis Benson, did receive a letter of reprimand even though he didn't order the televisions.

The two people who did place the order left the Department of Human Services for unrelated reasons.