By the way: who is paying for the meals and lodging? If the dem senators are paying for it themselves, out of their own pockets, fine and dandy. And perhaps they are.
But if the expenses are being footed by someone else, that's another matter. Then the payments are a gift to the legislators and should (1) be reportable and taxable as gifts; and (2) be subject to Wisconsin's ethics limits on gifts to legislators.
Purely in the spirit of bipartisan comity and fair warning, the Governor should get word out to the vacationing legislators that that they are incurring personal liabilities and that the expenses will be audited, so they'd better make sure they're paying properly and keeping records.
I read on one of the lefty sites that there is a site set up for donations for the runaways and they already had 100 grand as of yesterday. I checked the link and it was over that amount and growing, so it appears they will have the money.