Minn. Guard to get 8 TVs bought for sex offenders

Eight of the flat-screen TVs removed from a Minnesota sex offender treatment facility on Gov. Tim Pawlenty's orders will go to Minnesota National Guard facilities.

The state Department of Administration said Wednesday that Camp Ripley, near Brainerd, will get six of the 50-inch plasma televisions that prompted Pawlenty's ire last week. The Guard's Minneapolis and Duluth airbases will also each get one.

Pawlenty called for discipline for whoever authorized buying 26 TVs costing $1,500 each, plus $700 mounting brackets, for the Moose Lake sex offender facility. The Department of Human Services is investigating.

The governor previously announced that 14 TVs will wind up in state veterans homes.

Administration Department spokesman Jim Schwartz said the four remaining televisions will either be used for yet-to-be-determined public purposes or sold.