The idea, to add a budget amendment that functionally maintains the status quo for Turnpike Chairman Matt Amorello, must have come to Dianne Wilkerson in a dream. She tells the Globe it wasn't part of some larger prearranged deal.

Wilkerson insisted that the provision was her own idea and that Senate leaders agreed with her when she broached the subject. ``It came from me to them," she said.

Sure, we buy that. Turnpike management staffing must be one of her personal passions.