UNDATED (WSAU)  Six companies that never repaid job creation loans from Wisconsin taxpayers are now bankrupt. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel said the firms owed almost a half-million dollars. And they’re among the 67 loans that were not tracked for over a year by state economic development officials. Those loans total over $12-million dollars – and at last word, the businesses that received the tax assistance were $2.5-million behind in their payments.

Most of the loans were made by the former Commerce Department, the state agency that was replaced in the summer of 2011 by the public-private Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation.

Ryan Murray, the agency’s chief operating officer, said some of the loans from the bankrupt firms were supposed to be written off years ago – but the word never got to the agency’s central offices. The Journal Sentinel says there’s a chance that millions-of-dollars loaned by taxpayers to create new jobs will never be repaid. Flambeau River Bio-fuels, one of the firms which are behind on their payments, is not expected to pay back around $2-million it owes.