Boots & Sabers

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Category: Politics – Wisconsin

Republicans finally propose a tax cut

by | 0726, 27 Jun 23 | | 1 Comment

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a taste:

Wisconsin currently has four income tax brackets. Under the Republicans’ plan, they would reduce it to three brackets and reduce the rates on all three remaining brackets. Simply put, everyone who pays state income taxes would benefit from paying less.

 

While the Republicans push for a tax cut and the Democrats oppose it, let us remind ourselves of why it is necessary. As this column recounted last week, Wisconsin is facing an existential threat to its economy and ability to fund government. People are leaving the state. Wisconsin is now losing population. One of the reasons is that the inherent mobility of the modern workforce means that people are moving to states that provide a good quality of life and a lower tax burden. The income tax is a big part of that.

 

This fact is particularly true for high-income people. Low-income people already do not pay much, if anything, in income taxes. According to those same Department of Revenue statistics, the bottom 40% of income taxpayers (474,050 filers) paid an average of just $303.80 in income taxes. That only includes people who earned enough to file taxes. Nobody is going to move to another state to save $303.80 in taxes. But for the top 40% of tax filers, who are paying thousands of dollars every year in state income taxes, the math is different. This is especially true for tech-sector professionals where remote work has become the norm. Retirees have been fleeing the state for decades in search of lower taxes and warmer climes, but the advent of the remote technical workforce has made this choice viable for professionals in the middle of their careers.

 

This column has long advocated for abolishing the state income tax. It can be done. It should be done. But it will not be done because neither elected Republicans nor Democrats have the will to do it. As a second choice, a true flat income tax would set Wisconsin apart and catapult it into the upper echelon of attractive tax states for mobile affluent professionals. As a third choice, the Republicans’ current proposal is a step in the right direction. It will not move the needle substantially, but it will help.

 

As it stands, even with this tax cut, the current budget proposals still increase state spending by at least 10% over the previous budget. That is an abomination that explains why taxes will not be reduced further.

Legislature Proposes to Merge UWMWC and MPTC

by | 2052, 26 Jun 23 | , | 1 Comment

The combined enrollment of these two schools is less than the enrollment of just MPTC ten years ago. There is not rational reason for the taxpayers to continue to support two campuses. Whether they merge or just close one, something needs to be done to adjust to the shrinking demand.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Washington County would merge with Moraine Park Technical College under a plan pushed through by Republican lawmakers Thursday as part of the state budget.

 

If signed into law, UWM-Washington County could become the second UW branch campus to effectively shutter its doors since a 2018 restructuring put the UW System’s two-year campuses under the oversight of four-years.

 

UW-Platteville Richland essentially closed at the end of this school year, a move that came after more than a decade of stagnant state funding, tuition freezes and declining enrollment that left the Richland Center campus with less than 60 students studying there.

 

The Joint Committee on Finance voted to shift UWM-Washington County from a UW branch campus to a “joint Moraine Park Technical College/Washington County operation.” It’s unclear from the motion what, if any, UW’s involvement would be post-merger. UW System could receive $3.35 million, pending the budget committee’s approval, to aid in the transition.

Republicans Push Prioritization at UW

by | 0808, 24 Jun 23 | , | 0 Comments

Good.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Republican lawmakers voted to cut the University of Wisconsin System’s budget by $32 million on Thursday despite a projected record-high $7 billion state budget surplus, leaving the university nearly half a billion dollars short of what it requested.

 

The cut comes in reaction to Republican anger over diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, programs on the system’s 13 universities. Republican leaders have said the $32 million is what they estimated would be spent on those programs over the next two years.

 

“They need to refocus their priorities on being partners on developing our workforce and the future of the state, and we’re hopeful that they’re going to be ready to do that as we move forward,” Republican state Rep. Mark Born, co-chair of the Legislature’s budget-writing committee, said at a news conference.

 

The university system could get the $32 million back at a later date if it shows how it would be spent on workforce development efforts, and not diversity, equity and inclusion programs, lawmakers said. The GOP plan also aims to cut more than 180 diversity, equity and inclusion jobs on UW campuses.

The UW System has been bleeding students and money for years, and yet, they have steadfastly refused to make any significant structural reforms to adapt to that reality. Meanwhile, they continue to increase spending in areas that don’t have anything to do with education. Until they prioritize students and education, the UW System should not be given more taxpayer money to waste.

Demographic destiny

by | 1648, 22 Jun 23 | , | 0 Comments

I’m still out, but here is my column that ran in the Washington County Daily News this week:

If, as the axiom goes, demography is destiny, then Wisconsin is facing a troubling economic future. A recent study by the WMC Foundation titled, “Wisconsin’s Demographic Dilemma” highlights the troubling trends that threaten Wisconsin’s current and future prosperity.

 

According to the study, Wisconsin’s population grew by 3.6% between 2010 and 2020. That is less than half the rate of the national average population growth rate of 7.4% over the same period. Even more troubling, Wisconsin actually lost population between 2020 and 2022. It was only a loss of 1,186 people, but that is a trend in the wrong direction when the United States grew by 1.8 million people over the same period according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

 

Further exacerbating Wisconsin’s demographic destiny is that the population is aging. The national median age is 38.8 years old. Wisconsin’s median age is 40.1 years old. That may not sound like much of a difference, but Wisconsin is one of only 14 states with a median age older than 40 and is tied with Michigan with the oldest median age in the Midwest. An aging population means fewer people working and fewer younger people entering the workforce to support the government programs funding the social safety net. To put it in perspective, Wisconsin’s population in the 65-to-85 age bracket grew by a whopping 41.7% since 2010. Over the same period, Wisconsin’s population in the 5-to-17 age bracket declined by 2.2%. If these trends continue, the consequences for the state’s economy are severe. As of April of this year, Wisconsin has a labor participation rate of 64.8% as compared to 75% in the late 1990s. A full 10% of Wisconsin’s working- age people are opting out of work compared to 15 years ago at the same time that Wisconsin’s working-age population declined by almost 18,000 people between 2010 and 2020. Fewer working age people. Fewer working age people actually working. No wonder Wisconsin currently has about 2.4 job openings for every unemployed person in the state according to the latest data from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

 

The reasons for Wisconsin’s shrinking and aging population are twofold. First, there has been a dramatic decline in the birth rate. Wisconsin is not immune from the national collapse of the birth rate being driven by cultural and economic trends that were accelerated by the pandemic. Meanwhile, people continue to die at normal rates. The net result is that people are dying faster than new people are being born, thus resulting in a steadily shrinking natural population.

 

Second, Wisconsin is on the negative side of domestic migration. For many years, older Wisconsinites have become snowbirds as they entered retirement and shifted their residences to states with warmer climates and lower taxes. With the advent of remote workers — another trend accelerated by the pandemic — many workingage people have taken advantage of remote work to move to warmer states with lower taxes. Meanwhile, fewer people are moving into Wisconsin from other states. The net result is another steady drain on the state’s population.

 

Offsetting the dual population drains of a natural population decline coupled with a net loss in domestic migration is an increase of international immigration into the state. Almost 12,000 immigrants from other countries found their way to Wisconsin to add to the population. That was not enough to offset the population drains, thus resulting in Wisconsin losing total population since 2020.

 

The consequences of a declining population are pervasive. As companies fail to find an available workforce, they will continue to look to other states to expand or move. As businesses leave, more people follow them, thus exacerbating the population decline. Fewer people means a decreasing tax base and fewer services or amenities to attract people. It is not quite a death spiral, but it is certainly a problem that will force years of unpleasant choices.

 

From a public policy perspective, there is not much that government can do to stem or reverse the declining birth rate. There are, however, public policy choices that would attract more working-age people and their families. The WMC Foundation’s report suggests a few policy recommendations, but they do not go far enough. It is a competitive country out there and Wisconsin is an afterthought when people are considering a move.

 

If state lawmakers are going to be serious about attracting more people to our wonderful state, they need to dramatically decrease the tax burden. Small changes will not be noticed. Nobody notices when another state lowers its income tax rate. They do notice when states eliminate the income tax. Wisconsin should use the budget surplus to mitigate the impact of eliminating Wisconsin’s income tax to attract high-income families to move to the state.

 

When those high-income families arrive, they will want great schools for their kids. Wisconsin’s reputation for great schools has faded as educational outcomes have eroded. In modern Wisconsin, less than half of kids read or do math at grade level. Wisconsin needs to dramatically reform schools to deliver the outcomes that Wisconsin’s kids deserve. That reform begins with universal school choice to allow the money to flow to the schools that work.

 

There are many other policies that should be done, but dramatic tax and education reform would put Wisconsin at the top of the list for the smart, mobile, high-income people that Wisconsin needs to secure its economic future.

Let kids work: Power of work yields lessons for lifetime

by | 0458, 13 Jun 23 | , , | 13 Comments

Yes, I’m still on vacation, but I wrote a couple of columns ahead of time. Check out my most recent colum from the Washington County Daily News.

Wisconsin Republicans have joined a widespread effort to ease child labor laws to allow more kids to work more often in more places. While advertised as a way to help ease the national labor shortage, it is the kids who will benefit most if the laws are relaxed.

 

Contrary to the squeals of opposition, nobody supports businesses exploiting child labor. Those who wear shoes and carry phones produced by child labor in other countries seem to be the most vocal about relaxing America’s childlabor laws, but no American wants child sweatshops in our nation. The proposals being discussed are targeted efforts to make it easier for more kids to work.

 

One bill in Wisconsin, for example, would allow servers between the age of 14 and 17 to serve alcohol. The current law prohibits anyone under the age of 18 from serving alcohol. We have all seen how this works in the real world. When dining at a supper club, the 17-yearold server brings everything to your table except the old fashioneds. The poor server has to have the bartender or an adult server to bring your drinks. This is a rule that has no purpose unless one thinks that 16-year-old servers would slurp customers’ drinks on the way to the table. This change in law would simply allow the server who is already working to carry alcohol 40 feet from the bar to the table.

 

Other states like Ohio are asking the federal government to allow students aged 14 and 15 to work until 9 p.m. on school days. Current laws prohibit them working after 7 p.m., which effectively eliminates the ability for these teens to work during the school week if they are involved in after-school activities. Busy, productive teens are often participating in after-school activities.

 

What we have seen in the past few decades is that people are beginning their working lives later and later. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median age of a worker in 2001 was 39.6 years. In 2021, it had risen to 41.7 years. It is projected to be 42.6 years in 2031. What is driving this is that older people are working to later in life while younger people are entering the workforce much later. The number of 16- to 19-year-olds in the workforce dropped from 7.9 million to 5.9 million between 2001 and 2021, and is projected to drop to 4.9 million by 2031. That is a 38% drop in teens working in a single generation.

 

Over the same period, the rates of mental illness, anxiety, depression, and suicides have all increased for teens. According to the Center for Disease Control, feelings of persistent hopelessness and suicidal behaviors increased by almost 40% among young people between 2010 and 2020. While there are many causes for the rise in troubled teens, it is not coincidental that more kids are feeling worthless and lost as fewer of them are working.

 

What too often gets lost in this discussion is that there is an intrinsic value in work that goes far beyond the benefit to the employer. Work teaches young people the value of individual effort, how to participate in a team for a common goal, and accountability for actions. Working at an early age teaches people basic work ethics like punctuality, how to follow directions, professional communication, and time management. It teaches kids how to function in an environment where they are not the center of the universe, how to be productive with unreasonable customers and bad bosses, and slacker co-workers.

 

The value of work is that it provides kids with a sense of selfworth, pride, and dignity that no amount of self-esteem puffery in school and home can produce. These are benefits that kids will carry within themselves for the remainder of their lives.

 

Ralph Waldo Emerson once opined that, “The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.” One cannot be happy without feeling useful and valued. Relaxing the labor laws to allow more kids to get that feeling through work will lead to happier, more well-balanced, and mentally healthier adultis.

 

 

 

Pro-moms. Pro-babies.

by | 0859, 8 Jun 23 | | 0 Comments

Here is my full column that ran in the Washington County Daily News earlier this week.

Republican State Sen. Romaine Quinn and Republican Reps. Gae Magnafici and Donna Rozar have released four bills designed to expand support for mothers and children while protecting babies. While Gov. Tony Evers has already committed to vetoing the bills should they reach his desk, the Republican Legislature should pass them anyway.

 

Under current law, Wisconsin bans abortion in all cases except in the event that the life of the mother is at stake. As written, however, the exception is vaguely written and doctors might be unwilling to risk criminal charges to perform an abortion to save a mother. It should be noted that such scenarios are exceedingly rare, but they do happen.

 

The first bill would simply clarify what qualifies as an exception to the abortion ban. If passed, the law would identify specific procedures and circumstances that would allow an abortion and protect both the doctors and the mother from any undue legal consequences.

 

The second bill would expand the state child tax credit from $700 to $1,000 for each child and extend the credit to children inside the womb. The bill would allow parents to claim the child tax credit as soon as an ultrasound detects the child’s heartbeat.

 

The third bill would direct an annual $1 million grant to pregnancy resource centers throughout the state. These centers are vital in providing support for mothers and care for their babies. The fourth and final bill would have the state spend an additional $5 million to provide grants to organizations that help people adopt children. As a package, the four bills comprise a compassionate approach to protecting babies while providing more support for mothers who have unplanned babies. As expected, Governor Evers has promised to veto the bills if they reach his desk. Evers has been consistent in promising to veto any bill related to expanding access to abortions, supporting unborn children, or making any changes whatsoever to Wisconsin’s almost total ban on abortions.

 

Evers’ political calculations are simple to understand. With the most recent Supreme Court election in Wisconsin, the pro-abortion leftists hold a majority on the court. Attorney General Josh Kaul has already sued the state to overturn Wisconsin’s abortion ban. If you thought that the state’s top lawyer was supposed to defend the state’s laws, you would be correct. But Kaul does not see his role as defending the state’s laws as passed by a duly elected Legislature and signed by a duly elected governor. Kaul views his job a simply a platform to advance his leftist ideology and that is exactly what he is doing by suing his own state.

 

Given the current makeup of the state Supreme Court and certainty that the leftist justices will strike down Wisconsin’s abortion law irrespective of the facts of the suit or the laws on the books, Evers is unwilling to allow any changes to Wisconsin’s abortion laws lest such a change undermines the legal effort to overturn the law. He need not fear because the leftist justices are going to overturn the state’s abortion ban no matter what. In their ideology, the end justifies the means and the law and Constitution are merely words to be ignored when they become inconvenient.

 

Still, one must step back from the political machinations at play and marvel at the ghoulishness and cruelty of Evers’ position. He refuses to extend the child tax credit to unborn children because to do so would acknowledge that they are children. Even at nine months, Evers’ maniacal support for abortions cannot acknowledge that the baby is a human — as if the thin layers of skin, muscle, and membrane separating the baby from air also separates her from humanity.

 

In Evers’ pro-abortion world, it would be unforgivable to clarify when an abortion would be allowed to protect a mother’s life. He would rather see the mother die, or the doctors risk their careers, than sign anything that might be construed as defining an unborn baby as a living human deserving of protection.

 

As Republicans are putting forth reasonable changes to the law in consideration of concerns raised, Evers will broker no adjustments in lieu of his ardent desire to see babies aborted up to the point of natural birth. If there is a more radical and grisly position, I know not what it is.

Wisconsin Republicans Take a Harder Stance on Shared Revenue Negotiations

by | 2041, 7 Jun 23 | | 7 Comments

In an ideal world, they would just strip out the Milwaukee bailout and spending increases anyway, but it’s good to see a little party unity.

MADISON – In order to force a deal with Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, Republican leaders of the state Legislature are threatening to strip out measures intended to save Milwaukee from falling off a fiscal cliff in a bill aimed at boosting funding for local municipalities across the state.

 

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos on Wednesday afternoon said he was halting work on the state budget and threatened to strip the Milwaukee-related proposals from the bill if a deal between legislative Republicans and Evers isn’t struck this week.

 

By evening, Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu went a step further and said if Evers did not immediately agree to support a version of the bill Assembly and Senate Republicans had agreed upon, he would move forward with a proposal that did not allow Milwaukee to raise additional sales tax revenue − a key provision for Milwaukee leaders.

Republicans Move to Block Unnecessary Vaccine Mandate

by | 1258, 7 Jun 23 | | 1 Comment

Excellent.

The state Assembly and state Senate will take action on Wednesday that will bar Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ administration from implementing a new rule that would have required seventh graders to get vaccinated against meningitis and mandated parents to show proof their children were infected with chickenpox before obtaining a waiver from the state’s chickenpox vaccination requirement.

 

The floor action comes after a Republican-controlled Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules voted in March to block the rule after a public hearing during which GOP members questioned the decision-making of state health officials, largely because they disagreed with their orders to shutter businesses in the weeks after Evers declared a health emergency over COVID-19 and to wear masks during the most threatening periods of the coronavirus pandemic.

I wrote about this a few months ago.

The meningococcal vaccine was introduced in 2005 and has seemingly worked well. Although rare, meningococcal disease can cause devastating life-altering damage and death. Before the vaccine, there were usually between 30 and 50 cases per year in Wisconsin with several deaths, according to DHS data. Between 2012 and 2022, there were rarely more than 10 cases with just four deaths in a decade. In 2022, there was a single reported case.

 

Despite the rarity of the disease and the demonstrably effectiveness of recommending the vaccine, state government officials have mandated the vaccine for children. Why?

 

The short answer is that some unelected government health bureaucrat thinks that the vaccine is a good idea, so it should be mandated instead of allowing families to make their own informed health care decisions. It might be a good idea. Indeed, the data seems to show that the vaccine is a good idea for a lot of people. But is a mandate necessary?

Pro-moms. Pro-babies.

by | 0635, 6 Jun 23 | | 1 Comment

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:

Still, one must step back from the political machinations at play and marvel at the ghoulishness and cruelty of Evers’ position. He refuses to extend the child tax credit to unborn children because to do so would acknowledge that they are children. Even at nine months, Evers’ maniacal support for abortions cannot acknowledge that the baby is a human — as if the thin layers of skin, muscle, and membrane separating the baby from air also separates her from humanity.

 

In Evers’ pro-abortion world, it would be unforgivable to clarify when an abortion would be allowed to protect a mother’s life. He would rather see the mother die, or the doctors risk their careers, than sign anything that might be construed as defining an unborn baby as a living human deserving of protection.

 

As Republicans are putting forth reasonable changes to the law in consideration of concerns raised, Evers will broker no adjustments in lieu of his ardent desire to see babies aborted up to the point of natural birth. If there is a more radical and grisly position, I know not what it is.

Judge Rules that Special Council Records are Public Records

by | 2036, 5 Jun 23 | , | 0 Comments

I agree. Now do John Doe.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin judge on Monday declined to dismiss a lawsuit seeking to ensure that no records are deleted from a now-closed state office created to investigate former President Donald Trump’s loss in 2020.

 

The lawsuit was one of several filed by liberal watchdog group American Oversight against former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman and the office of special counsel that he led. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos hired Gableman to lead the probe in 2021 under pressure from Trump and conservative Republicans in Wisconsin who were pushing for decertifying Biden’s win.

 

Vos put the investigation on hold in April 2022 and then fired Gableman in August 2022 after he turned up no evidence to back Trump’s false claims that the election had been stolen from him. Vos fired Gableman just days after Vos won his primary over an opponent endorsed by Gableman and Trump. Vos called Gableman an “embarrassment” to himself and the state.

 

Even though the office has been unstaffed for nearly a year, it continues to fight open records lawsuits. Courts have repeatedly ruled against Gableman and his former office in those cases.

Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost on Monday affirmed with his latest ruling that the office formerly led by Gableman, and any future version of it, is subject to Wisconsin’s open records law. Frost granted a temporary injunction against any deletion of records by the office and rejected the motion to dismiss, a request made nearly a year ago.

Where is our refund?

by | 1032, 3 Jun 23 | | 0 Comments

Here is my column that ran in the Washington County Daily News earlier this week. I’m still waiting.

I have been trying to be patient. Truly, I have. But what is going on with the Republicans in the state Legislature?

 

The state has been projecting a major budget surplus for some time. At the beginning of the year, it was expected to be about $7.1 billion. At last count, they have lowered that forecast to about $6.9 billion. In either case, it is a lot of money. It is a lot of money forcibly confiscated from Wisconsinites through taxation far and above what the government budgeted to fund the state government with all of its girth.

 

When confronted with a pile of unspent cash, politicians are incapable of resisting their desires to spend it. The Democrats are ideologically consistent in this regard. They believe that more government is better government, so any time they can find an excuse to make government bigger, they are going to seize it.

 

Republicans have an imperfect record in this regard, but they are certainly better than the Democrats. Wisconsin’s legislative Republicans have been quite good in the last decade in lowering taxes. During the election last year when the state was already projecting a significant surplus, the Republicans were once again touting the benefits of smaller, less expensive government. They were right, of course, so one could expect them to give the surplus back to the taxpayers, right? Right!? Since the beginning of the year some five full months hence, there have been quite a few proposals from the Republicans. As discussed in this column last week, the Assembly has proposed an aggressive increase in the money the state sends to local and county governments in the state’s shared revenue program. That proposal also includes a bailout plan for the government pension plans for Milwaukee County and the city of Milwaukee. It does this partially by allowing the city and county governments to increase local sales taxes.

 

The Senate Republican leadership seems to support a spending increase in the shared revenue program and a bailout for Milwaukee, but is tepid about allowing voters a voice on the sales tax increase. Evers and Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu seem united in allowing Milwaukee’s local governments to jack up taxes without asking the voters first. The Republicans and Democrats seem united in wanting a spending increase and a bailout. They agree in principle. Now they are just bickering over the mechanics.

 

Governor Evers and the Republican leaders also seem united in wanting the taxpayers to pay for an upgrade to American Family Field. Evers wants to spend about $400 million with almost no strings attached. Speaker Robin Vos wants to spend a bit less and on the condition that the Brewers extend their lease for a substantial term. Once again, Republicans and Democrats are united in spending.

 

To his credit, Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu has proposed a flat income tax to replace the state’s progressive income tax scheme. As proposed, a flat tax would reduce future income taxes by about $5 billion. The proposal would not give the surplus back to the taxpayers, but it would be a substantial tax decrease.

 

Unfortunately, Evers has already promised to veto LeMahieu’s flat-tax proposal and Vos has been unable or unwilling to rally Republican support for it in the Assembly. The Assembly Republicans have not offered any alternative proposals to lower taxes or give the surplus back.

 

I ask again, what is going on with the Republicans in the state Legislature? The state has been projecting a major surplus for over a year. The voters returned the Republicans to the state Legislature with even larger majorities than they had the previous session. Those Republicans have had six months since that election to come up with a plan to return the surplus to the taxpayers. Most of those Republicans were in the legislature last session and have had even more time to contemplate.

 

Where is the Republican plan — coordinated and supported by Republican majorities in both houses of the Legislature — to return the budget surplus? Where is the refund? Where is the systemic tax reform? Milwaukee did not elect those Republican majorities. The Brewers did not elect those Republican majorities. Local governments did not elect those Republican majorities.

 

Plain, old grassroots Republicans elected those Republican majorities, and it is past time for those elected Republicans to deliver on their promises of smaller government. We have been patient long enough.

Where is our refund?

by | 0742, 30 May 23 | | 1 Comment

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:

I have been trying to be patient. Truly, I have. But what is going on with the Republicans in the state Legislature?

 

The state has been projecting a major budget surplus for some time. At the beginning of the year, it was expected to be about $7.1 billion. At last count, they have lowered that forecast to about $6.9 billion. In either case, it is a lot of money. It is a lot of money forcibly confiscated from Wisconsinites through taxation far and above what the government budgeted to fund the state government with all of its girth.

 

When confronted with a pile of unspent cash, politicians are incapable of resisting their desires to spend it. The Democrats are ideologically consistent in this regard. They believe that more government is better government, so any time they can find an excuse to make government bigger, they are going to seize it.

 

[…]

 

I ask again, what is going on with the Republicans in the state Legislature? The state has been projecting a major surplus for over a year. The voters returned the Republicans to the state Legislature with even larger majorities than they had the previous session. Those Republicans have had six months since that election to come up with a plan to return the surplus to the taxpayers. Most of those Republicans were in the legislature last session and have had even more time to contemplate.

 

Where is the Republican plan — coordinated and supported by Republican majorities in both houses of the Legislature — to return the budget surplus? Where is the refund? Where is the systemic tax reform? Milwaukee did not elect those Republican majorities. The Brewers did not elect those Republican majorities. Local governments did not elect those Republican majorities.

 

Plain, old grassroots Republicans elected those Republican majorities, and it is past time for those elected Republicans to deliver on their promises of smaller government. We have been patient long enough.

A bad bill gets worse

by | 1818, 26 May 23 | | 0 Comments

Here is my full column that ran earlier in the week in the Washington County Daily News.

A couple of weeks ago this column criticized the Shared Revenue bill advancing through the state Assembly. Since then, the bill has gotten worse and the momentum seems to be on the side of disaster. One can only hope that it falls apart under its own craptaculance.

 

Readers of this column will recall that Assembly Bill 245 was negotiated in private for several months by the Assembly Republican leadership, Milwaukee Democratic leadership, and some other stakeholders — not including the governor’s office. The thrust of the bill is that the state will dramatically increase Shared Revenue for local governments while imposing some restrictions on them. For the City of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County, the state would further allow them to impose a massive sales tax increase if the voters approve and in exchange for further restrictions.

 

Beyond that, the bill would end the personal property tax in which personal property is subject to property taxes. The personal property tax is a particular burden for businesses that have a substantial amount of equipment. The bill would also limit the power of local health officials to close businesses, grant the legislative Joint Finance Committee and local governments some control over the State Stewardship program, prohibit most advisory referenda for local governments, and a host of other things. As the bill is crafted, Gov. Tony Evers cannot use his line-item veto to carve it up. The governor must either sign the bill or veto the entire thing. After the bill was announced a few weeks ago, feverish negotiations began with Governor Evers’ office to try to incorporate any changes the governor might want to induce him to sign the bill. The root of the contention is fairly simple. The Republicans and the governor seem to agree that a boost in Shared Revenue is a good thing. The notion that Republicans should work for smaller government seems to have been eschewed in favor of filling up the trough. The governor disagrees with some of the smaller provisions in the bill that Republicans favor, but they are somewhat lost in the bigger issues.

 

The primary bone of contention has to do with the City of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County. The problem that Republicans are trying to fix is that both local governments are on a trajectory to go bankrupt due to their lavish pension obligations grated to government employees for decades. The Republicans want Milwaukee City and County to ask the voters if they will increase their local sales taxes to meet those pension obligations. If the voters agree, then the money must be used to retire the pension debt and other requirements will be imposed like requiring that new employees join the solvent state retirement system, prohibiting spending more money on the city trolley and maintaining law enforcement.

 

Governor Evers wants all of the money to bail out the city of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County, but he does not want any of the restrictions. Furthermore, the governor does not want to have to ask the voters about raising taxes. He wants to allow Milwaukee City and County to just raise the taxes without asking for fear that the voters might say, “no.”

 

As a concession to the governor, the bill that finally passed the Assembly kept most of the deal for Milwaukee intact but spends more and watered down some of the restrictions. The Assembly Republicans negotiated and drafted the new version in private and rushed it to a vote without anyone having time to even read it. There is absolutely no reason to rush the bill through and the “we have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it” mentality is exactly the kind of bad governance that gives politicians their slimy reputations.

 

Through all of this, nobody apparently thought to ask the Senate Republicans what they want in a bill. Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu has expressed concerns for the bill and seems to share Governor Evers’ worry about asking the voters in Milwaukee before raising their taxes. It seems unlikely that the Senate will pass an identical bill to the Assembly thus forcing a reconciliation before it ever reaches the governor’s desk.

 

What are we doing here? Republicans are clamoring for a massive spending increase and trying to bail out the City of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County for decades of terrible policies? The ornamental conservative policies being hung on the bill are a glittery distraction from the abysmal spending and opening the floodgates for local tax increases.

 

If the bill ever reached Evers’ desk, let us hope that he will veto it to put an end to the Republicans’ momentary lunacy.

A bad bill gets worse

by | 0651, 23 May 23 | | 0 Comments

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. It’s about the continuing machinations over the Shared Revenue bill in the Wisconsin legislature. Here’s a taste:

As a concession to the governor, the bill that finally passed the Assembly kept most of the deal for Milwaukee intact but spends more and watered down some of the restrictions. The Assembly Republicans negotiated and drafted the new version in private and rushed it to a vote without anyone having time to even read it. There is absolutely no reason to rush the bill through and the “we have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it” mentality is exactly the kind of bad governance that gives politicians their slimy reputations.

 

Through all of this, nobody apparently thought to ask the Senate Republicans what they want in a bill. Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu has expressed concerns for the bill and seems to share Governor Evers’ worry about asking the voters in Milwaukee before raising their taxes. It seems unlikely that the Senate will pass an identical bill to the Assembly thus forcing a reconciliation before it ever reaches the governor’s desk.

 

What are we doing here? Republicans are clamoring for a massive spending increase and trying to bail out the City of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County for decades of terrible policies? The ornamental conservative policies being hung on the bill are a glittery distraction from the abysmal spending and opening the floodgates for local tax increases.

 

If the bill ever reached Evers’ desk, let us hope that he will veto it to put an end to the Republicans’ momentary lunacy.

Special Instrests Lobby for More Tax Money

by | 2220, 21 May 23 | , | 1 Comment

It’s shameful how many teachers can’t do math.

Teachers from around Wisconsin gathered at the state Capitol Saturday to ask for more education funding. They described their large class sizes, lack of mental health support for students and colleagues leaving the profession.

 

They called on lawmakers to support Gov. Tony Evers’ proposed $2.6 billion funding boost for public schools, as the state contends with an unprecedented budget surplus most recently projected at $6.9 billion.

 

In addition to general aid for schools, Evers’ plan would support free meals for all students, more special education funding and more mental health support. Lawmakers, who have already tossed some of those provisions, are now crafting their own budget proposals through the Joint Finance Committee.

 

[…]

 

“It’s a desperate situation,” Strieker said. “The needs are higher than ever. And then from the teacher side, the cost of living goes up.”

According to the DPI, here’s the average per-student spending in the past decade.

In the past decade, spending is up a whopping 33.88%. If we are spending a full third more on schools than we did a decade ago and the teachers are still complaining about a lack of resources, where is all the money going? Yes, I do know the answer…

Gorsuch Decries Assault on Civil Liberties During Pandemic

by | 1917, 20 May 23 | , , | 3 Comments

Yes. And. Yes.

‘Governors and local leaders imposed lockdown orders forcing people to remain in their homes. They shuttered businesses and schools, public and private,’ he wrote.

 

‘They closed churches even as they allowed casinos and other favored businesses to carry on. They threatened violators not just with civil penalties but with criminal sanctions too.’

 

[…]

 

Referring to the broader issue of strict lockdown policies during the pandemic, Gorsuch added: ‘Doubtless, many lessons can be learned from this chapter in our history, and hopefully serious efforts will be made to study it.

 

‘One lesson might be this: Fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces. They can lead to a clamor for action—almost any action—as long as someone does something to address a perceived threat.

 

‘A leader or an expert who claims he can fix everything, if only we do exactly as he says, can prove an irresistible force.’

 

He concluded: ‘Make no mistake—decisive executive action is sometimes necessary and appropriate. But if emergency decrees promise to solve some problems, they threaten to generate others.

 

‘And rule by indefinite emergency edict risks leaving all of us with a shell of a democracy and civil liberties just as hollow.’

Remember that Wisconsin’s Governor Evers was in the vanguard of Medical Totalitarianism until the Republican legislature and right-leaning Supreme Court yanked on the reins. The results would be different if it happened today after two liberal wins to the court.

Leftist criminal justice policies are killing us

by | 1903, 19 May 23 | , | 4 Comments

Here is my full column that ran in the Washington County Daily News earlier this week. Sorry about the lack of posting this week. It’s been a busy time.

Eight minutes into a routine traffic stop for a suspected drunk driver, the suspect pulled out a gun and killed St. Croix County Sheriff’s Deputy Katie Leising. The 29-year-old new mother was the fourth officer murdered while on duty this year. At only five months into the year, it is already the deadliest year for police officers in 25 years.

 

The circumstances of Deputy Leising’s murder were eerily similar to the other three officers who were murdered this year. The suspect she was investigating was a multiple felon. Convicted for kidnapping and criminal sexual misconduct in 2015 in Minnesota, and with a long criminal record, he served just four years in prison before being released. With a history of violence and perhaps fearing another arrest, the suspect murdered Deputy Leising.

 

In April, Officers Emily Breidenbach and Hunter Scheel of the Chetek and Cameron Police Departments, respectively, confronted a suspect with an open warrant in a traffic stop. The suspect had a history of domestic violence and opened fire on the officers. Both of the officers were killed.

 

In February, Milwaukee Police Officer Peter Jerving was working with other officers to apprehend a robbery suspect. When they caught up to the suspect after a chase on foot, the suspect opened fire and killed officer Jerving. The suspect had a history of criminal behavior. In fact, the very week he killed officer Jerving, he had been sentenced for two counts of hit-and-run. He was sentenced to a scant four months, but the sentence was suspended meaning that he did not have to serve any time unless he violated his probation.

 

What’s going on? The increasing violence against law enforcement officers is a symptom of two sickening societal trends being driven by the political left.

 

The first trend is the intentional softening of our criminal justice system. With callous disregard for the victims of crime, the left has made a concerted effort in recent years to drive soft-on-crime policies while putting in place prosecutors, judges, and police leadership who use their positions to coddle criminals at every opportunity.

 

The left is so proud of their pro-crime positions that they are not shy about telling people. Gov. Tony Evers has a stated policy goal of halving the state’s prison population. The only way to do that is to let some criminals out early while preventing more from going in. Milwaukee District Attorney John Chisholm has a long history of advocating for criminal justice reform, the euphemism liberals use for soft-on-criminal policies. Chisholm’s “bail reform” initiative, which allows violent offenders to bail out of jail for little or no money, has led to criminals committing more crimes when they should have reasonably been in jail.

 

In each of the three incidents that led to the deaths of four officers this year, the murderers should have been in jail. We used to know that locking up violent criminals was the surest path to reducing crime. The left wants us to forget that fact, but the evidence is clear.

 

The second trend is the cultural contempt for police that the left is advocating. Every time there is a police-involved shooting, leftist politicians activists leap to blame the police and attack them with accusations of racism or misconduct before the guns have even cooled.

 

The left pushed the defund-the-police movement using rhetoric that the police were so fundamentally corrupt that they could not be reformed. They must be defunded and disbanded instead.

 

When leftist rioters burn down our cities, attack people, and occupy neighborhoods, leftist politicians and activists side with the rioters and prevent the police from keeping order.

 

Even with our children, the left teaches that police are inherently bad and corrupt. In the wake of the BLM movement, the Milwaukee Public Schools ejected all Milwaukee police officers from their schools and are boisterously rejecting Republican calls to let them return. How are Milwaukee’s public school kids supposed to respect police officers when they are being taught that the police are violent bigots?

 

The overall increase in crime driven by leftist policies, prosecutors and judges coupled with the leftist anti-police rhetoric is having the intended effect. More police officers are being murdered by violent criminals who no longer respect the police and should have been in jail anyway. The story of leftist rule is being written in blue and red.

More Rail in Wisconsin Could… Could Attract 250,000 New Passesngers

by | 0718, 17 May 23 | , | 7 Comments

But at what cost?

MADISON – State transportation officials who want to expand Amtrak rail to Wisconsin’s population centers of Madison, Green Bay, Waukesha County and other communities project the move could attract about 250,000 new passengers to the trains within a decade and an additional 1.6 million by 2050.

 

The state Department of Transportation this week released a long-term plan for Wisconsin’s rail lines that includes the department’s vision for rail service in Wisconsin over the next three decades, including proposals to extend passenger rail to 11 new communities in Wisconsin that would connect the state’s capital and Milwaukee.

The first assumption that they don’t even bother to explain is that increasing rail passengers is a good thing. Is it? At best, it’s neutral, isn’t it? So some people who might prefer to take a train from Green Bay to Madison can do so instead of driving. So?

And what will that cost? Look at California… it ain’t cheap. So let’s say it will cost $20 Billion (probably low) to expand the passenger rail service so that someone can take a train from Wausau to Madison in 4 hours instead of driving it in 2. So we should spend $80,000 per ride to build that out?

Can we just accept that we like our cars and want to use our government resources to be used to make the roads better and stop making cars more expensive?

More spending is not the solution for bad governance

by | 1454, 12 May 23 | | 5 Comments

Here is my full column that ran in the Washington County Daily News earlier this week:

After lengthy, private discussions with legislative Democrats and local leaders, including the Democratic leaders of Milwaukee, the Republican leaders of the Legislature have released a comprehensive and intricate plan to reshape the state’s shared revenue program for decades to come. While the reasons for the effort are laudable, it perpetuates a political arrangement in which everybody wins except the taxpayers. It is a bill with fundamental flaws that should be rejected.

 

Shared revenue is a rather ridiculous Wisconsin state scheme where the state collects a bunch of sales and income taxes and then distributes much of it back to local governments with an archaic formula that nobody likes. This column has long advocated the abolishment of shared revenue in exchange for something far simpler, but there is too much power wrapped up in the distribution of shared revenue for its abolishment to be considered. This bill is a good example of that power being wielded.

 

The primary objectives of the Republicans’ bill, Assembly Bill 245, are threefold. First, it would provide the largest increase in shared revenue in decades in exchange for municipalities spending that money on law enforcement and first responders.

 

Second, it would allow the city of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County to ask the voters to raise the sales tax to pay for their unfunded pension liabilities in exchange for making all future employees join the well-managed state retirement system. Third, it would provide a huge incentive program for local governments who innovate by consolidating or combining services.

 

There are some other things in the bill that are good, like barring local health officials from closing businesses for more than 14 days without approval by elected governments, and allowing local governments a say when the state Stewardship Program decides to buy a slew of land and remove it from the tax rolls, but the grand bargain is more money if local governments do what elected state leaders want them to do.

 

The first bargain is that local government can get more money if they spend that money on law enforcement and first responders.

 

The problem with that bargain is that not every community needs more law enforcement. Some communities are declining in population or have overstaffed law enforcement agencies. The goal of this provision is to push back on the defund-the-police movement that has infected our liberal communities, but the solution in this bill would just have state taxpayers pumping money into local communities to pay for services that they have rejected.

 

The second bargain would allow Milwaukee city and County to ask the taxpayers to jack up sales taxes to pay for their unfunded pension liabilities. The problem the state legislators are trying to fix is that the city of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County have grossly mismanaged their pension obligations to the point that they are underfunded by $1.14 billion and $331 million, respectively. These pension obligations are malignant and starving the rest of their budgets of funding for vital services. The bargain would force these governments to stop making the problem worse by having new employees join the Wisconsin Retirement System and raise sales taxes to pay for the pensions.

 

The problem is that it is already within these local officials’ power to fix the problem by having new employees join the WRS. They have chosen not to do so. The proposed solution would result in a huge tax increase on city and county residents with absolutely no increased benefit to them. Once again, the taxpayers would bear the burden of decades of political mismanagement.

 

The third bargain would create a $300 million slush fund for local governments to do what they should already be doing — looking for ways to consolidate and economize services for the benefit of their citizens. Some local governments have already been progressive in this regard, but the additional money would only go to the laggards. Furthermore, if consolidating and economizing a government service results in efficiencies, why would the taxpayers pay more money for it?

 

Republican legislators are attempting to force local government leaders to do the things that they should already be doing by incentivizing them with more money to spend. This is a government solution, for government, by government. Experience tells us that the restrictions and covenants will eventually be eroded or circumvented, but the spending will remain forevermore. There is nothing so eternal as a government spending program.

 

Necessity is the mother of invention. As long as the state taxpayers keep bailing out the bad decisions of local government leaders, they will continue to make bad decisions.

More spending is not the solution for bad governance

by | 0614, 9 May 23 | | 0 Comments

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:

After lengthy, private discussions with legislative Democrats and local leaders, including the Democratic leaders of Milwaukee, the Republican leaders of the Legislature have released a comprehensive and intricate plan to reshape the state’s shared revenue program for decades to come. While the reasons for the effort are laudable, it perpetuates a political arrangement in which everybody wins except the taxpayers. It is a bill with fundamental flaws that should be rejected.

 

Shared revenue is a rather ridiculous Wisconsin state scheme where the state collects a bunch of sales and income taxes and then distributes much of it back to local governments with an archaic formula that nobody likes. This column has long advocated the abolishment of shared revenue in exchange for something far simpler, but there is too much power wrapped up in the distribution of shared revenue for its abolishment to be considered. This bill is a good example of that power being wielded.

 

The primary objectives of the Republicans’ bill, Assembly Bill 245, are threefold. First, it would provide the largest increase in shared revenue in decades in exchange for municipalities spending that money on law enforcement and first responders.

 

Second, it would allow the city of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County to ask the voters to raise the sales tax to pay for their unfunded pension liabilities in exchange for making all future employees join the well-managed state retirement system. Third, it would provide a huge incentive program for local governments who innovate by consolidating or combining services.

 

There are some other things in the bill that are good, like barring local health officials from closing businesses for more than 14 days without approval by elected governments, and allowing local governments a say when the state Stewardship Program decides to buy a slew of land and remove it from the tax rolls, but the grand bargain is more money if local governments do what elected state leaders want them to do.

 

[…]

 

Republican legislators are attempting to force local government leaders to do the things that they should already be doing by incentivizing them with more money to spend. This is a government solution, for government, by government. Experience tells us that the restrictions and covenants will eventually be eroded or circumvented, but the spending will remain forevermore. There is nothing so eternal as a government spending program.

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