Here & Now

Shawn Johnson on Dealmaking for Wisconsin's 2023-25 Budget

Frederica Freyberg:

The headline from the state Capitol, there’s a shared revenue deal and a school funding package. On the first, that’s good news for local governments across Wisconsin who’ve been sounding the alarm on the need for an infusion of state funding, especially for police and fire services. The shared revenue package was designed to do just that, giving 20% of the money the state collects from the sales tax to local governments, but how the package treats Milwaukee nearly fell apart this week and threatened to put state budget work on hold. Milwaukee was originally given a 10% increase with the ability to raise more in sales tax, the additional bump tied to voters there. But Milwaukee, facing insolvency, worried the vote would fail. Legislative leaders were split and under tight deadline to come to an agreement with the governor. By week’s end, there was an agreement, and then some, including on school funding. We turn to Wisconsin Public Radio Capitol Bureau Chief Shawn Johnson for details. Hi, Shawn.

Shawn Johnson:

Hi, Fred.

Frederica Freyberg:

So what is in this most important shared revenue package?

Shawn Johnson:

I think we’ve been hearing about the broad strokes for weeks and months right now and all those are still in there. You’re going to have a portion of the state sales tax, 20% of the state sales tax going forward, will be dedicated to local governments. So as sales tax grows, local governments will get more money, which is a far cry from what they’ve been the last 20 years when they saw their fixed budget from the state cut three times. As far as the percentage of money that they get, it’s going to vary. Towns are going to get a larger percentage increase, but cities will get a larger dollar increase. Everybody will get at least a 20% increase in the package that was released this week and then there are those provisions in Milwaukee that were the most contentious but very key to that city that will let Milwaukee raise its sales tax by 2% and the county raise its sales tax by.4% without going to voters.

Frederica Freyberg:

Exactly, so does this end up, then, being a better deal in terms of shared revenue for local governments than was originally proposed by Republican legislators?

Shawn Johnson:

Yeah. I mean, I think if you measure it just against what has been proposed this year, they originally came out with a 10% floor for state payments to local governments. Governor Tony Evers said, you know, you’ve got to increase that funding or I’m going to veto this bill. The Assembly passed a version that had a 15% minimum. The version that came out in the deal this week between Governor Tony Evers and Republican leaders has a 20% floor. So just by the numbers, that’s a better deal. There are still all of these restrictions on local governments in terms of how they can spend the money. They have to maintain what they’re spending on police, for example, or they would be financially penalized. They can’t spend the money in Milwaukee’s case on the streetcar or in any case on diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. But just from a money standpoint, this deal is better than where Republicans started a month or so ago.

Frederica Freyberg:

As to the school funding part, how does that shape up?

Shawn Johnson:

We don’t have a lot of details beyond what they said in a press conference and a press release this week, but it sounds like they’re going to set aside a billion dollars between state and local property tax funding for schools and then there will also be funding dedicated to literacy, to school mental health, to special education. If you look at that total, you know, it’s bigger than Republican lawmakers have approved in years past, assuming the state does fund somewhere close to a billion dollars. It’s smaller than the nearly $2.5 billion that the governor proposed when he introduced his budget though earlier this year.

Frederica Freyberg:

So with about 30 seconds left, if there aren’t too many details out there, not too much meat on the bone for public consumption, presumably it’s still being worked up?

Shawn Johnson:

You know, I think you’re going to see the Republican element of the education budget released in the coming weeks, but the deal is seemingly set for this shared revenue package. They did say they want to get Democratic votes for it. We’ll see how it shakes out.

Frederica Freyberg:

Shawn Johnson, thanks very much for joining us from the Capitol.

Shawn Johnson:

Thanks, Fred.