GOP reverts to form
A couple of notes on the state budget that the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee approved last week:
On transportation: Legislators shied away from the exorbitant borrowing that had been proposed by Gov. Scott Walker and state senators earlier this year. That’s the good news. Here’s the bad: There’s a lot of work that won’t get done. Instead of borrowing or raising revenue or finding new ways to pay for transportation, significant road projects are simply being put on hold.
It’s not just the can that’s being kicked down the road; whole roads are now being booted down the freeway.
Among them are the north leg of the Zoo Interchange and the widening of the east-west freeway in Milwaukee. While everyone acknowledges that Milwaukee is the state’s economic engine, too many GOP legislators apparently don’t care if that engine has the lubrication it needs to move goods and traffic.
That’s shortsighted, says state Sen. Alberta Darling, and she’s right. So is Craig Thompson of the Transportation Development Association who said in a statement, “Wisconsin needs a plan to improve poor road conditions, help local governments shorten road replacement cycles, rebuild the 50-year old interstate system in southeastern Wisconsin and make other investments to strengthen our transportation system. That is not what we got.”
Not even close. This plan does nothing to meet Wisconsin’s long-term need to find new revenue sources for a broken system.
On local government: GOP legislators once again couldn’t help show their disdain for local control, something they used to tout as a conservative principle. They placed limits on how the city of Milwaukee can fund its streetcar project (which isn’t getting any state funding), and blocked a special tax district in Milwaukee from putting assessments on residential properties. The action follows a recent court fight between DJK 59 LLC, owned by Milwaukee-area real estate investor Daniel Katz, and the city of Milwaukee over special taxes charged to a downtown apartment complex.
JFC also approved a measure that would bar local governments from enforcing ordinances that conflict with the letter or even the spirit of state laws. Sen. Jon Erpenbach said the measure was so broadly written that it would greatly constrain the powers of local officials.
And legislators barred local governments from regulating quarries, such as those used by road builders to collect gravel. As Erpenbach noted, “I don’t know why we have city councils anymore. Don’t know why we need county boards. Don’t know why we need town boards.” Why indeed, when Big Brother in Madison can impose its will wherever it wants?
On taxes: Legislators rejected several of Walker’s tax cut proposals in favor of tax cuts for businesses and narrow groups. “The budget panel nixed Walker’s proposals to cut the income tax, put a sales tax holiday on back-to-school purchases and increase a tax credit for the working poor,” the Journal Sentinel reported. Now, they plan to cut taxes on broadcasters, business equipment and the wealthy.
Yes, making it easier to run a business in Wisconsin by getting government out of the way is a good idea but it’s a good idea that can be taken too far (such as, say, the Foxconn deal in which government almost becomes an endangered species). But families, and especially the working poor, need help, too, and that’s what Walker’s tax proposals would have provided.
Instead, the JFC rewarded the wealthy and interest groups. None of us should be surprised: Next year is an election year.