Water measure founders

Council’s funding plea struggling in Legislature

An effort to make more grant money available for The Water Council in Milwaukee is losing steam as the state Legislature’s session winds down.

The Water Council would receive $1 million in grants funded by Wisconsin taxpayers over the next two years under a bill that was passed on Thursday by the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee.

Senate bill 526 is a watered-down version of the Milwaukee trade association’s wish list, which was contained in two bills that would have given the organization $10 million of grants and a 25% tax credit for water research done by its members.

The Water Council is not specifically named in the bill, but it is essentially the only organization in the state that would meet all of the criteria for getting the money.

The council, which lobbied for the legislation, has not yet determined what it would do with the grant money, said Dean Amhaus, president and chief executive officer. However, the trade group is planning to put together a proposal for the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp., which would administer the grants.

“We’re going to be very judicious on how we use those dollars; it’s toward the mission of economic growth for businesses that are here, starting new businesses and attracting businesses from other areas,” Amhaus said.

The bill, however, is not on the Assembly’s calendar and probably won’t be voted on in this legislative session, which could end next week, said Rep. Adam Neylon (R-Pewaukee), one of its sponsors.

Neylon said he is “not comfortable” with the bill now that the tax credit component has been nixed. “I like the idea of clusters around the state in a variety of industries and having incentives to invest in the companies that are developed through those clusters,” he said.

“I support the cluster strategy approach, but I have serious questions about both these bills,” said Sen. Julie Lassa (D-Stevens Point). “WEDC has already made over $1.3 million in grants to the Water Council since 2012, so I’m not sure why (the bill) is needed.”

The committee on economic development, which originally evaluated the water bills, never got any information about which industries besides water would be affected by the proposals, said Lassa, one of its members.

The Water Council has 185 members, and most are companies in the water technology area, Amhaus said. The group doesn’t track the amount of academic or industrial water research done in this region, but Amhaus said that some of the most robust industry segments here are industrial water treatment, wastewater treatment, and water energy efficiency.

The council in January received a $750,000 grant from WEDC to help it create a second, smaller Global Water Center in Walker’s Point that it has said will provide space for graduates of the council’s business acceleration programs, as well as other companies.