Governor
__________________
Communications
State of Wisconsin
Office of the Secretary of State
Madison
To Whom It May Concern:
Acts, Joint Resolutions and Resolutions deposited in this office have been numbered and published as follows:
Bill Number Act Number Publication Date
Assembly Bill 15027July 28, 1995
Sincerely,
Douglas La Follette
Secretary of State
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Governor's Veto Message
State of Wisconsin
Office of the Governor
Madison
July 26, 1995
To the Honorable Members of the Assembly:
I have approved
Assembly Bill 150 as
1995 Wisconsin Act 27 and deposited it in the Office of the Secretary of State.
A384
The signing of this budget marks the culmination of a long process that began last year with a bipartisan agreement to provide dramatic property tax relief by having the state fund two-thirds of school costs by the 1996-97 school year. When I signed last year's Budget Adjustment Bill enacting this commitment into law, I was asked how we would pay for it in the 1995-97 budget. My response was that we would do it by making state government more efficient and effective and reducing spending, and we would do it without a general tax increase.
Today I am pleased to sign a budget bill that does just that. It wasn't easy, but with the support of the Joint Committee on Finance, the Assembly and the Senate, the goal of having the state fund two-thirds of school costs will be achieved and my commitment to do it without a general tax increase will be honored.
I am also pleased to say that the budget I am signing today is balanced. There will be a positive ending balance in fiscal year 1995-96 and in fiscal year 1996-97, the two fiscal years in the 1995-97 biennium covered by this budget. There is no deficit in this bill, and I want to stress in the strongest terms possible that there won't be deficits in the future either.
We are required to balance the budget under our state constitution. We have balanced the books in this budget and we will continue to do so in the future. We have lived within our means in this budget and we will continue to do so. The skeptics who said we could not balance this budget and reach two-thirds state funding of schools have been disproved, and the critics who predict deficit spending in the future will be disproved as well.
Total spending under this budget will be $14.8 billion in fiscal year 1995-96 and $15.5 billion in fiscal year 1996-97, for a biennial total of $30.3 billion. (When projected transportation budget spending of approximately $3 billion for the 1995-97 biennium is added in, total spending for the biennium will be about $33.3 billion.) Net spending from general purpose revenue will be $8.3 billion in fiscal year 1995-96 (a 3.6% increase) and $9.1 billion in fiscal year 1996-97 (a 10.3% increase, which primarily reflects the increased support for schools), for a total of $17.4 billion. General purpose revenue spending in areas other than school aids will increase only 1.6% in fiscal year 1995-96 and 1.3% in fiscal year 1996-97.
The budget bill will significantly reduce the actual amount of property taxes paid by homeowners, farmers and businesses, and will further reduce the overall tax burden in Wisconsin. On the average home property tax bill received in December of 1996, school property taxes will go down by 26% and overall property taxes will go down by 10% compared with the December 1995 bill. The average homeowner will see a tax reduction of $222 from December 1995 to December 1996. School property taxes for all classes of property taken together will drop by 25% from December 1995 to December 1996 and overall property taxes will drop by 9%. Equally important, the budget bill contains no general tax increases to fund this property tax reduction. There is no increase in income tax rates, no increase in sales tax rates and no expansion of the sales tax to new classes of goods or services. Progress in reducing property taxes has not come at the expense of increases in other taxes.
I am signing this budget bill with a total of 112 vetoes. A number of these vetoes are technical in nature and clean up conflicting language or drafting problems. A number of them also reduce paperwork requirements for state agencies. The Legislature created over 100 new one-time or permanent reports, studies or legislative approvals for state agencies. These are time-consuming and come at a time when agencies are already being asked to do more with fewer resources. The most onerous of these additional new requirements have been vetoed out.
The partial vetoes I am executing will also improve the ending balance on June 30, 1997, by over $800,000. This will provide an additional cushion for the general fund which is prudent given our pledge to significantly increase state support for schools.
This budget is a very constructive plan for the future. It builds on the successful foundations of economic development and responsible taxing and spending policies that we have established. Among the highlights are the following measures:
Property Tax Relief, Spending Controls and Mandate Relief
• Provides increases in state aid to local governments.
-- Provides record increases in state aid to schools.
-- Increases total state aid and credits for K-12 schools by $248 million for school year 1995-96 and by another $964 million for school year 1996-97.
-- Provides additional annual funding of $14.9 million for shared revenue for municipalities, $6.0 million for the expenditure restraint program for municipalities and $15.4 million for county mandate relief grants.
-- Increases the local assistance share of state GPR spending from 56% of the budget at present to 61% in fiscal year 1996-97.
-- Directs additional relief to farmers by phasing in use value assessment on farmland.
• Continues state spending controls to assure tax restraint.
-- Makes school revenue limits permanent.
-- Makes the qualified economic offer provisions of the state's mediation-arbitration law permanent for school employes.
-- Requires arbitrators to give "greatest weight" to limitations on local government or school district spending or revenues when making decisions regarding public employe contracts under the state's mediation-arbitration law.
• Increases mandate relief.
-- Eliminates the mandate on counties to provide general relief.
-- Increases state grants for support of circuit courts by $13 million during the biennium.
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Governmental Reorganization and Efficiency
• Reduces the state operations share of state GPR funding from 23% of the budget at present to 21% in fiscal year 1996-97.
• Converts three existing agencies to cabinet government status.
• Consolidates numerous state programs and functions.
• Improves the use of information technology.
• Encourages greater use of the private sector in delivering certain services.
• Requires state agencies to improve their cost recovery efforts.
• Reduces most state agency administrative budgets by 5% and 10%.
• Eliminates the Sentencing Commission, Privacy Council, Cost Containment Commission and several other state functions.
• Establishes a sunset process to consider the elimination of up to 144 statutory boards, councils and commissions.
• Requires several agencies to pursue opportunities for further efficiencies in their operations.
Economic Development
• Creates a new cabinet level Department of Tourism.
• Consolidates state labor training, employment and welfare programs into a renamed Department of Industry, Labor and Job Development.
• Consolidates various business development services into a renamed Department of Commerce.
• Consolidates financial regulatory agencies into a new Department of Financial Institutions.
• Consolidates most consumer protection programs into the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection.
• Authorizes creation of enterprise development zones to ensure economic growth throughout the state by providing tax credits for specific business projects.
• Provides funding for the operation of the Mexico Trade Office.
• Increases funding for the Dairy 2020 program to encourage innovations in dairy farming and ensure growth in the dairy industry.
Education
• Creates a new cabinet level Department of Education.
• Ensures that all school districts will benefit from the large increase in school aid.
• Provides school boards with greater flexibility to innovate and enhances local control.
• Expands the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program to include sectarian schools in Milwaukee only, and increases participation to up to 15,000 students by 1996-97 and thereafter.
• Initiates several reforms for Milwaukee Public Schools, including the authority to close failing schools.
• Provides that an unlimited number of charter schools can be created statewide.
• Maintains UW tuition at levels that are the second lowest of the schools in the Big Ten.
• Creates a University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics Public Authority to help maintain the hospital's high quality in an increasingly competitive health care market.
Environmental Protection and Resource Management
• Converts the Departments of Natural Resources and Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection to cabinet agencies.
• Streamlines regulatory services to business and industry by consolidating in the new Department of Commerce responsibility for grants under the petroleum environmental cleanup fund award (PECFA) program and for approving remediation of low and medium priority leaking underground storage tank sites.
• Authorizes the reallocation of uncommitted funds from the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway component of the Warren Knowles-Gaylord Nelson stewardship program for acquisition of the Willow Flowage in Oneida County.
• Improves boating safety on Wisconsin lakes and rivers by increasing aids for local water safety patrols to over $1 million.
• Eliminates the $2 per tire fee for removal and recovery of waste tires, effective June 30, 1997, reflecting successful cleanup of waste tires in the state.
• Encourages the redevelopment of vacant urban industrial sites by providing staff for review and approval of property cleanups to ensure purchaser release from future liability related to past contamination.
• Enhances the recycling of high volume industrial waste (including foundry sand and paper mill sludge) by authorizing its use in highway improvement projects and by directing the Department of Natural Resources to establish standards for the reuse of this waste.
Human Services
• Renames the Department of Health and Social Services to be the Department of Health and Family Services, reflecting the agency's redefined mission.
• Creates an assisted living initiative providing a long-term care option stressing independent and individualized living.
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• Provides counties with an estimated increase of $20 million in federal funds for the biennium by expanding claims for federal funds for MA services currently paid with county dollars.
• Creates a Division of Children's Programs to provide a focus for the well-being of children.
• Creates state support for an optional medical relief program for counties to pay for the medical costs of the indigent.
• Provides an increase of $1 million annually to pay for treatment costs of drunk drivers.
Government Operations and Justice
• Completes the phased-in pickup of county court costs by providing additional state funds to offset approximately 90% of court costs currently funded by the property tax.
• Consolidates juvenile correctional programs and youth services in the Department of Corrections.
• Eliminates juvenile court jurisdiction over 17-year olds alleged to have committed criminal offenses.
• Lowers the minimum age of adult court jurisdiction from 18 to 17.
