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Improves access to health care by expanding deductions for medical insurance premiums to 100 percent for employed persons without employer-provided health insurance and creating a deduction for an unemployed person's purchase of health insurance beginning at 33 percent in 2007 and increasing to 100 percent by 2009.
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Improves Wisconsin's business tax climate by modifying the single sales factor apportionment for computer software, intellectual property and services.
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Increases access to higher education by expanding the deduction for college tuition from $3,000 to the average tuition level in the University of Wisconsin System.
Economic Development and Transportation
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Restores comprehensive planning statutes and state-funded grants to assist communities in planning for efficient and effective use of limited resources. This program provides significant benefits to property taxpayers, farmers, developers, local governments and all citizens by keeping service and development costs manageable.
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Promotes business development throughout the state by improving the Enterprise Development Zone program to allow the creation of enterprise development zones within development zones, allow multiple businesses to be eligible for tax credits within a single zone and increase the statutory cap on the number of zones from 79 to 98. This will unleash over $170 million in tax credits that can be used to help distressed communities in Wisconsin generate economic development and new jobs.
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Improves highway safety and enhances economic development by providing almost $1.75 billion of state and federal funding for highway rehabilitation and construction projects over the biennium. This includes an 8.7 percent increase for state highway rehabilitation and a 13.6 percent increase for major highway development over the biennium.
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Provides the funding needed to ensure that the reconstruction of the Marquette Interchange remains on track to be completed on time and on budget. In addition, the budget allocates $19.3 million in fiscal year 2005-06 and $49.4 million in fiscal year 2006-07 for critical projects on the Southeast Wisconsin freeway system and provides over $32 million to begin preliminary engineering for the next phase of the Southeast Wisconsin freeway system reconstruction.
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Assists in expanding the transportation options for those who need access the most by increasing elderly and disabled transportation aids by $6 million, a 36 percent increase, over the biennium. General transportation and transit aids are also increased by two percent in each calendar year to help communities maintain safe and efficient local road and transit systems.
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Invests in Southeast Wisconsin economic development by providing $800,000 in fiscal year 2005-06 for final engineering for the Metra commuter rail extension and by creating a Regional Transit Authority covering Kenosha, Racine and Milwaukee counties.
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Enhances Wisconsin's image as a premier tourism destination by dedicating an additional $3.8 million over the biennium to tourism promotion.
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Promotes economic development in the city of Green Bay by providing a grant of $1.4 million for a downtown redevelopment project.
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Supports collaborative research and development of new technologies by providing $500,000 to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee to establish a Biomedical Technology Alliance in Southeastern Wisconsin.
Environmental Protection and Resource Management
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Protects Wisconsin's natural beauty and tourism economy by vetoing a requirement that the Warren Knowles-Gaylord Nelson Stewardship 2000 Program be used to purchase land already owned by the state Board of Commissioners of Public Lands.
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Maintains the recycling tipping fee and business surcharge at current levels to ensure adequate future funding for important recycling programs including financial assistance for responsible units and recycling efficiency incentive grants.
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Provides an additional $5.6 million over the biennium to fund various forestry programs including grants to local units of government, third-party certification of forestry practices, invasive species management, forest fire prevention, and several education and professional development programs.
Agriculture
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Creates a bioindustry grant program to promote research, development and implementation of technologies to use agricultural and forest products and waste as energy sources or to create other biobased products with beneficial uses. This program will assist agricultural and timber producers by adding value to existing products and converting currently unused materials into potential income-producing assets.
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Encourages modernization of livestock production systems through the creation of a new Livestock Farm Investment Tax Credit program.
A380
Education and Workforce Development
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Reverses the Legislature's ill-advised and harmful cut to school district revenue limits, enabling Wisconsin schools to continue to provide high-quality public education program for our children.
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Restores $330 million to general school aids over the biennium to deliver real property tax relief and provide school districts the revenues needed to maintain financial resources at the modest levels needed to provide a high-quality public education. Schools will be able to spend about an additional three percent annually – the same level of increase that they have been allowed for many years under Republican and Democratic administrations alike.
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Preserves the current kindergarten through third grade level requirement for the Student Achievement Guarantee in Education (SAGE) small class size initiative that research has shown produces long-lasting benefits for student learning.
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Deletes the Legislature's proposed 50 percent increase to teacher license fees, while still providing $1.35 million in new funding to support a mentoring program for beginning teachers.
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Increases pupil transportation reimbursement rates, especially for districts that must bus students over long distances, and increases funding by $12.75 million over the biennium.
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Increases special education aid by $12.5 million over the biennium, including $3.5 million for a new program to offset the high cost of educating disabled students with the greatest needs.
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Increases funding for bilingual-bicultural education by $2.4 million over the biennium.
Helps ensure that college remains affordable for lower income Wisconsin residents by increasing financial aid programs by $22.9 million over the biennium.
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Recognizes the importance of the University of Wisconsin System to the state's economy by providing $5 million over the biennium to retain high-demand faculty at system campuses.
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Strengthens Wisconsin's leadership role in cutting-edge multidisciplinary biomedical research by providing $2.5 million over the biennium to help support research on Alzheimer's disease and $150 million in general fund supported borrowing and gifts for the first phase of the construction of the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery.
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Ensures access to affordable child care for low-income working families by fully funding the estimated child care subsidy caseload and eliminating the Legislature's proposed 15 percent increase in family copayments.
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Restores $4 million annually of the $16 million cut by the Legislature for child care resource and referral centers, grants to child care providers for training and technical assistance, scholarship and bonuses for child care providers to improve retention of highly-qualified staff, and grants to local entities to improve the quality and increase the availability of child care services.
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Continues to allow adequate investments in worker training by maintaining the current law mill rate limit on Wisconsin Technical College District levies.
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Provides $2 million over the biennium to Wisconsin's technical colleges to provide skills training or other educational services that directly benefit Wisconsin businesses.
Human Services
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Preserves Medicaid eligibility for Wisconsin's most vulnerable residents: the elderly, disabled and low-income families.
Controls prescription drug costs by adopting a reduced reimbursement rate of the average wholesale price discounted by 16 percent and reducing the pharmacy dispensing fee by 50 cents.
Increases the quality of life for Wisconsin's seniors and improves the use of long-term care resources by implementing the Community Relocations program allowing more than 1,400 seniors to live independently in the community instead of nursing homes. This is a significant step toward the goal of reducing the nursing home population by 25 percent over the next eight years.
Implements cost containment measures for Medicaid and BadgerCare programs including: reducing fraud through new initiatives to improve Medicaid program quality assurance, enhancing efforts for collection of third-party claims, improving disease management for frequent users of emergency room services, and expanding use of managed care for Supplemental Security Income recipients to improve care and reduce costs.
Provides more time for all stakeholders in the Health Insurance Risk Sharing Plan (HIRSP) to work together to craft a privatization proposal that ensures that policyholders are protected and sufficient state safeguards are maintained.
Increases monthly payments to foster families by five percent starting in calendar year 2006 to provide support for food, clothing, housing, personal care and other expenses of foster children.
Provides $400,000 GPR in fiscal year 2006-07 to establish a new dental clinic for low-income, disabled and elderly individuals in Chippewa Falls.
Public Safety
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Provides $216,900 PR over the biennium to support two methamphetamine drug enforcement efforts, including an enforcement response team and drug-endangered children training program.
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Provides $100,000 PR annually for grants to communities to divert youths from gang activities and substance abuse through prevention and treatment programs.
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Implements measures to reduce recidivism and prison costs by providing funding and staff for alcohol and other drug abuse treatment units at the Racine and Taycheedah Correctional Institutions and by reducing the maximum term of probation from two years to one year for certain nonviolent misdemeanor offenses.
State Government Operations
A381
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Provides free tuition at University of Wisconsin System and Wisconsin Technical College System campuses for families of Wisconsin service personnel who died while on active duty and for disabled veterans and their families.
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Provides $117,300 GPR each year for a housing demonstration program for homeless veterans in Milwaukee.
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Provides $13 million over the biennium to maintain operations at the veterans home at King and to expand operations at the veterans home at Union Grove.
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Implements the Accountability, Consolidation and Efficiency (ACE) initiative, which will generate significant savings for the state by streamlining the administration of procurement, human resources, server and network support, and facility and space management and by investing in new administrative information technology systems.
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Maintains state ownership and operation of University of Wisconsin System and other state agency power plant and wastewater treatment facilities.
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Authorizes the Department of Administration to restore the Senate-sponsored 2.3 percent across-the-board GPR reduction to state agencies, including the Department of Military Affairs, and allocate the net $4 million cut to state agencies in a way that does not compromise critical public services.
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Deletes the requirement added by the Senate that nonrepresented employees begin paying 1.5 percent of wages into the Wisconsin Retirement Fund. This provision would have amounted to a 1.5 percent pay cut for all nonrepresented employees – with the notable exception of the legislators who voted for it, who are protected by state law from any changes to their compensation package during their terms. Not only is it patently unfair, it would have seriously hurt the University of Wisconsin System's ability to attract and retain great faculty, staff and researchers.
There are also several budget provisions I did not or could not veto that warrant discussion.
1.
Single Factor for Corporate and Technology Firms: I was gratified that the Legislature approved my proposal to extend the single factor sales apportionment for corporate income to technology and service firms in Wisconsin. It just makes no sense to have a corporate tax policy that penalizes Wisconsin employers for every job they create in our state. This change places Wisconsin technology firms on the same footing as manufacturers and in a more favorable tax climate than many other states. The Legislature appropriately preserved the apportionment of income from sales of intangible property.
However, the resulting revisions do not benefit Wisconsin-based biotechnology and franchising firms. I look forward to working with the Legislature to address this unintended consequence.
2.
Specific Position Reductions: Through several legislative motions, not directly included as part of the budget bill, the Legislature has attempted to dictate specific position reductions in this bill. In some instances, most notably the sale of all state-owned power plants and wastewater treatment plants, and closure of the Milwaukee W-2 State Oversight Office, the bill includes no specific language regarding position reductions. It is my intent to give executive branch agencies discretion in implementing these reductions or requesting additional position resources. This means that the Department of Corrections will have the flexibility to substitute other positions in place of the correctional unit supervisor and assistant unit supervisor positions deleted in a Joint Committee on Finance motion. Executive branch agencies with power plant and wastewater treatment facilities will be able to seek restoration of the positions through approval processes authorized under current law. Similarly, the Department of Workforce Development will have the same latitude in finding ways to ensure the Milwaukee Office is adequately staffed.
3.
Medical Assistance Cost Containment Efforts: Containing health care costs, while preserving eligibility and access for Wisconsin's Medicaid populations, is one of my top priorities, and I am disappointed with certain actions the Legislature has taken to hamstring these important efforts. Therefore, I am directing the Department of Health and Family Services secretary to take the following actions to maximize the state's ability to manage the Medicaid program in the most efficient and effective way possible:
Transportation Broker – The Legislature reversed my recommendation to implement a competitively-bid brokerage system for nonemergency transportation under Medicaid – which would have improved service, lowered costs and helped stamp out fraud – only to turn around and levy an undesignated cut to the nonemergency transportation services budget without offering one idea for a way to actually achieve those savings. I maintain my position that a brokerage system is best for Wisconsin taxpayers, and I am directing the Department of Health and Family Services secretary to continue development of this initiative.
Home Care, Personal Care and Private Duty Nursing Reduction – The Legislature doubled the percentage reduction I had proposed for home care, personal care and private duty nursing services. A cut of this magnitude directed exclusively at these community long-term care services would have a chilling effect on the state's ability to implement my community relocation program. Therefore, I am directing the Department of Health and Family Services secretary to manage this reduction across the entire Medicaid program.
A382
Request for Information on Community Long-Term Care Options – As our population ages, we need to seek out new, innovative, cost-effective delivery systems for community long-term care services. I was dismayed that the Joint Committee on Finance failed to recognize the value in gathering additional information on options for community care. I remain committed to finding solutions for this issue, and I am instructing the Department of Health and Family Services to issue a Request for Information (RFI) to managed care organizations regarding their ability to develop primary, acute and long-term managed care on a regional basis. Further, I am directing the department to issue the RFI within the first six months of fiscal year 2005-06. Upon receipt of the RFI results, the information should be provided to the Department of Administration.
4.
Milwaukee Child Welfare: I was disappointed that the Legislature failed to acknowledge our legal and moral obligation to provide sufficient resources to safeguard children in the Milwaukee child welfare system. Recruiting and retaining high-quality caseworkers has been demonstrated to hinge in large part on providing adequate compensation and training. While the Legislature cut the funding I had proposed for these critical functions so that they could await the results of yet another study, the needs of these children cannot wait. Therefore, I am directing the Department of Health and Family Services secretary to identify and reallocate funding toward the Bureau of Milwaukee Child Welfare reinvestment plan, especially for activities related to caseworker retention and training.
5.
Milwaukee State W-2 Oversight Office: One of the casualties of this budget was the Legislature's decision to abruptly delete funding for the W-2 office located in Milwaukee. This action will undermine state oversight of the largest and most challenging W-2 service area, but was done without language that allows me to reverse the decision. However, I am determined to keep this key office open and retain the state's W-2 presence in Milwaukee. This is especially important because Milwaukee has over 75 percent of Wisconsin's W-2 caseload. Furthermore, over the past year, a string of well-publicized missteps by Milwaukee's then-largest W-2 provider only serves to emphasize a compelling need to maintain the state's Milwaukee office. I am directing the Department of Workforce Development secretary to identify funding from within existing revenue to ensure that the Milwaukee office remains open and fully operational.
6.
Controlling Invasive Aquatic Species: My budget included a comprehensive approach to preventing and reducing the impact of aquatic invasive species in the state. The Legislature, however, chose to greatly reduce the effectiveness of my proposal by removing the ability of local and state law enforcement officers to enforce common sense restrictions on transporting these nuisance species from one body of water to another. While concern was raised regarding one aspect of the enforcement powers, the Legislature illogically chose to eliminate the statewide requirement to remove aquatic plants and zebra mussels from boats and equipment rather than rationally adjusting the provision to focus enforcement on boat landings.
7.
Nonpoint Source Pollution Abatement Grants to Farmers and Other Landowners: While I commend the Legislature for retaining the additional funding I provided for cost-share grants to farmers and other landowners for nutrient management planning and grants to counties to ensure adequate staff is available to assist farmers and other landowners, I am deeply disappointed that the Legislature reduced the funding I provided to assist landowners and communities in installing practices that would reduce nonpoint source pollution. Farmers and communities rely on this funding to support efforts to protect Wisconsin's abundant waters. This unjustifiable reduction in funding will have a significant negative impact on the efforts of local communities statewide to grow and develop recreational, economic and tourism opportunities, and to improve the environment for fish, wildlife, citizens and visitors to this state.
8.
Sturgeon Bay Bridge: The bill contains a provision to make the construction of a new bridge in the city of Sturgeon Bay a priority for the Department of Transportation. The existing bridge that connects the two sides of the city is scheduled for reconstruction, and without the new bridge, the two sections of the city would be completely separated by the Sturgeon Bay Ship Canal during the reconstruction. To ensure that the city remains connected for emergency response and traffic safety purposes, I am committed to doing everything in the state's power to get this project under construction within the provision's one-year timeframe. Unfortunately, the Federal Highway Administration has indicated that the preliminary activities (e.g., reevaluation of the environmental assessment, final design, real estate acquisition, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Coast Guard permits, etc.) for such a project would take three years to complete. I do not accept that timeframe and am directing the Department of Transportation secretary to work with the Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Coast Guard to expedite this project.
Protecting taxpayers and investing in our priorities. Those were my simple goals when I introduced the budget, and the goals I have met through my vetoes in signing the budget. This budget delivers true property tax relief by enacting realistic limits on local levies, maintaining the strict current law revenue limits for schools and providing adequate state school aid and direct property tax credits.
Two years ago, I signed a budget that brought us out of the depths of the worst deficit in the state's history. Today, I sign a budget that moves Wisconsin on toward full recovery. It cuts taxes and grows our economy. It assists Wisconsin's service personnel, veterans and their families who are making the greatest sacrifices to protect freedom for us all. It builds on my efforts to streamline and improve state operations. It helps parents and students with accessing higher education. It protects our environment and abundant natural resources.
Wisconsin is a great state because we have always been optimistic about our future. I am optimistic for Wisconsin – present and future. I sign a budget today, after vetoes, that keeps us on course to a brighter future for all Wisconsin citizens.
On Wisconsin.
Respectfully submitted,
Jim Doyle
Governor
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Table of Contents
A. EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
ARTS BOARD
1. Required Lapse to the General Fund
HIGHER EDUCATIONAL AIDS BOARD
2. Wisconsin Higher Education Grants; University of Wisconsin System Students
PUBLIC INSTRUCTION
3. School District Revenue Limits
4. Increasing Funding for School Aids and Property Tax Relief
5. Milwaukee Parental Choice Program Eligibility
6. Milwaukee Charter School Pupil Eligibility
7. Milwaukee and Racine Charter School Program Funding
