Under current law, the Director of State Courts reimburses counties for certain
costs incurred in administering the circuit courts. Each county is required to submit
information about court costs annually by July 1. This bill requires counties to report
their reimbursable court costs annually by May 15. The bill authorizes the director
to audit the reports and to establish a uniform chart of accounts that each county
would be required to use to record all of its financial transactions relating to court
operations.
In some civil proceedings, such as those involving children in need of protective
services, current law requires a circuit court to provide an interpreter for an indigent
party or witness who has limited English proficiency. This bill requires the court, in
all civil proceedings, to provide an interpreter for any party or witness who has
limited English proficiency.
This bill authorizes the Director of State Courts to establish and collect fees for
use of the circuit court automated information systems.
Public defender
Under current law, the State Public Defender (SPD) provides counsel to
represent people in various legal proceedings, including criminal proceedings that
may result in imprisonment, emergency detention or involuntary civil commitment
proceedings, proceedings for the protective placement of an adult, paternity
determinations, and juvenile delinquency proceedings. The SPD provides counsel
to adults who are indigent and to children regardless of the child's income or assets.
This bill requires the SPD to provide legal representation to any person,
regardless of whether the person is indigent, who seeks SPD representation and is
the subject of an involuntary commitment proceeding for mental health or
alcoholism treatment, a protective placement or services proceeding, or a proceeding
concerning involuntary administration of psychotropic medication. The bill provides
that the court may require such a person to reimburse the SPD for all or part of the
costs of legal representation if the person is an adult who is able to make
reimbursement.
The Supreme Court created Wisconsin Trust Account Foundation, Inc., to
allocate moneys from attorney trust accounts to programs that provide civil legal
services to persons who are indigent. This bill requires the Office of Justice
Assistance to provide money to the Foundation, to be awarded as grants for assisting
Wisconsin Works participants with medical claims, developing discharge plans for
mentally ill inmates, coordinating insurance benefits for medical assistance
recipients, providing ancillary services to juvenile offenders, obtaining child
support, and acting as a guardian ad litem in cases with the Bureau of Milwaukee
Child Welfare.
cRIMINAL LAW
Criminal procedure
Under current law, if a court has reason to doubt the competency of a criminal
defendant, the court may require DHFS to examine the defendant to determine
whether the person is competent to proceed to trial. If the examiner determines that
the person is not competent, but may attain competency with treatment, the court
must suspend the criminal proceedings and commit the defendant to the custody of
DHFS for placement in an appropriate mental health institution for up to 12 months,
or for the maximum sentence specified for the most serious offense with which the
defendant is charged, whichever is less.
Under this bill, if DHFS determines that a defendant is incompetent, DHFS
also determines whether he or she will be treated in a mental health institution or
receive treatment in a jail or a locked unit of a facility.
Under current law, a person found not guilty of a crime by reason of mental
disease or defect may receive supervision in the community under the conditional
release program. If a participant in the conditional release program violates a
condition of his or her release, or is otherwise deemed unsafe for community living,
DHFS may require the person to be detained pending a petition by DHFS to revoke
the person's conditional release. Current law requires DHFS to file the petition
within 48 hours of the person's detention.
This bill extends the time for DHFS to file a petition for revocation of a person's
conditional release from 48 to 72 hours, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and legal
holidays.
Sentencing
The bill creates a Truth-In-Sentencing Phase II Council in DOA to submit a
report containing sentencing guidelines to the legislature and the governor by
January 1, 2008.
This bill eliminates the Sentencing Commission and creates a Bureau of
Criminal Justice Research in the Office of Justice Assistance (OJA), which takes on
some of the duties of the Sentencing Commission. Under the bill, the bureau also
serves as a clearinghouse of justice system data and conducts justice system research
and data analysis, currently performed by OJA. The bureau must prepare a
statistical report detailing standard sentences for felonies and how the sentencing
practices of each circuit court compare to its region and to the state.
Under current law, OJA awards grants to fund county programs that provide
alternatives to prosecution and incarceration for criminal offenders who abuse
alcohol or other drugs. This bill requires the county with the highest violent crime
rate to apply for a grant and provides that, upon approval of the application, OJA
must award the county a grant of $250,000 for 2008 and $500,000 for 2009.
The bill also requires the county that has the highest violent crime rate to
submit a plan to OJA for conducting presentencing assessments of a target group of
people who commit a Class F to I felony or a misdemeanor for the purpose of collecting
information that courts may use at sentencing. Upon approval of the plan, OJA must
award the county $250,000 for 2008 and $500,000 for 2009 to perform presentencing
assessments of offenders.
Under current law, when a court imposes a sentence on a person who has
committed a crime or places a person who has committed a crime on probation, the
person must pay a crime victim and witness assistance surcharge of $60 for each
misdemeanor and $85 for each felony. Most of the surcharge is allocated to county
programs for crime victims and witnesses and to provide awards to crime victims.
The rest of the surcharge is used to fund services for victims of sexual assaults.
Also under current law, if a person is charged with a crime for conduct that could
also be prosecuted as a civil offense and the person agrees to pay a forfeiture as part
of an agreement to have the prosecution deferred or suspended, the court must
impose, in addition to the forfeiture, a crime victim and witness assistance surcharge
of $60 (if the person was originally charged with a misdemeanor) or $85 (if the person
was originally charged with a felony).
Under this bill, a court must impose the crime victim and witness assistance
surcharge if: 1) a person is charged with one or more crimes in a complaint; 2) as a
result of the complaint being amended, the person is charged with a civil offense in
lieu of one of those crimes; and 3) the court finds that the person committed that civil
offense. Under the bill, all money collected in such cases must be used to fund county
programs for crime victims and witnesses and to provide awards to crime victims.
Law Enforcement
Currently, OJA awards grants to cities to employ uniformed police officers
whose primary duty is beat patrolling. This bill authorizes OJA to provide additional
grants to first class cities to employ additional uniformed police officers whose duties
may or may not include beat patrolling.
Under current law, OJA awards grants to law enforcement agencies for digital
recording equipment for making audio or audio and visual recordings of custodial
interrogations or for training personnel to use such equipment. This bill eliminates
these grants.
education
Primary and secondary education
Current law generally limits the increase in the total amount of revenue per
pupil that a school district may receive from general school aids and property taxes
in a school year to the amount of revenue increase allowed per pupil in the previous
school year increased by the percentage change in the consumer price index. The
limit does not apply to school districts in which the amount of per pupil revenue is
less than $8,400. This bill increases this amount to $8,700 for the 2007-08 school
year and to $9,000 for any subsequent school year.
Currently, if a school district's enrollment is declining, its revenue limit is
increased by the amount of additional revenue that would have been calculated had
the decline in enrollment been 25 percent of what it was. This bill increases the
district's revenue limit by the additional amount that would have been calculated
had there been no decline in enrollment.
The bill also provides that, if a school district's revenue limit, as calculated
before any adjustments, is less than the district's base revenue from the previous
school year, the district's initial revenue limit would be set at the prior year's base
revenue.
This bill provides that, beginning in the 2008-09 school year, a school district
may exceed its revenue limit in any school year by $25,000 for up to 500 pupils
enrolled in the district in grades 9 to 12 and by an additional $25,000 for each
additional 500 pupils enrolled in the district in grades 9 to 12. A school district must
work in partnership with a local law enforcement agency to develop a school safety
plan and must submit the plan to DPI. The excess revenue must be used to pay for
certain specified safety expenses.
This bill provides that, beginning in the 2008-09 school year, a school district
may exceed its revenue limit in any school year by the amount spent in that school
year to provide teacher mentoring activities, required by DPI by rule, for initial
educators. An initial educator is an individual who has successfully completed an
approved professional education program and is licensed by the department for the
first time in a particular level or category. A school district may exceed its revenue
limit by up to $2,160 per initial educator, less any grant money received by the school
district for that initial educator.
Current law allows an eligible school board to enter into a five-year renewable
student achievement guarantee (SAGE) contract with DPI to reduce class size to 15
pupils in grades kindergarten to three in schools with specified low-income
enrollment. Eligible schools receive $2,250 for each low-income pupil enrolled in
grades eligible for SAGE funding. The most recent set of SAGE contracts expired at
the end of the 2004-05 school year.
This bill authorizes a new installment of renewable, five-year SAGE contracts
beginning in the 2008-09 school year. DPI must give priority in awarding new SAGE
contracts to schools with the highest percentage of low-income pupils.
Currently, under the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP), the state
pays for certain pupils to attend private schools located in the city of Milwaukee. For
each pupil attending a private school under the MPCP, the state pays the lesser of
the private school's educational cost per pupil or the amount paid per pupil in the
previous school year under the MPCP increased by the percentage change in general
school aid over the previous school year. State aid to the Milwaukee Public Schools
(MPS) is then reduced by an amount equal to 45 percent of the amount paid by the
state for the MPCP.
This bill maintains the 45 percent reduction in state aid paid for up to 15,000
pupils attending private schools under the MPCP, but eliminates the reduction for
all pupils above 15,000.
Under current law, to continue in the MPCP, a private school must submit an
independent financial audit and evidence of sound fiscal practices to DPI by
September 1 following a year in which the private school participated in the MPCP.
This bill requires each private school participating in the MPCP to pay to DPI
an annual, nonrefundable fee in an amount to be determined by DPI. DPI must use
the fees to evaluate the financial audits and evidence of sound fiscal practices.
This bill authorizes DPI to pay up to $5,000,000 in the 2007-08 school year and
up to $10,000,000 annually thereafter to the Milwaukee Board of School Directors
to implement initiatives to improve pupil academic achievement in all grades. The
board must submit a plan to DOA for its approval that describes the initiatives
planned and the research showing that the initiatives have a positive effect on pupil
academic achievement.
This bill directs MPS to reduce by $150 the fee for each pupil who enrolls in a
driver education program offered by the school district and who meets income
eligibility standards for a free or reduced lunch plan. For each pupil who successfully
completes the driver education program, DPI must reimburse MPS $150 per eligible
pupil or a prorated amount if the number of eligible pupils exceeds the amount of aid
available. The aid is paid from the transportation fund.
This bill allows the city of Milwaukee to establish one residential charter school
of no more than 300 pupils. If the city does so, the per pupil reimbursement rate for
the state's payment to the school is twice the rate for other charter schools.
This bill changes the funding source for pupil transportation aid from the
general fund to the transportation fund.
Beginning in the 2007-08 school year, this bill increases the annual
reimbursement rate for school districts that transport pupils more than 12 miles to
school from $180 per pupil so transported to $220 per pupil so transported.
Beginning in the 2008-09 fiscal year, this bill authorizes DPI to award grants
to school boards to implement four-year-old kindergarten programs. A school board
may receive an initial grant of up to $3,000 for each pupil enrolled in a four-year-old
kindergarten program in the school district and a second grant, in the succeeding
school year, of up to $1,500 for each such pupil.
Under current law, the state reimburses school boards and private schools 10
cents for each breakfast served under the School Breakfast Program. This bill raises
the reimbursement rate to 15 cents.
Current statutes direct DPI to award precollege scholarships to minority pupils
who enroll in college classes or programs designed to improve academic skills that
are essential for success in postsecondary school education. In November 2004, DPI
reached an agreement with the Office of Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of
Education to award the scholarships to pupils who, regardless of race, are eligible for
a free or reduced-price lunch under the federal School Lunch Program. This bill
modifies the statutes to conform to this agreement.
Under current law, a school board may not grant a high school diploma to any
pupil unless the pupil has earned, in grades 9 to 12, at least 4 credits of English, 3
credits of social studies, 2 credits of mathematics, 2 credits of science, and 1.5 credits
of physical education. Beginning with pupils graduating in 2011, this bill requires
an additional credit of mathematics and of science.
This bill directs DPI to award grants to school districts to develop innovative
instructional programs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics;
support pupils who are typically under-represented in these subjects; and increase
the academic achievement of pupils in these subjects.
Current law directs DPI to award a grant to any person who is certified by the
National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, licensed by DPI as a teacher
or employed as a teacher in a private school, and employed as a teacher in this state.
This bill provides that a teacher who is licensed by DPI as a master educator
is also eligible for the grant. The bill also doubles the amount of the grant if the
recipient is employed in a school in which at least 60 percent of the pupils are eligible
for a free or reduced-price lunch under the federal school lunch program.
This bill creates a grant program to encourage world languages instruction in
elementary grades. Under the bill, a school board may apply to DPI for a six-year
grant to pay for a portion of the compensation packages of up to two teachers and to
phase in world languages instruction in grades one to six. The bill directs DPI to
establish criteria for receiving a grant and requires teachers from participating
schools to attend professional development workshops to be offered by the
department twice each year.
This bill authorizes a school board to construct or acquire a wind electricity
generation facility and to use or sell the energy generated by the facility.
Higher education
Generally, current law allows a UW System student who has been a bona fide
Wisconsin resident for the 12 months preceding the beginning of a semester or
session for which the student registers to pay resident, as opposed to nonresident,
tuition.
This bill allows an alien who is not a legal permanent resident of the United
States to pay resident, as opposed to nonresident, tuition if: 1) he or she graduated
from a Wisconsin high school or received a high school graduation equivalency from
Wisconsin; 2) was continuously present in Wisconsin for at least one year following
the first day of attending a Wisconsin high school; and 3) enrolls in a UW System
institution and provides the institution with an affidavit stating that he or she has
filed or will file an application for permanent residency with U.S. Citizenship and
Immigration Services as soon as the person is eligible to do so.
The bill also provides that such persons are to be considered residents of this
state for purposes of admission to and payment of fees at a technical college.
Currently, under certain circumstances, the UW System and each technical
college must provide a full remission of fees for 128 credits or eight semesters,
whichever is longer, to an eligible veteran or to the spouse, unremarried surviving
spouse, or child of an eligible veteran. An eligible veteran is one who died on active
duty, died as the result of a service-connected disability, died in the line of duty while
on duty for training purposes, or has been awarded at least a 30 percent
service-connected disability rating.
Currently, to be eligible for the fee remission, the child of the eligible veteran
must be at least 18 but not yet 26 years old and a full-time student. This bill reduces
the minimum age to 17 and eliminates the full-time requirement. The bill also
requires the Higher Educational Aids Board (HEAB) to reimburse the UW and each
technical college for fees remitted for eligible veterans and their spouses,
unremarried surviving spouses, and children.
This bill prohibits the Board of Regents of the UW System (board) from making
expenditures for supplemental salary increases for faculty whose services are in high
demand by other higher educational institutions unless the board has submitted a
plan for the expenditure to the secretary of administration, and the secretary has
approved the expenditure. The prohibition applies only if the board expends an
amount in a fiscal year that exceeds the amount expended in the prior fiscal year.
The secretary's approval is required only for the amount that exceeds the prior fiscal
year's amount.
Under current law, the board must require undergraduate applicants, with
certain exceptions, to pay a $35 application fee, and graduate, law, and medical
school applicants to pay a $45 application fee. This bill increases the undergraduate
application fee to $50 and the graduate, law, and medical school application fee to
$60.
This bill provides general purpose revenues to the board to support the
Biomedical Technology Alliance in southeastern Wisconsin.
This bill requires the board to allocate $200,000 of its general program
operations funding in the 2008-09 fiscal year to establish the UW-Milwaukee School
of Public Health, but only if the board approves the school.
This bill changes the funding source for several technical college system
appropriations from the general fund to the transportation fund.
Other educational and cultural agencies
Under current law, HEAB awards various grants to resident students for
higher education. This bill establishes a Wisconsin Covenant Scholars Program
under which, beginning in the 2011-12 academic year, HEAB must award grants
based on financial need to undergraduates enrolled at least half time at nonprofit
public or private institutions of higher education or at tribally controlled colleges in
this state. A student is eligible for a grant under the program for up to the equivalent
of ten semesters, so long as the student meets acceptable academic standards.
The bill also requires DOA to conduct certain activities to promote attendance
at nonprofit postsecondary educational institutions in this state. Those activities
include contracting with The Wisconsin Covenant Foundation, Inc., to establish and
implement a campaign to promote attendance at nonprofit postsecondary
educational institutions in this state and distributing not more than $250,000 in
each fiscal year as grants to school districts for reimbursement of teachers and
administrators for costs incurred in participating in training relating to character
education.
Under current law, HEAB awards Wisconsin higher education grants (WHEG
grants) to undergraduates enrolled at least half time at nonprofit public institutions
of higher education or tribally controlled colleges in this state. Currently, a WHEG
grant may not exceed $3,000 for an academic year. This bill sets that maximum grant
amount during any academic year at 50 percent of the resident undergraduate
academic fees charged to attend the University of Wisconsin-Madison for the
previous academic year.
Under current law, DOA receives aid from a federal program that supports
universal access to telecommunications services, commonly referred to as the
E-Rate Program, that DOA uses to provide educational telecommunications access
to educational agencies that are eligible for a rate discount under the E-Rate
Program, specifically, public or private elementary and secondary schools and public
libraries. This bill permits DOA to use moneys received under the E-Rate Program
to make payments to telecommunications providers that provide educational
telecommunications access to those educational agencies.
This bill appropriates to the Medical College of Wisconsin, Inc., general purpose
revenues for translational research, which is the transfer of knowledge gained from
basic research to new and improved methods of preventing, diagnosing, or treating
disease, as well as the transfer of clinical insights into hypotheses that can be tested
and validated in the basic research laboratory.
Under current law, historical organizations in this state may be incorporated
as affiliates of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin if their purposes and
programs are similar to and consonant with those of the Historical Society. This bill
directs the Historical Society to distribute a grant annually to the Wisconsin Black
Historical Society and Museum to fund the operations of that society and museum.
employment
Under current law, faculty and academic staff of the UW System do not have
collective bargaining rights under the State Employment Labor Relations Act
(SELRA). This bill provides faculty and academic staff of the UW System collective
bargaining rights under state law in a manner similar to that provided other state
employees under SELRA, including the right to collectively bargain over wages,
hours, and conditions of employment.
Unfair labor practices for UW System academic staff and faculty collective
bargaining are generally the same as those under SELRA, except that the bill
specifically provides that it is not an unfair labor practice for the Board of Regents
of the UW System to implement changes in salaries or conditions of employment for
members of the faculty or academic staff at one UW institution and not for such
persons at other UW institutions if certain conditions are met. Under the bill, the
subjects of collective bargaining are the same as under SELRA, except that collective
bargaining is prohibited on the mission and goals of the Board of Regents; the
diminution of the right of tenure provided faculty; the rights granted faculty and
academic staff under current law; and academic freedom. Finally, under the bill,
collective bargaining agreements covering UW faculty and academic staff must be
approved by the Joint Committee on Employment Relations and adopted by the
legislature.
Under current law, in local government employment other than law
enforcement and fire fighting employment, if a dispute relating to the terms of a
proposed collective bargaining agreement has not been settled after a reasonable
period of negotiation and after mediation by the Wisconsin Employment Relations
Commission (WERC), either party, or the parties jointly, may petition WERC to
initiate compulsory, final, and binding arbitration with respect to any dispute
relating to wages, hours, and conditions of employment. An arbitrator or arbitration
panel must adopt the final offer of one of the parties on all disputed issues, which is
then incorporated into the collective bargaining agreement.
This process does not apply, however, to a dispute over economic issues
involving a collective bargaining unit consisting of school district professional
employees if WERC determines that the employer has submitted a qualified
economic offer (QEO). A QEO consists of a proposal to maintain the percentage
contribution by the employer to the employees' existing fringe benefit costs and the
employees' existing fringe benefits and to provide for an annual average salary
increase having a cost to the employer at least equal to 2.1 percent of the existing
total compensation and fringe benefit costs for the employees in the collective
bargaining unit plus any fringe benefit savings. Fringe benefit savings is that
amount, if any, by which 1.7 percent of the total compensation and fringe benefit
costs for all municipal employees in a collective bargaining unit for any 12-month
period covered by a proposed collective bargaining agreement exceeds the increased
cost required to maintain the percentage contribution by the municipal employer to
the municipal employees' existing fringe benefit costs and to maintain all fringe
benefits provided to the municipal employees.
This bill eliminates the QEO exception from the compulsory, final, and binding
arbitration process.
This bill requires DWD to use moneys received by DHFS from licensing, review,
and certifying activities to implement and operate youth summer jobs programs in
the city of Milwaukee and to award grants to the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater
Milwaukee to fund programs that improve the social, academic, and employment
skills of youths who reside in the city of Milwaukee.
This bill changes the funding source for the Employment Transit Assistance
Program, which funds projects to improve access to jobs in areas that are not served
by an adequate mass transit system, from the general fund to the transportation
fund.
Environment
Water quality
Under the Clean Water Fund Program, the state makes loans at subsidized
interest rates for projects to control water pollution, including sewage treatment
plants. This bill changes the interest rate for projects that are necessary to prevent
a municipality from violating a pollution limit in its wastewater discharge permit
from 55 percent of the market interest rate to 70 percent of the market interest rate.
This bill sets the present value of the Clean Water Fund Program subsidies that
may be provided during the 2007-09 biennium at $99,100,000. The bill also
increases the general obligation bonding authority for the Clean Water Fund
Program by $49,500,000 and increases the revenue bonding authority for the Clean
Water Fund program by $368,145,000.
Under the Safe Drinking Water Loan Program, the state makes loans at
subsidized interest rates to local governmental units for projects to construct or
modify public water systems. This bill sets the present value of the Safe Drinking
Water Loan Program subsidies that may be provided during the 2007-09 biennium
at $16,700,000. The bill also increases the general obligation bonding authority for
the Safe Drinking Water Loan Program by $6,090,000.
Current federal law authorizes the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to
carry out projects to clean up contaminated sediment in the Great Lakes and
tributaries of the Great Lakes. The federal law requires a portion of the funding for
a project to be provided from a source other than the federal government. This bill
authorizes DNR to pay a portion of the costs of a project to remove contaminated
sediment from Lake Michigan or Lake Superior or a tributary of Lake Michigan or
Lake Superior if EPA provides federal funds for the project, and the bill provides
$17,000,000 in bonding authority for this purpose.
Under current law, DNR provides funding for the management of urban storm
water runoff and for flood control and riparian restoration projects. This bill
increases the general obligation bonding authority for these projects by $6,000,000.
Under current law, DNR provides funding for measures to reduce water
pollution from nonpoint (diffuse) sources. This bill increases the general obligation
bonding authority for nonpoint source measures by $12,000,000.
Under current law, under the targeted runoff management grant process, local
governmental units annually apply for funding from DNR for new nonpoint source
projects. DNR annually ranks the eligible applications based on specified criteria
and selects projects to receive funding. Local governmental units provide
cost-sharing grants to land owners to implement the projects.
This bill authorizes DNR to provide funding, outside of the targeted runoff
management grant process, for animal waste management. DNR may provide
funding to a local governmental unit for a project at an animal feeding operation that
is discharging pollution to the waters of this state if DNR determines that such
funding outside of that process is necessary to protect fish and aquatic life.
Environmental cleanup
Under the Land Recycling Loan Program, the state makes interest-free loans
to political subdivisions for projects to remedy contamination that has affected, or
threatens to affect, groundwater or surface water. This bill sets the present value
of the Land Recycling Loan Program subsidies that may be provided during the
2007-09 biennium at $3,400,000.
