Month: February 2017

Wisconsin Department of Revenue Targets Fraud and Identity Theft

Posted on February 28, 2017 by

More than $63 million in fraudulent and erroneous refunds and credits were blocked last tax season thanks in part to the Wisconsin Department of Revenue's use of identity verification tools.

“We are vigilant in our efforts to safeguard the refunds and identities of tax filers with enhanced ID verification tools,” said Richard Chandler, Wisconsin Department of Revenue Secretary.

“As reports of cybercrimes and identity theft become more common, the DOR prevents fraudulent activity by diligently reviewing filed tax returns to protect our citizens,” Sec. Chandler said. “Our systems are secure, however when fraudsters steal your identity from other sources, they may try to file a fraudulent tax return.”

“We ask tax filers to allow at up to 12 weeks processing time this season as we leverage our ID verification tools to ensure their refund is not going to someone who's stolen their personal, confidential information,” Chandler added.

How ID Verification Works

The Wisconsin Department of Revenue uses analytics to identify returns that indicate possible identity theft. When this happens, the DOR sends a letter to the tax filer asking them to complete a quiz, enter a Personal Identification Number (PIN), or submit documentation to confirm their identity. The unique PINs are a tool the DOR began using last year to help safeguard tax filers.

During the past six tax seasons, the Department stopped more than $255 million in potential fraud. The increase is due to the DOR's continuous expansion of its anti-fraud efforts and tools as more cybercriminals attempt fraud. For more information, visit the DOR's Protecting Taxpayers page.

Proposed Federal Budget Would Hike Defense Spending, Cut EPA

Posted on February 27, 2017 by

President Donald Trump is proposing major defense spending increases and big cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency, State Department and other federal agencies in a proposed budget to be presented soon to Congress, said a person familiar with the plan.

The outline of the budget will be made public as early as Monday, according to two White House officials. They declined to comment further on what the budget may entail. Trump is scheduled to make an address to Congress on Tuesday night.

Congress ultimately determines how the federal government’s money is spent, and the White House budget is mostly an opening bid in what could be a protracted process to set a federal spending plan for the upcoming fiscal year.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Trump’s first budget won’t touch entitlement programs such as Social Security or Medicare. It will instead focus on ways to produce long-term economic growth by slashing taxes, he said in an interview taped Friday and broadcast Sunday on Fox News Channel.

The New York Times reported Sunday evening that the budget will assume economic growth of 2.4 percent, below the 3 percent growth Trump has pledged. Mnuchin said that the administration thinks a combination of tax cuts and regulatory relief will lead to economic growth of 3 percent or higher. “We’re going to make sure this works,” he said in the Fox interview. “This is all about creating growth.”

Defense Budget

A spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget, which compiles the document, declined to comment on its details. He said the outline wouldn’t address entitlements or tax changes, which would be included in a fuller budget proposal later in the year.

“The president and his Cabinet are working collaboratively to create a budget that keeps the president’s promises to secure the country and restore fiscal sanity to how we spend American taxpayers’ money,” the spokesman, John Czwartacki, said in an e-mail.

One top national security official said the budget’s main thrust is to boost defense spending, as Trump has repeatedly promised. The president has called the U.S. military, the world’s largest, “badly depleted.”

“We’re also putting in a massive budget request for our beloved military,” Trump said in a speech Feb. 24 at the Conservative Political Action Conference. “We will be substantially upgrading all of our military, all of our military, offensive, defensive, everything, bigger and better and stronger than ever before. And hopefully, we’ll never have to use it, but nobody’s gonna mess with us, folks, nobody.”

Restructuring, Cuts

Trump’s budget outline will show the president’s “commitment to fixing VA,” Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin said in an interview that aired on Fox News on Monday. Shulkin said it’s not about increased funding, but a matter of restructuring the system.

The State Department will not share in the largesse. One of the agency’s deputy secretary positions, in charge of management and resources, is expected to be eliminated and its staff reassigned, people familiar with the plan said. Trump and his aides also are reviewing whether to eliminate many special envoy positions, the people said — diplomatic staff assigned to key regions and issues, including climate change, anti-Semitism and Muslim communities.

The EPA, meanwhile, has been a consistent target for Trump. He’s said the agency has too many regulations that burden companies and cause long delays for businesses trying to get approvals for new factories.

Trump’s pick for EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, was a long-time foe of the agency as Oklahoma’s attorney general. Trump is slated to sign documents as soon as Monday compelling the EPA to begin undoing recent regulations, including the Clean Power Plan that slashes greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation and the Waters of the U.S. rule that defined which waterways are subject to pollution regulation.

“Its clogged the bloodstream of our country,” Trump said of the agency earlier this month. “People can’t do anything, people are looking to get approvals for factories for 15 years.”

Two-Thirds Cut

The EPA is a perennial target for budget cuts for some conservatives in Congress, and advisers on Trump’s transition team said its funding and staff could be slashed below its $8.3 billion budget this fiscal year. Myron Ebell, who led the Trump transition team focused on the EPA, said the agency’s workforce could be cut to a third of its current size — about 15,000 employees nationwide.

The White House’s budget outline, a so-called “skinny budget,” is essentially a summary document often used by new presidents to provide advance looks at an administration’s policy and funding priorities. Typically, more details come from the White House in a fuller budget document later.

House and Senate committees don’t have to embrace the president’s proposals, as presented. They will hold hearings to establish a congressional budget resolution laying out a framework for anticipated revenues and discretionary spending allocations for the 12 annual appropriations bills for the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. That budget resolution is adopted by Congress, but is not signed by the president.

State Lawmakers Tout Self-Driving Cars at Hearing

Posted on February 24, 2017 by

The prospect of self-driving vehicles on Wisconsin roads got a warm reception from state lawmakers at an informational hearing at the state Capitol on Wednesday.

Legislators on the Assembly Committee on Jobs and the Economy peppered speakers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in addition to officials with companies like Uber and General Motors, with questions on the emerging technology.

They raised concerns ranging from cybersecurity to how the cars would handle deer crossings. But for the most part, committee members hailed the technology as an exciting development.

“I am absolutely sold. I have experience through a friend who uses these things out in Seattle,” said Rep. John Macco, R-Ledgeview. “He swears by 'em.”

“It's really an exciting topic, and one I'm sure we're going to be involved in,” added Rep. Tod Ohnstad, D-Kenosha.

Many of the legislators said they were particularly keen on attracting business and research centered on driverless technology. Macco said that kind of economic activity could be a way of bringing younger workers to the region.

“We have less millennials than we do boomers,” he said. “Here's a reason to attract those young lives to our state.”

The crux of the testimony at the hearing came from two engineering researchers with the University of Wisconsin-Madison leading an effort to bring autonomous vehicles to Wisconsin for testing. The U.S. Department of Transportation recently designated the state as an officially sanctioned proving grounds. The designation means that experimental autonomous vehicles could be on Wisconsin's roads within the year.

Rafferty stressed to lawmakers that the advent of driverless cars isn't up for debate.

“It's not a question of whether you agree or disagree with what's going on,” he said. “They are going to be happening.”

Lisa Schrader, a public affairs official with Uber, echoed that idea. She stressed that the future is one in which autonomous cars, coupled with ridesharing, will increasingly become the norm.

“If you have a child or a grandchild or a niece or nephew under 10 years old today, it's less likely that the first thing they do before they turn 16 is get a driver's license,” she said.

Doug Rebout, a local farmer, also gave a presentation on what autonomous vehicles looks like in agriculture, an area in which the technology has already seen some integration. He said that thanks to autonomous combines and tractors, he and his family have been able to drastically change their workflow.

“We're able to go relax, and we're able to pay attention to other things that are going on in the field,” said Rebout.

The informational hearing came as an increasing number of states pass laws permitting autonomous vehicles on their roads, and laying out rules on what they can or cannot do. Wisconsin currently has no autonomous vehicle laws on the books.

Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison, has said he is planning to introduce an autonomous vehicles bill for Wisconsin this session. The Assembly GOP also have the issue on their agenda.

Pruitt: Federalism Matters at the EPA

Posted on February 23, 2017 by

New Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt wants to make the agency a place where “federalism matters” and states are not seen as adversaries, he said Tuesday.

“I seek to ensure that we engender the trust of those at the state level,” rather than approach them as “adversaries,” Pruitt said in his first address to agency staff on Tuesday.

He made the comments after being sworn in as President Trump’s head of the EPA on Friday, despite widespread Democratic opposition and protests by environmental groups and former EPA administrators.

Trump has pledged to roll back a number of EPA regulations seen as detrimental to coal miners and energy production jobs.

Pruitt said Tuesday that he doesn’t see a conflict between being pro-energy and pro-environment. “We can be both pro-energy and pro-environment … and we don’t have to choose.”

Pruitt also wants to make sure everything the agency does is based firmly in statute and the law.

He said the agency should abide by the law to “avoid litigation,” devoting more of its time doing the business of the agency, and less time going to court over its regulations.

New DOT Secretary: Audit Signals We “Must Change the Culture, Be Transparent”

Posted on February 22, 2017 by

Wisconsin’s new transportation secretary vowed Tuesday to “change the culture” at the Department of Transportation after an audit found it underestimated highway project costs by more than $3 billion, in part by failing to account for inflation.

Dave Ross’ comments came during a legislative hearing on a recent state audit of the DOT highway program. Lawmakers said the audit raises broad questions about DOT management, including whether lawmakers must oversee highway projects more closely.

Lawmakers and Ross signaled they will adopt recommendations in the audit, which Ross called a “template” to improve the agency.

Ross replaced Mark Gottlieb as DOT secretary in January. Acknowledging the audit found “inefficiencies,” Ross told members of the Joint Legislative Audit Committee that DOT must become more transparent and “break down silos” between its regional offices.

“We need to become more performance-driven. We need to become more accurate,” Ross said. “We need to build back up DOT’s confidence in your eyes.”

As examples of where the department must improve, Ross highlighted cost overruns on two Dane County projects: expansion and reconstructions of Verona Road and the Madison Beltline, and of Interstate 39-90 from the Beltline to the Illinois state line. Since lawmakers approved both projects in 2011, the Verona Road price tag has soared from $150 million to $283.3 million and the I-39-90 cost rose from $715 million to $1.2 billion.

Lawmakers hinted at the implications the audit findings could have for the state’s next transportation budget, debate on which is expected to be contentious.

The audit, in addition to project cost overruns, also found the DOT could save money by taking steps to curb engineering and construction costs. The findings have become a rallying cry for lawmakers, who say DOT must find more cost savings before they contemplate increasing gas taxes or vehicle fees. That includes some conservative GOP lawmakers and Gov. Scott Walker, whose 2017-19 budget proposal holds the line on taxes and fees.

“Giving (DOT) more money would be absolutely the wrong thing to do at this point,” Sen. Chris Kapenga, R-Delafield, said.

Others, such as Rep. John Nygren, R-Marinette, see it differently. He, along with fellow Assembly GOP leaders and legislative Democrats, is open to tax or fee hikes to resolve the transportation-funding imbalance.

Nygren noted the audit findings also say Wisconsin’s highway conditions are deteriorating and compare poorly to neighboring states. “Even after we make those reforms (outlined in the audit), we’re still in a position where, I believe, there’s a shortfall,” Nygren said.

The bill draft circulated before Tuesday’s hearing would require DOT to account for inflation and other factors, such as environmental studies, engineering or land acquisition, in future project cost estimates.

It also has recommendations for actions by DOT, including providing more information to lawmakers about highway project costs and compiling such information, including explanations for major cost increases, in a central location.Sen. Rob Cowles, R-Green Bay, co-chairman of the panel, said he expects the panel to watch the DOT closely in coming months to see how it responds to the audit.

“This committee is going to have to have ongoing dialogue … back and forth with the agency,” Cowles said.

States may have Best Plan to make Health Care Affordable Again

Posted on February 21, 2017 by

As President Donald Trump, Republican, and Democrats in Congress wrangle over the future of Obamacare and its replacement, the answer to how to make health care affordable for all Americans may not come from another contentious health reform battle in Washington.

Instead, we may follow Trump’s ideas on Medicaid and education reform. Let the states derive their own solutions, particularly when it comes to cost containment.

Gallup says that 26 percent — or more than 1 in 4 health care dollars — are completely wasted. These dollars are spent on defensive medicine or when physicians order more tests, procedures, and medications than are clinically necessary. I see it every day as my colleagues order everything from x-rays, blood work, MRIs, CT scans and a host of other unnecessary procedures to protect themselves from a potential lawsuit.

The impact of wasteful spending by physicians –known as defensive medicine — is astounding. Consider this:

  • BioScience Valuation, a health care economics firm, says that doctors ordered $487 billion in defensive medicine in 2015. That, of course, results in higher premiums, co-pays, deductibles and out-of-pocket expenses for consumers and employers.
  • A 2015 survey conducted by the Congress of Neurological Surgeons found that 75 percent of neurosurgeons said they practice defensive medicine to protect themselves from litigation.
  • A 2014 survey of hospital administrators conducted by Jackson Health care, one of the nation’s largest medical staffing firms, found that 32 percent of costs generated in a hospital could be attributed to wasteful, defensive medicine.

According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), health care spending is expected to consume more than 20 percent of our nation’s GDP by 2025, up from 17.5 percent today. In 2015, federal, state and local governments spent $1.5 trillion. In the same year, the private sector spent $1.7 trillion on health care, according to CMS. Spending will continue to skyrocket if we don’t offer incentives for physicians to change their behavior when it comes to defensive medicine.

That’s why we may need to look to six states that are aggressively working to contain costs. The Florida, Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee legislatures are considering a proposal to eliminate defensive medicine by abolishing each state’s medical malpractice system and replace it with a no-blame model similar to workers’ compensation. Two other states are also examining the concept.

When doctors are no longer the target of litigation, they would be less likely to order unnecessary tests, medications and procedures.

Under the proposal known as the Patients’ Compensation System, a patient could still file a claim if a physician had injured them. But the claim would no longer go through the traditional legal system and instead would be heard by a state administrative panel of health care experts. This administrative system, similar to workers’ comp, would hear a claim in a matter of months instead of the years it takes to litigate a case. Compensation would be identical to awards in a legal system. Patients with smaller injuries could also be compensated for a loss.

But completely abolishing the malpractice system and replacing it with a no-blame model would change the behavior of our nation’s physicians. It would result in annual savings of $115 billion in Medicare and $133 billion in Medicaid, according to BioScience Valuation. In the private sector, employers could save 11 to 22 percent in health care costs for each employee annually– as premiums, co-pays, deductibles and out-pocket costs drop with the elimination of defensive medicine, according to BioScience.

No matter how swiftly Congress acts to repeal and replace Obamacare, there is no doubt that waste in our health care system has to be a top priority. Eliminating defensive medicine with a new state-based solution may just be what’s needed to make health care affordable again for all of us.

Governor Walker's Budget Extends Funding for Extra Tax Auditors

Posted on February 20, 2017 by

Gov. Scott Walker is proposing to increase funding for an enhanced tax auditing program that generated nearly $27 million in additional revenue last year — more than enough to cover the cost, but about $4.6 million short of its goal.

Business groups are closely monitoring the Audit 2020 initiative, which the Walker administration promoted two years ago as focusing on out-of-state companies. The auditors are keying on corporate and sales tax collections, and not individual income taxes.

The latest budget adds 46 four-year project positions with the expectation they will generate $64 million in revenue over the next two years. The goal of 102 permanent positions in the last budget was to collect $113.5 million more over two years.

The Department of Revenue reported to the Legislature last month that in the first year of the biennium the new positions and related expenses — such as expanding offices in Minnesota, Illinois, Madison and Appleton — cost $9.2 million out of a budgeted $11.8 million. The rest of the money paid for additional audit bureau staff and a bureau reorganization.

The positions generated $26.9 million in new revenue, though the goal was $31.5 million. The report noted the agency’s compliance bureau, which collects delinquent taxes, exceeded its agency goal by $22 million, more than making up for the shortfall in the auditing program. Some of those extra delinquencies were generated by the additional audits.

The program’s corporate auditors also billed companies $15 million that weren’t collected last year, but are due in the current year.

Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, the state’s largest business lobby, opposes the new program. Scott Manley, WMC’s vice president of government relations, said members have reported the audit process is “very long, cumbersome and expensive in terms of investment of time and employee resources to comply.”

DOR was unable to provide historic data on the number of audits it conducts each year, but the number of higher corporate tax assessments increased from 429 in 2014 to 670 in 2015 to 981 last year, according to DOR spokesman Casey Langan. The number of higher sales and use tax assessments increased from 1,195 in 2014 to 1,201 in 2015 to 1,256 last year.

Steve Baas, vice president of government relations for the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, lauded Walker’s goal of recovering more money from tax cheats to help reduce taxes elsewhere.

“The implementation of strategies to meet that goal, however, need to be carefully monitored to see when/if the DOR reaches a point of diminishing return where the marginal increase in collections will be outweighed by the cost of funding the additional auditors,” Baas said in an email.

An Alternative to Raising the Minimum Wage

Posted on February 17, 2017 by

 

If there’s one blessing in the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States, it’s that it has highlighted one of the worst festering social problems of the country: the slow decline of the working class (not just white), buffeted by the combined social forces of globalization, technology, and social liberalism.

Working-class incomes have stagnated for too long, and low-skill unemployment and underemployment are highly problematic. If conservatives are serious, as we claim to be, about upward mobility, this is a problem we can no longer afford to ignore.

Underemployment and low wages in working-class communities have led not just to the loss of the dignity of work, but to a host of ensuing societal diseases that should have conservatives horrified: family breakdown and illegitimacy, drug addiction, crime.

A solution that has been kicking around for years solves a big part of the problem of stagnating working-class wages while, unlike a minimum wage, allowing the market to clear. It is called wage subsidies.

The idea is just what it sounds like: Employers pay low-wage workers the prevailing market wage, and the government supplements that wage. Everyone wins: The labor market remains efficient, and low-wage workers get real wages for real work. What’s more, in an era of ever-increasing global competition, it would make the American workforce much more competitive.

Before you get agitated about the idea of government subsidies, let’s remember that such a policy is actually in the best conservative tradition. A wage subsidy would be an extension and a reform of one of the most successful poverty-reduction programs in history, and a major conservative policy win: the Reagan-era Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). The EITC is exactly what it sounds like: a tax credit for low-wage work. It’s the proverbial “hand up, not hand out” on the ladder of opportunity. But while the EITC has done a phenomenal amount of good, it also needs reform. The program is overly complicated, and many eligible families don’t sign up for it. What’s more, it no longer is the 1980s, and the issue of competitiveness has grown ever sharper over the intervening decades.

It’s time for conservatives to go even further than the Gipper and revamp and expand the EITC by turning it into a larger wage-subsidy program. Senators Marco Rubio and Mike Lee have already proposed plans to this effect. It would be a policy and political winner, by increasing the competitiveness of American workers — bringing more industrial employment — and increasing the wages of working-class families, two things that the government desperately needs to do, both to reward the core of the GOP coalition and for the common good more generally. As the issue of tax reform in Congress slowly rises into view, this is an issue conservatives need to rally around.

State Senator wants Audit of Federal Funding, Obligations in State Programs

Posted on February 16, 2017 by

A conservative lawmaker wants an audit conducted of all state programs that use federal funds — and the ultimate costs federal obligations place on state and local freedom.

State Sen. David Craig sent a letter Tuesday to the Joint Legislative Audit Committee requesting it direct the Legislative Audit Bureau to conduct a “comprehensive audit of all state programs which receive or utilize federal funds.”

The Town of Vernon Republican wants a review of the “federal requirements, regulations, and restrictions which bind the usage of those (federal) funds and tie the hands of our state government officials, local officials, and limits the freedom of our constituents.”

Craig asks the audit bureau to consider:

  • The cost of compliance and freedom lost by the state agency and local officials due to regulation.
  • The estimated savings that could be realized should a regulation be lifted or lessened.
  • The cost of compliance and loss of freedom born by the citizens of the state as a result of the regulation.

A Tax Foundation review found that in fiscal year 2013 a combined 30 percent of state revenues nationally were derived from federal grants-in-aid. That included everything from federal Medicaid payments and education funding assistance to cash for infrastructure projects and housing grants.

Mississippi topped the dependency list in fiscal year 2013, deriving nearly 43 percent of its revenue from federal assistance. Louisiana was next at 41.9 percent, followed by Tennessee (39.5 percent).

Wisconsin ranked 36th in the nation, with 27.7 percent of revenue coming from federal sources, according to the Tax Foundation.

North Dakota was least dependent, at 19 percent, followed by Hawaii (21.5 percent), and Alaska (22.4 percent).

Such dependency creates obligations that can be costly for state and local governments, particularly in funding areas such as transportation and health care. In essence, the federal government demands that state and local governments follow costly rules and procedures or risk losing a portion or all of the federal dollars.

“As part of the on-going efforts to return powers and flexibilities back to the states though our (legislative) Federalism Committee, I am seeking additional information to identify the areas which would lift the burden of federal government regulations and mandates so the committee can craft reforms which will bring efficiency to our state government and liberty our citizens,” Craig wrote in the letter to state Sen. Robert Cowles, R-Green Bay, and Rep. Samantha Kerkman, R-Salem, co-chairs of the Joint Audit Committee.

Senator Marklein Introduces Rural Broadband Bill to Increase Funding and Expand Access

Posted on February 15, 2017 by

State Senator Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) introduced LRB -2042/1, a collaborative rural broadband expansion bill today that is a combination of the proposal that was promoted by Governor Scott Walker on December 1, 2016 and recommendations made by the 2016 Study Committee on Rural Broadband, which he chaired in 2016.

“This bill is the product of hundreds of hours of hard work and study by many dedicated people in Wisconsin,” Marklein said. “We took the funding ideas from the Governor and combined them with the Rural Broadband Study Committee’s recommendations to produce legislation that will make an immediate, significant impact on rural broadband in Wisconsin.”

LRB -2042/1 is co-authored by Rep. Romaine Quinn (R-Rice Lake) and is part of the Assembly’s Rural Wisconsin Initiative for the 2017-2018 session. The bill is currently in circulation for co-sponsorship through Friday, February 17, 2017.

“The Study Committee on Rural Broadband developed several recommendations for improving the Rural Broadband Expansion Grant program that is administered by the Public Service Commission,” Marklein said. “This bill insures that these ideas are applied to any new grants from the program.”

“In December, the Governor announced the availability of surpluses in other programs that could be used for broadband,” Marklein said. “Combining these funds with the study committee’s recommendations is good policy and I look forward to moving this bill through the legislative process quickly.”

The bill accomplishes the following:

1. Allocates an additional $15.5 million to the Rural Broadband Expansion Grant Program for additional 2017 grant awards from surplus funds in E-Rate ($5 million) the Universal Service Fund (USF) ($6 million) and the unencumbered balances from other USF-funded appropriations (estimate $4.5 million).

2. Provides the PSC with a requirement that the grants go to the areas of the state with the greatest need. We want to use scarce resources to “fill from the bottom up”.

3. Includes a policy that prevents broadband service providers from “cherry picking” high value customers, while ignoring the needs of residential customers.

4. Directs the PSC, in evaluating grant proposals, to consider the impact of improved broadband on our students at home, and patients at home.

5. Discourages the duplication of existing service. Seeks to supplement the federal CAFII funding in areas not benefiting from the federal money.

6. Adds funding to the Technology for Educational Achievement (TEACH) program and expands the number of rural school districts who are eligible for the program.