Month: June 2019

Republicans on the Joint Finance Committee (JFC) voted to cut taxes by more than $530 million Thursday, finishing their work on the 2019-21 budget and passing the document out of committee. The vote follows more than a month of JFC meetings on Gov. Tony Evers’ budget proposal.

Under the Republican package, the average tax filer will see more than $200 in tax relief in the next two years, with the bulk of the tax relief coming through income tax rate reductions. The second income tax bracket, currently at 5.84 percent, will fall to 4.93 percent in 2020. The bottom-most bracket will fall from 4.0 percent to 3.76 percent in 2020.

Immediately after the budget vote, JFC passed a separate bill authored by Sen. Dale Kooyenga (R-Brookfield) and Rep. Jessie Rodriguez (R-Oak Creek). Assembly Bill 251 (AB 251) sends new revenue from remote sales tax collections (out-of-state online sales) into income tax reductions for the bottom-most rate. The budget motion and AB 251 together bring tax relief over the biennium to more than $530 million.

The Assembly and the Senate are expected to take up the budget in its entirety during the last week in June.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said today cutting taxes for the middle class continues to be a priority for his caucus. But he says that can be accomplished without raising taxes on others.

“Because of our good budgeting and the great economy, we can cut taxes without raising taxes on anyone else,” the Rochester Republican said. “We look forward to working with the Senate to enact a middle class tax cut, and hopefully this time Governor Evers won’t veto this bipartisan goal.”

That followed Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald saying his caucus is looking at a $400 million middle-class tax cut for the budget.

The Juneau Republican told the Wisconsin State Journal that Assembly and Senate Republicans hadn’t agreed on a final number, though he said it would be similar to the tax cut the Legislature approved in January.

Evers was critical of the proposal for using one-time money from a projected surplus to cover an ongoing cost.

Evers’ version of the cut would have saved filers $833.6 million over the biennium. But he wanted to raise taxes, including those on manufacturers, to cover the costs. Republican leaders have balked at that approach.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted on Thursday to allow phone carriers to block suspicious calls by default in an effort to bolster industry efforts to filter out robocalls and scammers.

The proposal would also let phone companies offer their customers the option of blocking any numbers that are not pre-approved, a service that could help protect elderly consumers from scams and telemarketers.

“We expect phone companies will move quickly to use this tool and help consumers block unwanted robocalls,” FCC Chairman Ajit Pai wrote in USA Today. “Among other things, default call-blocking will reduce the costs of handling the robocalls that flood their networks and save them grief by limiting customer complaints.”

The rate of robocalls has steadily increased. According to YouMail’s robocall index, 4.7 billion calls were placed in the U.S. in May, up from about 4.1 billion in June 2018.

The issue has gotten increased attention from lawmakers, many of whom are hearing from angry constituents. Last month, the Senate passed a bill 97-1 that would give regulators the ability to fine scammers up to $10,000 per illegal call.

The FCC said that under the proposed rules companies like Verizon and AT&T would be able to use analytics to determine which calls are “spoofed” — meaning that they use a fake number — and filter them out before they reach the recipient.

Republican state lawmakers on Tuesday moved forward with their own spending plan for Medicaid in Wisconsin after rejecting Gov. Tony Evers’ proposal to expand it.

The GOP-backed plan increases state spending by about $588 million on Medicaid and related health care programs, but spends about $187 million less than the governor called for.

Republicans zeroed out funding for an early intervention program for children with developmental disabilities and a program aimed at curbing tobacco use, among others.

They also decreased spending from Evers’ plan by about $26 million for county mental health crisis intervention services and $39 million for dental care for low-income individuals.

However, Republicans did find some areas of agreement with the governor.

Their plan includes increases larger than those requested by Evers for Medicaid reimbursements for nursing homes and personal care workers.

Committee co-chair Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, said lawmakers heard a lot about the state’s low payment rate for personal care workers, as well as the number of nursing homes closing across the state, at public budget committee hearings earlier this year.

“This is a budget that we really listened to the people,” Darling said to reporters before the vote. “People told us we need to save our nursing homes, we need to invest in our personal care workers.”

The spending plan increases the hourly rate for personal care workers from  $16.73 to $18.24 an hour starting July 1, 2019.

The GOP plan also increases funding for nursing homes by $37 million, bumping reimbursement rates by about 6 percent over the next two years.

“There’s nothing more threatening than thinking that the nursing home where your parents are is thinking about closing, or the fact that you want to keep your parents in the home and can’t get personal care workers there because there’s not enough payment for those,” Darling said. “This is very personal stuff.”

Republicans also voted to approve the governor’s recommendation to fund intake, application and screening costs for children’s long-term care services. That would allow the state to eliminate a waiting list for a program that serves children with disabilities.

Governor Tony Evers says he is keeping an open mind when it comes to how to pay for roads without a gas tax increase. This comes after Republican leaders said they won’t consider his proposal to raise the gas tax by 8 cents a gallon.

The Governor said he’s open to listening to Republicans ideas to help fund transportation infrastructure improvements and repairs but voiced some doubts their proposals might not raise enough money.

“If Republican leadership has ideas on how we can “magically” do that without raising the gas tax will certainly be looking for that, but it has to be a sustainable future around this issue to finding money to fix our damn roads,” said Evers.

Republicans said last week they are looking at raising a variety of other fees for drivers but didn’t specify how much.

Evers didn’t say if he would support or oppose a transportation plan without a gas hike but expressed he won’t make a decision until Republicans sent him a budget.

Wisconsin’s Department of Transportation Secretary-designee Craig Thompson also doubted GOP leaderships idea reject a gas tax increase.

“The gas tax is the fairest and most affordable solution because it applies to everyone using the highway system — including visitors,” said Thompson in a statement to 27 News.

Thompson said he’s looking forward to what Republicans have in mind. The Republican controlled budget-writing committee will put forth their plan to pay for roads Thursday.

Wisconsin is lagging behind neighboring states in attracting highly-educated workers.

In the new study “Wisconsin’s Brain Drain Problem,” the nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum analyzed federal data from 2017 that found over 20 percent of native Wisconsinites ages 31 to 40 who moved away were classified as “highly educated,” meaning they were in the top third of educational attainment.

The percentage of highly educated people born elsewhere who moved into Wisconsin was under 10 percent.

Wisconsin’s gap was the eighth highest in the country and second only to Iowa in the Midwest. Meanwhile, Illinois and Minnesota saw net gains of highly educated workers in the same age group.

Wisconsin Policy Forum senior researcher Joe Peterangelo said the need for more skilled workers is only going to grow.

“Those higher-wage occupations and the ones that require more education are also going to be opening up, and we need to attract some of those people from elsewhere,” he said.

Wisconsin officials have repeatedly pointed toward a workforce shortage that may grow larger over time.

Last summer, the state launched a $6.8 million marketing campaign focused on drawing younger workers from Chicago and other Midwestern cities, but critics have called it ineffective and its future isn’t certain.

State officials have also proposed incentives to convince more Wisconsin students to stay in the state after graduation.

On that count, Peterangelo said, the state is doing better.

“Relative to other states, Wisconsin’s pretty strong at retaining people, but doesn’t attract people into the state that have college degrees, for example,” he said.