A Budget for Real People

“The most frustrating part for me as governor is that Republicans consistently reject basic, commonsense proposals that can help kids, families, farmers, seniors and Wisconsinites across our state…” Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers

“Unfortunately, [Evers] sends us an executive budget that’s just piles full of stuff that doesn’t make sense and spends recklessly and raises taxes and has way too much policy.” Wisconsin Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam) and co-chair of the Joint Finance Committee.

Are these two contrasting views on the Wisconsin budgeting process another example both sides being unwilling to compromise because of their extreme conservative or liberal ideologies? Or is one of the above statements true and the other false? More importantly, is there a way Wisconsin citizens can assess these differences for themselves to determine what is true and best for Wisconsin?

Last week the Joint Finance Committee, with one motion, voted to cut 612 diverse funding, programmatic, personnel, tax and new policy requests from Evers’ budget proposal (see below for the full list and a link to the budget details).

This article examines a sampling of Gov. Evers’ “common sense” budget proposals that were rejected by the Republican controlled Joint Finance Committee. You can decide for which don’t “make sense,” are “reckless spending” or “too much policy.”

Preventing Violence. Gov. Evers wants to create and staff an “Office of Violence Prevention” to “establish a violence prevention focus” across state and local government to “support the development of community-based violence prevention initiatives” and “public yourself education campaigns to promote safer communities.”

In January of 2025 Evers used an executive order to set up an office within the Department of Administration. He had $10.6 million in federal pandemic recover money. He is now asking for $13.2 million (out of a $119 billion budget) to hire seven people to staff the office. In addition to trying to prevent interpersonal violence, these staff would be tasked with finding “a source of funding beyond state revenues to maintain the Office and expand its activities.”

Apparently attempting to prevent and reduce violence “doesn’t make sense” to Republicans.

Building and Improving Affordable Housing. Gov. Evers asked for $1 million to create “a competitive grant program to award grants to local governments, nongovernmental entities, and school districts for building or improving affordable housing” (note, some school districts build and sell student built small houses).

One assumes this “reckless spending” would be regarded by Republicans as socialism. The private sector is supposed to build housing for a profit. Which is why we don’t have much affordable housing.

Juvenile Justice Reform. Gov. Evers wants to create a “Juvenile Justice Reform Review Committee” to study and make recommendations (prior to September 15, 2026) on a wide variety of issues related to the current system. There is no money requested for this committee. A budget request to implement the recommendations must be made in the 2027-29 biennial budget.

Given that juvenile justice systems are broken all over the country and desperately in need of reform, what is the problem with studying our system?

Funding Elections. The “Grants to Local Governments for Election Costs” budget request would provide $900,000 in 2025-26 and $500,000 in 2026-27 for grants to municipalities for election administration expenses. Administered by the Wisconsin Elections Commission, the grants would be for the “purchase of election supplies and equipment” and for “grants to municipalities for election administration expenses.”

Using state money for public elections run by local towns and counties obviously “doesn’t make sense.” Perhaps this “reckless spending” should be replaced with local bake sales?

EMS Grants. This budget item provides $25,000,000 annually to fund grants to municipal emergency medical service providers. It also creates a continuing appropriation in the Division of Public Health for this purpose.

Nothing could be more “reckless” than supporting local ambulance services.

Automatic Voter Registration. This proposal authorizes $988,000 over the biennium to implement the electronic transfer of drivers license and identification card information to the Elections Commission for voter registration purposes. This would include proof of citizenship. Applicants can opt out and not be registered to vote. These transfers would occur regularly to maintain an accurate statewide list of eligible voters.

This very sensible idea would eliminate all the political angst over voting by immigrants and ineligible voters.

Lead Service Line Replacement Funding. This proposal provides $200 million for a continuing “safe drinking water loan program.” It provides for “forgivable loans (grants) for replacing private lead service lines connected to public water systems.”

Since 2016, federal law authorized use of federal grants for this purpose. Since then Wisconsin has spent $197 million for private lead service line replacements. All funds came from federal grants. Currently, the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act provides annual grants through 2026-27. Wisconsin is expected to receive $83,278,000 each year under this program.

Lead in water lines can leach into drinking water. Lead is known to reduce cognitive ability in children and produce other health problems.

County Well Testing Grant Program. This budget item spends $4 million to create a continuing appropriation from the PFAS (forever chemicals) clean up funding to award grants to counties to provide sampling and testing services to private well owners. This would include testing for PFAS, nitrates, bacteria and lead contamination in private wells.

Apparently, Republicans believe “what you don’t know doesn’t hurt you.”

Exemptions From Sales Taxes. Republicans are constantly wanting to cut taxes. Gov. Evers’ budget proposed a number of changes to the sales tax that would help women and working families. Specifically Evers’ budget exempted purchases of over-the-counter drugs, diapers, feminine hygiene products, breastfeeding equipment, and gun safety equipment (gun safes, trigger locks, and gun barrel locks but not locking gun cabinets), It is estimated these exemptions would save consumer $108.6 over two years.

I think it is pretty obvious that Gov. Evers’ budget does many good things for most working people. Do you agree?

You can access the many other things summarily cut from the budget using these two documents: 1) The Joint Finance Committee motion to cut the 612 items (click on “Motion 4” at https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/misc/lfb/jfcmotions/202 5), and 2) The Legislative Audit Bureau’s

“Summary of Governor’s Budget Recommendations PDF 2025-27.” The first document contains page and item numbers for the second document’s description of each budget request.