Majority Leader Tyler August, R-Lake Geneva, says Assembly Republicans will likely release their version of a Brewers stadium maintenance funding bill “in the next week or so.”
“There’s a lot of people talking about it, to be honest with you,” August said on WISN’s “UpFront,” produced in partnership with WisPolitics.com. “The speaker will come out with what we believe is a good plan for us, and the negotiations will continue once we have a bill to negotiate on, but there’s been members of both parties and a lot of meetings from both houses talking about this.”
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August said the Assembly GOP plan will forgo Gov. Tony Evers’ proposal to use $290 million from the state surplus and instead rely on revenue from the tax collected on player’s salaries, sales tax revenue from the games itself like concessions and a local buy-in requirement.
“We haven’t spoken to the governor yet,” August said. “We’re trying to make sure we’ve gotten some buy-in from both political parties and again our local partners here in the city and county.”
Meanwhile, the GOP-run Assembly is expected to vote on its income tax plan on Tuesday and a package of childcare bills on Thursday.
Evers said last week he will veto the income tax plan, in part over concerns the state could lose $2.5 billion in federal pandemic relief dollars. August said he didn’t anticipate making any changes to the GOP bill before Tuesday’s vote.
“I know he’s got Joe Biden’s phone number,” August said. “He could have a conversation with him about how these tax cuts are really important to the working people of this state, and they could have that conversation. Because he chooses not to is unfortunate, but we’re still going to move forward with our plan.”
On the possibility of impeaching Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz if she doesn’t recuse herself from lawsuits involving the state’s legislative maps, August said he hasn’t polled the GOP caucus yet to see if the votes are there.
“We haven’t even had those conversations yet, and I think it’s because both myself and the Speaker and the members of our caucus, we believe she’s going to recuse herself because it’s the reasonable and right thing to do,” August said.
Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer, D-Racine, says Dems will do whatever it takes in an attempt to block impeachment proceedings if the GOP were to move forward.
“The people of Wisconsin elected Justice Protasiewicz because they share her values and they believe she will judge the merits of each case on the merits,” Neubauer said. “Justice Protasiewicz has not weighed in on this case. She has said when looking at those maps she thinks they are not fair, and that is what the people of Wisconsin believe as well.”
Neubauer also said it’ll be unlikely to see Dem support for the GOP income tax cut proposal and childcare bills, and Dem lawmakers will continue to push to fully fund the Child Care Counts program.
“This tax cut proposal from Republicans is once again too broad,” Neubauer said. “It goes up to an income level of people who are not struggling in Wisconsin.”
A new poll by Public Policy Polling shows 56 percent of Milwaukee County residents oppose using tax dollars to pay for improvements for the Milwaukee Brewers at American Family Field.
The poll was commissioned by the nonprofit Milwaukee Works.
When asked if residents would be more likely to support paying for improvements if it meant the Brewers would leave Milwaukee, 26 percent said they would be more supportive, 48 percent were not more likely to support the plan and 26 percent were unsure.
“In 2023 it’s very hard to get a consensus on any policy issue,” said Dan Adams, the director of Milwaukee Works and a local defense attorney. “Everything usually breaks down GOP versus Dems, and this poll shows there is a consensus on the issue of a stadium subsidy, and the taxpayers are saying loud and clear we don’t want to pay for this.”
The poll, though, did find Milwaukee County residents would be more likely to support a subsidy if the tax money came statewide as opposed to just Milwaukee County, with 59 percent saying they would be more likely to support a plan; 29 percent said it wouldn’t make a difference.
“The voters are saying we don’t want any subsidy, but if we are going to do a subsidy, it should come from the state coffers, not from Milwaukee County only,” Adams said.
See more from the show:
https://www.wisn.com/upfront
