The debate over how to best handle the state’s budget deficit continues this week as the Joint Committee on Finance holds public hearings across the state.
The hearings are designed to give local officials and citizens the opportunity to address concerns about the budget. These concerns are supposed to be taken by state lawmakers in order for them to offer alternative solutions to Gov. Scott McCallum’s proposal.
In addition to the committee hearings, Assembly Democrats, led by Rep. Spencer Black, D-Madison, are holding listening sessions across the state. Black said the listening sessions will help Democrats get a better idea about what citizens want from the state’s budget before they suggest amendments to the governor’s plan.
Gov. McCallum has also been touring Wisconsin, explaining his budget proposal at rallies, which have not always been supportive of the budget. At several occasions, McCallum has been booed.
Despite the negative coverage, a spokeswoman for the governor said the meetings have gone well. She said the governor’s rallies have been accomplishing their goal of furthering the debate over the state’s budget deficit.
“I do think the public’s input is very important,” spokeswoman Debbie Monterrey-Millett said. “This is the people’s budget, and these hearings are a good way for people to express what they think.”
When a hearing came to the Neville Public Museum Monday, Brown County Executive Nancy Nusbaum took the opportunity to address the ways her area has already consolidated its systems to compensate for budget shortfalls.
“It is imperative to point out that local officials are not the big spenders as the governor has stated,” Nusbaum said. “Counties have been under a levy cap since 1992. We have had to increase courts and jails as a direct result of the state’s ‘get tough on crime’ policy, so we have considered it a mandate.”
Nusbaum compared the relationship between local governments and the state with that between the Green Bay Packers and the National Football League.
“Without the NFL’s revenue-sharing formula, the Packers would not be able to compete in the NFL,” she told the committee.
Monterrey-Millett said the hearings are an opportunity to discuss and show support for the governor’s plan. McCallum’s rallies have been a good way for the governor to address local officials and their concerns.
“It is the governor’s job to come up with legislation,” Monterrey-Millett said. “If [lawmakers] don’t like it, they need to find a way to change it.”
After the governor’s rally in Appleton, a number of people did not like the governor’s plan or understand his proposed shared-revenue program.
“There were a lot of angry people, and the governor started talking and explaining what he was trying to do,” Monterrey-Millett said. “He started by asking if people wanted their taxes raised and if they were happy with the government.”
Cuts to the state budget will be drastic and everyone will be affected, Monterrey-Millett said, but when people get a chance to hear the governor explain what he is trying to do, they understand and support the budget proposal.
“The budget has to be passed,” she said. “Critical or not, there are not many other ways we can do this.”
