2025-2026 Legislative Bulletin | | |
In this edition of the League's Legislative Bulletin, you'll find:
- JFC Action Stalls but Legislature Still Active
- Local Campaign Finance Reporting Transition Delayed
- Recently Introduced Legislation of Municipal Importance
- Join Us for the Final 2025 Regional Roundtable
- Agency Anecdotes on MOE Reporting, a Grant Opportunity, Tourism Spending, and More
| | |
JFC Action Stalls but Legislature Still Active
In last week’s The Wheeler Report Bulletin, Gwyn Guenther reported on the breakdown of negotiations between legislative leadership and the Governor on the 2025-2027 State Budget. At the time, the Joint Finance Committee (JFC), the Legislature’s budget-writing committee, was moving ahead with crafting their budget. In the past week, it was made public that negotiations between legislative leadership and the Governor and his staff resumed but again broke down, this time causing JFC to cancel a planned executive session and temporarily halting the legislature’s budget work.
While the budget process is stalled and a new budget is highly unlikely to be in place for the start of the 2025-2027 fiscal biennium beginning on July 1st, Wisconsin state government will continue at base funding levels from Fiscal Year 2024-2025 until a new budget is in place. In other words, state government does not shut down, distinguishing it from the federal government which does shut down without a budget in place.
Once state budget work resumes, JFC will have several important topics to take up, including transportation funding, the building program (i.e., Capital Budget), childcare, natural resources programs, and more.
Even though the budget-writing process has stalled, the Legislature is still moving ahead with its work on non-budgetary proposals. Both the Senate and Assembly were on the floor last week to take up dozens of bills, with 15 Senate or Assembly Bills now agreed upon by both chambers and enrolled for action by the Governor. Among these is Assembly Bill 61, a bill the League supports to increase penalties for harming or killing a police or fire animal while that animal is performing official duties.
The Assembly is set to go back to the floor this Tuesday to take up more bills, including two the League supports. Assembly Bill 187 would provide awards of $500 to new volunteer firefighters upon completion of their initial training with half provided by the state and half provided locally. Assembly Bill 279 would create a Talent Recruitment Grant Program for local governments to provide incentives for out-of-state households to move to their municipalities. Both bills will have to be concurred in by the Senate before they may proceed to the Governor.
| | |
Local Campaign Finance Reporting Transition Delayed
2023 Wisconsin Act 126 set an effective date of July 1, 2025 to move all local election campaign finance reporting, including candidates and committees, from local clerks to the Wisconsin Ethics Commission’s Campaign Finance Information System (CFIS). While the effort received bipartisan support, after passage, the Ethics Commission determined it did not have the funding, staff, or technological capacity to absorb the roughly 10,000 new registrants this transition would require.
2025 Wisconsin Act 7, signed into law on June 9th, delays the transition of local election campaign finance reporting until December 1, 2027. This means that all local candidates and committees should continue submitting campaign finance reports to their municipal clerk until the 2027 date. While this delay continues the workload for local clerks, the alternative was a rushed transition that could have created new problems for local candidates looking to comply with statutory campaign finance reporting requirements.
The other elements of Act 126, which includes certain protections for local election officials including the creation of a felony crime of battery to elections officials, will still go into effect on July 1st.
| | |
League Contact on the Sunlight Report
On Thursday, June 19th, the League sent an alert to municipal leaders regarding a records request submitted to some cities and villages from an organization called the Sunlight Report. Reports have been received that a possible cyberattack virus may be contained in an attachment to this request. For more information on how to proceed, review an email you should have received from the League on June 19th. If you cannot locate this email, please contact the League’s Government Affairs Team at the email addresses below.
| | |
Recently Introduced Legislation of Municipal Importance
The following bills were recently introduced in the Wisconsin State Legislature and have been added to the list of those being monitored by the League. Unless otherwise indicated, no formal position has been taken on these proposals to date.
-
Senate Bill (SB) 337: Grant Writing and Compliance Assistance - Sen. Marklein (R-Spring Green) and Reps. Kurtz (R-Wonewoc) and Swearingen (R-Rhinelander) - This legislation allows local units of government with populations under 7,500 to receive grants of up to $5,000 to obtain grant writing and compliance assistance services. The program would be available from 2026 to 2029. The League worked with the authors on this proposal and has registered in favor of this legislation.
-
SB 333: Increasing and Indexing Local Court Fees - Sen. Wanggaard (R-Racine) and Reps. Allen (R-Waukesha), O’Connor (R-Fond du Lac), Donovan (R-Greenfield), and Mursau (R-Crivitz) - This legislation increases fees and surcharges collected by courts, including municipal courts. Further, this legislation indexes all fees to inflation every five years beginning in 2030.
-
SB 331: ATV, UTV, and Snowmobile Law Changes - Sen. Marklein (R-Spring Green) and Rep. Mursau (R-Crivitz) - This legislation makes various updates to the laws surrounding ATVs, UTVs, and snowmobiles, including removing the maximum bridge length for routes, allowing crossings or short routes on state highways, and allowing ATVs, UTVs, and snowmobiles to qualify as emergency vehicles.
-
SB 316: Reauthorization of the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program - Sen. Testin (R-Stevens Point) and Rep. Kurtz (R-Wonewoc) - The Stewardship Program is authorized through June 30, 2026. Without action, the program will end. This legislation extends that authorization for four more years. Exact funding levels would be determined in separate action whereas this legislation makes several statutory changes to the program. The League has registered in-favor of this legislation.
| | ⭐If you would like to contact your legislators on any bills mentioned in the Legislative Bulletin, you can find contact information for all legislators here. To find out which legislators represent your community, use the "Find Your Legislator" function on the right side of the page. | | Join Us for the Final 2025 Regional Roundtable | | | | The last of six 2025 Regional Roundtables is this Wednesday, June 25th. Join League staff and your fellow local officials in Neenah for League updates including a legislative update, dinner, networking, and a member roundtable from 5pm to 7pm. Additionally, all local officials, but especially new elected officials are welcome to attend the Local Government Basics program held from 2pm to 5pm. Additional details and a link to register may be found on the League’s website. We hope to see you there! | | |
Agency Anecdotes
MOE Reporting Deadline in Eight Days!
Congratulations to the more than 430 cities and villages that have already filed their 2025 Maintenance of Effort (MOE) reports to the state Department of Revenue as of last Wednesday. Great work getting those reports submitted early! To the cities and villages yet to file your municipality’s MOE report, please submit the report by the July 1st deadline to avoid the penalty of a 15% reduction in shared revenue payments. For resources to assist with filing this crucial report, visit the May 28th and June 9th editions of the Legislative Bulletin.
Rural Energy Startup Grant Program
The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin’s (PSC) Office of Energy Innovation has announced the second round of their Rural Energy Startup Program. With more than $1 million available to help rural local governments, this grant program will support the initial steps of reducing energy use and fossil fuel emissions and improving energy efficiency. Awards of up to $75,000 are available for comprehensive energy and renewable resource planning and up to $125,000 for energy efficiency audits and building upgrades or retrofits with no match required.
In round one, twelve cities and villages received awards totaling $691,330. For round two, applications are due by 1:30pm on Wednesday, July 16th. To determine if your municipality is eligible, to learn more about eligible projects, and to apply, visit the PSC’s website.
Record Year for Tourism in Wisconsin
Governor Tony Evers and Wisconsin Department of Tourism Secretary Anne Sayers announced that 2024 was a third-straight record year for tourism in Wisconsin. In 2024, tourism spending totaled $25.8 billion, or roughly $70 million per day, whereas tourism spending in 2023 was calculated at $25.0 billion. This spending was generated by 114.4 million visitors in 2024, an increase from 113.2 million visitors in 2019. Learn more about this exciting announcement on the Department of Tourism’s website.
PSC Webinar on Lead Service Line Replacement
In case you missed it in last week’s The Wheeler Report Bulletin, this Tuesday, June 24th, the PSC will host a webinar from 1:00pm to 2:30pm titled Using Customer Rates for Customer-Side Lead Service Line Removal - a PSC Perspective. This webinar will discuss a PSC program, initiated by 2017 Wisconsin Act 137, to assist in the replacement of lead service lines and recommended accounting treatments under this program and work funded by the Safe Drinking Water Loan Program. Register for this webinar here.
| | | | |
