April 27, 2012
One Billion…and Counting
You may be familiar the
adage, “a million dollars
here and a million dollars
there, and pretty soon it
starts to add up to real
money”. The phrase is often
used to expose the frivolous
spending habits of some
elected officials who pay
little attention to the
amounts being spent and its
impact on taxpayers.
Rarely, if ever, has it been
used to talk about saving
taxpayer dollars – until
now.
Over the last several years,
phrases such at that have
been used often here in
Wisconsin, as past Governors
and Legislatures increased
spending more than taxpayers
could afford and raised
taxes to new heights. But
things have changed. The
days of out-of-control
spending and skyrocketing
taxes are behind us, and
hopefully will be for some
time. A new day has come,
where we now talk about
saving money, eliminating
deficits, and reigning in
wasteful spending.
Recently, the Governor
announced a milestone event
in Wisconsin, as more than
$1 billion in taxpayer
savings has been achieved.
The savings comes from local
governments and school
districts that used the new
budget reform measures
created by the Governor and
Legislature under the state
budget, 2011 Wisconsin Act
10. Those statewide savings
have exceeded reductions in
state aid, and have not only
saved tax dollars, but saved
jobs.
Faced with a $3.6 billion
deficit and a pile of debts
to be paid, the Governor and
Legislature enacted some
ground-breaking reforms, at
the very time when other
states in similar situations
were laying off workers,
increasing taxes, and
cutting core programs and
services. People from around
the state and even other
parts of the country came to
the State Capitol to show
both support and opposition
to the new reforms. When
all that subsided, the
results now show that the
tough decisions made were the
right decisions, and the
budget reforms are working.
Over the last year, news
accounts and reports from
all across the state have
poured in of how local
officials would not only be
able solve their budget
deficits, but perhaps
generate a budget surplus.
Dire predictions of massive
layoffs did not come to
pass, while new and
innovative ways to save even
more money could now be
explored. A million dollars
here and a million dollars
there, and pretty soon, it
added up to real money –
more than $1 billion in
savings, and counting!
In the 11th
Senate District, the numbers
show a $23
million total savings for
local school districts alone. Many
districts virtually
eliminated teacher layoffs
and actually saved money by
utilizing the new budget
reform laws. Only a handful
of layoffs occurred among
those districts, which is
noteworthy, as many
predicted the number of
layoffs would be in the
several hundreds for our
area. Jobs were saved
and homeowners were spared
dramatic property tax
increases; in fact, many
went down for the first time
in twelve years.
One significant cost saving
measure for school districts
has been with health
insurance. Many school
districts have been able to
save significant amounts of
money simply by switching
health insurance carriers,
which many were not able to
do prior to Act 10 taking
effect. The Act also
requires public sector
employees to contribute a
small percentage of their
salary towards their pension
and health care benefits,
something most in the
private sector have been
doing for years.
Unfortunately, some
districts did not fare as
well. The school districts
experiencing the most
difficulty are Milwaukee,
Kenosha, and Janesville,
which did not take advantage
of the budget reforms. Those
three districts account for
less than 13% of Wisconsin
students, but 68% of all
teacher layoffs statewide.
Interestingly, the Milwaukee
school district recently
made a public and formal
request of the Legislature
to adopt legislation to
allow them to use the
reforms in order to avoid
the layoffs and generate
savings.
Even with a reduction in
state aid, funding for
public education remains
high. Total state aid
equates to $5,708 per pupil
in 2011-12 and $5,791 per
pupil in 2012-13. More than
40% of the state’s general
fund expenditures are
directed to support K-12
education, and funding for
public education greatly
exceeds any other
expenditure area in the
entire $66 billion state
budget. We know now
that courses were not
eliminated, class sizes
remain relatively
the same, and teachers will continue to teach.
A billion dollars in savings
is very real money and would
not have been possible
without the actions of the
Governor and Legislature to
put into place a new way of
thinking about how the
peoples’ money in spent. If
you would like to view the
savings in your area, you
may visit the following Web
site at
www.reforms.wi.gov/.
-30-
Sen. Kedzie can be
reached in Madison at P.O.
Box 7882, Madison, WI
53707-7882 or by calling
toll-free 1 (800) 578-1457.
He may be reached in the
district at (262) 742-2025
or on-line at
www.senatorkedzie.com
