Whitewater: Council ‘urges’ state lawmakers to review financial systems

By Kim McDarison 

The Whitewater Common Council Tuesday unanimously approved a resolution urging state lawmakers, including the Wisconsin State Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers, to review the state’s system of funding for critical local services. 

Language within the resolution called the state’s funding system “broken.” 

Whitewater joins with other cities that have passed resolutions making similar requests of the state’s governing entities. 

Late last year, the Fort Atkinson City Council approved a resolution in which it described the current statewide funding system as “broken” and called for its repair.

A link to the story about the resolution approved by the Fort Atkinson City Council is here: https://fortatkinsononline.com/fort-council-approves-resolution-urging-state-lawmakers-to-review-financial-system/. 

During Tuesday’s Whitewater Common Council meeting, City Manager John Weidl said the city’s officials had been asked “by numerous outlets,” including the League of Wisconsin Municipalities, to consider approval of the resolution. 

Said Weidl: “I don’t have any hard details because the Legislature is not talking about them, however there is a caucus that is currently meeting with members of both sides of the aisle to make considerations to changing how much money is allocated to local governments annually. 

“Said a different way, they are strongly considering changing the amount of money, upward, that all communities in Wisconsin get in, I believe it’s going to be general aids, because there’s not another way to cut it. I’ve met with our local representative, Ellen Schutt … to discuss this. Her opinion is the same as mine in that she has also been informed that there is a caucus working on this, but we have been asked — we are trying to get as many municipalities — to urge them to fix this issue as possible. I don’ think it’s a far-fetching statement for us to say we could use more resources from the state to help sure up some of our budgetary issues.”  

“It’s the best thing I’ve seen come out of the league in a long time,” Councilman Jim Allen said.  

Councilwoman Carol McCormack asked: “This is in regard to that huge budget surplus we had in the spring?” 

Weidl replied that is was, adding: “And there’s a bipartisan group committed to figuring out how to allocate some of that. I don’t want to get involved or try and impress our opinion on them. If they’re interested in increasing the dollars going to local governments, my inclination is to get this in front of the city council and ask them to consider supporting it.” 

Information within the resolution states that the system to fund local services like police, fire protection, EMS, streets and libraries is “broken, unsustainable, and needs to be reformed.” 

Communities “are forced to rely on property taxes and flat or declining state aid to pay for critical local services …” the resolution notes. 

As stated in the resolution, “state sales and income tax revenues have tripled in the last 30 years,  but the share of those taxes going to support police, fire, EMS, and other local services has gone down.” 

According to the resolution: “Over the last 20 years, state aid for police, fire and other critical services has steadily declined in real dollars, while inflation has caused average prices to increase by 51%. The funding level for county and municipal aid in 2003 was $938,529,507. Today, it is $753,032,613.

Additionally, the resolution stated: “County and municipal aid payments to the city of Whitewater (have) dropped from $4,316,975 in 2003 to $3,297,178 in 2022.” 

The resolution concluded by noting that the city of Whitewater “urges the Legislature and the governor to work collaboratively with the League of Wisconsin Municipalities, Wisconsin Counties Association, Wisconsin Towns Association, other local government leaders, and business leaders to create a better way of funding local governments that includes revenue options other than property taxes to continue delivering police, fire, EMS, and other critical services.”