Vos-Republicans Exposed: Attack Cities, Kill Businesses and Jobs, Strangle Local Governments limiting Shared Revenue, and Refuse allowing Local Sales Tax!!!

Fairly conservative columnist Tom Still continues to inadvertently criticize the Vos-Republican economic policies for killing jobs and new businesses. From ignoring broadband to defunding the huge economic engine of this state...the University of Wisconsin. 

Republicans Killing Wisconsin Economy and Reason NOT to Live Here #1: Here's what floored me; Republicans decided not fund the UW's Engineering Department. There is no blowback of any kind from capitalist loving conservative voters. Let's start with federal funding:

The federal government is poised to make its biggest investment in research and development since the end of World War II, with 100 billion dollars to improve U.S. competitiveness in a changing world. With one of the nation’s leading research universities, other academic research hubs and a vibrant manufacturing sector, Wisconsin should be positioned to vie for those dollars once approved by Congress and the president.

But absent more state investment in Wisconsin engineering centers at the heart of the federal effort, that might not be the case.

The U.S. Innovation and Competition Act would establish partnerships between universities, government and industry, with 10 interdisciplinary research hubs to transfer science and technology into innovative goods and services while boosting metro, state and regional economies.

Wow, what an opportunity wasted. That's right, the Vos-Republican multi-billion dollar tax cut crossed Wisconsin off the list of jobs and business:

The Wisconsin Legislature’s decision not to fund a two-part plan to build the first new engineering complex on campus since 2002 to replace a research and instructional facility that dates to 1930. The state budget proposal didn’t survive the final cut in the Joint Finance Committee. 

Republicans Killing Wisconsin Economy and Reason NOT to Live Here #2: It's now very clear that TAX CUTS have absolutely replaced everything, including investments in education, infrastructure, people, public health, and businesses. They have sold their souls, short changing share revenue to cities, just to turn rural communities against cities filled with liberals. 

Strangling Shared Revenue, It's Killing our State: Here's the whole story, a must see. Here and Now:

Steve O’Malley is the La Crosse County administrator: "For most of the last two decades, we’ve seen little growth in any form of state or federal revenue. And we have the most restrictive levy limits in the nation." O’Malley says state and federal mandates require them to maintain highways, the jails, the courts and provide human services all without additional revenue. "You end up having to cut budgets. You have to cut positions. We’ve steadily decreased the number of full-time employees within La Crosse County, as have most counties across the state." 

Plus...

Roger Stanford is president at Western Technical College, which covers an 11-county area centered in La Crosse. They too had limited authority to raise property taxes wiped out by Governor Walker. "Right now, those limits are going to really strangle us."

Andrew Reschovsky is a professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin. He studies public affairs and one of his studies found only about half of the school levy credit goes to Wisconsin homeowners. The rest of the credits go to the owners of farmland, commercial property, industrial property and out-of-state owners. Most of the credit goes to wealthy property areas.

Janesville tells the same story, from WKOW's Capitol City Sunday: 

Julie Underwood, former dean of the UW-Madison School of Education and board president for the Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools, explains how dramatic it was to see no money for schools:

I recently posted this out of Milwaukee, Mayor Tom Barrett's plea for more shared revenue and an added half cent sales tax:

This is a problem created by Republicans, who have been indirectly defunding the police through reduced shared revenue, and it's no accident. Marketwatch: 

The state’s revenue had increased 61% over the past two decades, yet Milwaukee would receive $272 million in 2021, less than the $284 million the state shared in 2003, when the city’s general fund was 25% smaller.

As its income dwindles, Milwaukee has lost 160 sworn police officers, or nearly 10% of its force, over the past few years.

That "Defund the Police" outrage just Projection: 

“Without a doubt, the most effective defunder of the police in Wisconsin is the Republican-led legislature,” Mayor Tom Barrett, a Democrat in office since 2004, told MarketWatch. “I’ve been arguing for years to give me more resources. They’re essentially trying to strangle local governments.”

This is a National Republican Strategy, Stopping Progressive Future Change from ever Proving it Works: 

But to Barrett it’s ironic that Wisconsin finished fiscal 2021 with a $2.6 billion surplus, and expects an even larger surplus in 2022, yet legislators can’t find a way to share any of that with locals. And lawmakers don’t seem any more inclined to “review” their restrictive policies than they were before the pandemic. “They have a surplus, and they won’t throw us a bone,” Barrett told MarketWatch. “They’ve won. They strangled us. We don’t have much left.”

Here's more from Marketwatch, exposing how Republicans are purposely making the problem worst:

A 2018 National League of Cities report noted that state legislatures had used pre-emption: “Recent pre-emption has pitted rural- and suburban-dominated state legislatures against cities with large populations of low wage earners and ethnic minorities.” 

Barrett said, “I think it’s a winning (Republican) political philosophy for the rest of the state to be pitted against Milwaukee and Madison.” 

Matt Fabian, a partner with Municipal Market Analytics said, "In general when cities default it’s less about finances and more about what the state does to not help the city navigate a situation.

Napoleon Wallace and Activest, a research firm he co-founded, said “When state legislatures limit the agency and capacity of local government to meet the demands of their residents, the result is generally a broken fiscal environment that harms communities of color and restricts [cities’] ability to operate in the best interest of their residents.”

“In a lot of areas, the role of state pre-emption and the ability to limit taxing at the local level is a very well-constructed apparatus that allows for gerrymandered state legislatures to impose their will on diverse cities,” he said. When states limit cities’ policy-making abilities, “you make it hard for progressive interests even when they have support among residents. You hamper their ability to finance progress.”