Gov. Scott McCallum's proposed state budget has been called many things in the past few weeks, most of which are unflattering. What it has not been called is an investment in Wisconsin's future. McCallum's budget may be unfair to cities and counties throughout the state, but it does protect the future of Wisconsin's students.
That McCallum has received flak from nearly every elected, appointed and hired official in the state is not surprising. The UW System must cut $50.5 million from its budget. Cities and counties across the state are already preparing to declare bankruptcy. Even the Department of Corrections is smarting from a 6 percent cut in funding.
In fact, there is really only one group that should not be complaining'students. If anything, McCallum has stood behind his commitment to higher and lower education throughout the state by refusing to cut money from Wisconsin's public school system and limiting cuts to the UW System to a paltry 4.5 percent.
In fact, one of the most prominent spending increases within the budget is a commitment of more than $2 million for college financial aid. The new financial aid will help low-income students afford the 9.1 percent increase in tuition that the UW System Board of Regents is expected to put in place.
UW-Madison will only suffer a $20 million cut in its billion-dollar budget, which is a blessing in disguise, considering the more than $1 billion budget deficit facing the state. Chancellor John Wiley has indicated that the cuts will result in perhaps a one-or two-year delay in the Madison Initiative and perhaps cuts in some other parts of UW-Madison administration.
Compared to Beloit, which will lose 52 percent of its operating budget if the state's shared revenue system is cut, UW-Madison has made out like a bandit. If Wiley is smart, he should be personally thanking McCallum for the biggest gift a Republican governor has ever given the university.
The result of this generosity toward education and UW-Madison is that the rest of the state suffers. There is no getting around the fact that local governments will have to do some major refinancing to make up for the loss of state revenue.
However, this restructuring may not be a bad thing for the future of state governance in Wisconsin. Cities and counties in most states do not enjoy the same revenue-sharing system established by the state of Wisconsin. Although the system has traditionally been considered a success, with the addition of a commitment to pay part of the cost of education throughout the state, one of the programs has to give.
The cutting of city services and the inevitable rise in property taxes that will occur in cities like Beloit in order to make up for the loss of state aid would not necessarily have to come at the expense of the poorest. As it stands, residential homeowners pay almost 60 percent of the statewide property tax levy. Commercial and manufacturing property owners pay considerably less, and the percentage has actually gone down during the 1990s.
Because of a large brewery lobby in the state Legislature, excise taxes on items like hard liquor and beer are considerably lower than in other states. Counties and cities like Beloit could consider raising sales taxes, which are quite low throughout the state, particularly on items like alcohol.
The fact is, despite the purported doom that local governments profess to face, McCallum's budget is simply speeding reforms that needed to be enacted anyway. Thankfully for Wisconsin's students, the cuts will not come from the state's most prized asset'its schools.
The days of large projected budget surpluses are over, but the mentality of prosperity lingers. McCallum is preparing Wisconsin for a prolonged recession by cutting funding, yet he is also protecting Wisconsin's economic competitiveness into the future by keeping those cuts away from education.
