Gov. Scott Walker reintroduced fiscal portions of the budget repair bill Wednesday, after removing them to bypass the Senate's quorum requirement, in a move he said would refinance the state's debt to save $165 million and balance the 2010-'11 budget.
The bill increases funding for Medicaid by $176 million and for the Department of Corrections by $22 million to address budget shortfalls. It also reallocates $37 million of excess Temporary Assistance to Needy Families funds to the Earned Income Tax Credit.
""This legislation will allow the state to finish this year's budget in the black without raising taxes on the middle class,"" Walker said in a statement. ""The balanced budget legislation also allows us to put an additional $176.5 million into health care for the poor.""
State Sen. Mark Miller, D-Monona, and State Rep. Peter Barca, D-Kenosha, released statements in support of the bill, saying the protests at the Capitol and Democratic senators fleeing the state never would have happened had this been the original budget repair bill.
""This is the budget adjustment bill the Legislature should have been considering all along,"" Barca said. ""It addresses shortfalls in important programs without pushing an extreme policy agenda.
""It is strikingly similar to the amendment Assembly Democrats proposed during the floor debate—dealing with the state's fiscal matters without controversial provisions on workers' rights and other policy changes that brought hundreds of thousands of citizens to the Capitol.""
Rep. Robin Vos, R-Burlington, also released a statement supporting the bill, but said he wished it had been passed with the original budget repair bill.
