Republican lawmakers are asking Wisconsin voters to approve a constitutional amendmenton Tuesday's primary ballotthat could have major ramifications for a core part of state operations: spending money from the federal government.
Wisconsin is unique in that it gives the governor’s office sweeping powers to decide how money sent to the state from Washington, D.C., can be used.
Not all federal funding is spent without legislative approval, but Gov. Tony Evers’ administration largely determined how billions of dollars in COVID-19 aid was to be handled in Wisconsin, over the objections of Republican legislators.
Now, those lawmakers are asking voters to give them more oversight, restricting the powers of Evers and any other governor moving forward.
Advocates believe this will provide for more accountability when federal money is spent and create a role for the Legislature, which drafts and passes the state budget.
The Wisconsin Democratic Party, voting rights groups and others are asking voters to reject the amendment. They argue the restrictions could slow the process of accepting federal money for disaster relief and other needs and is simply a power grab.
The ballot measure is one of several Wisconsin constitutional amendments voters will decide this year. In April, voters approved an amendment that would ban private funding for voting and limit who can work on elections. In November, voters will be asked whether to clarify that only U.S. citizens can vote in local elections.
On the Aug. 13 ballot, already available via mail, voters are asked to insert a new level of legislative oversight into the spending process at the same time Wisconsin is set to receive hundreds of millions — if not billions — of dollars in federal aid as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act.
“There's a shift of power from the (governor’s) administration to the Legislature,” said Andrew Reschovsky, professor emeritus of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an expert on public finance. “And is that good or bad? It depends on one's politics. But in a very fractured political environment, the consequences could be substantial.”
COVID-19 funding triggers debate
Wisconsin receives billions of dollars in federal aid each year, covering everything from road repair to conservation efforts in the state Department of Natural Resources to funding for the state’s Medicaid program, which provides health insurance for low-income residents and those who are pregnant.
Often, if the money is used for a specific purpose, state agencies are authorized to accept the funds, either in the state budget or by the Legislature passing a separate bill.
Block grants, which are federal funds given to states for a broad purpose with fewer spending restrictions, already require agencies to get legislative sign-off before they can be spent.
The Universities of Wisconsin are allowed to accept federal money on their own and some state agencies, such as the Department of Public Instruction, have more leeway as well in deciding what to do with federal money.
But if there is no specific destination for the federal money or if it's not part of the budget process, the governor could have wide latitude to accept those funds and figure out how they will be used.
The billions of dollars Wisconsin received under the American Rescue Plan Act in 2021 fell under this category, despite the objections of the Legislature.
When Congress passed ARPA, it placed few restrictions on how states could spend the money. Wisconsin wound up getting about $5 billion.
Evers’ administration decided to use most of the money to help local businesses and workers, provide relief to health care systems in the wake of the pandemic and send grants to local governments. Those local funds were used in Dane County for things like a proposed public market or a Black Business Hub in south Madison.
Republicans in the Legislature put forward their own plan for the money and later tried to wrestle control of the entire process from the governor. Evers vetoed both ideas.
GOP officials have also criticized Evers’ choices in where the money was used, as well as transparency surrounding how the spending decisions were made. They point to his administration’s decision not to provide information to the Legislature’s nonpartisan auditing arm for a review of the ARPA spending.
The Department of Administration told auditors that the governor's administration examined economic data and had conversations with advocacy groups but also needed to move quickly to get the money out the door.
Critics fear amendment would slow emergency response
The proposed amendment would do two things to give the Legislature more oversight over federal funding.
First, it would clarify that the Legislature cannot delegate its power to decide how money is spent via passing a budget, duties often referred to as the “power of the purse.” And, more importantly, it would prevent the governor from determining the use of federal money without the Legislature's consent.
Rep. Robert Wittke, R-Racine, who introduced the amendment, said the state has not always given the governor such sweeping powers to accept federal money. The COVID-19 pandemic, he said, showed the flaws in the current system.
“When one person is directing where something is dispersed, there is a larger possibility of picking winners and losers that really adversely affect different areas of our populations,” Wittke said.
Critics of the ballot measure say the amendment could tie up other forms of federal funding in bureaucratic purgatory when governors could act much more swiftly on their own.
Jennifer Giegerich, government affairs director for Wisconsin Conservation Voters, said the amendment would slow federal disaster relief or conservation funding that would go to the Department of Natural Resources.
She also noted the complicated nature of the subject matter, as well as the dense amendment language that will appear before voters on the ballot.
"It's our belief that these amendments were deliberately written to be confusing,"Giegerich said.
The amendment could also implicate the billions of dollars set to flow to the state under two sweeping pieces of federal legislation, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act.
The bulk of that money will go toward fighting climate change, making infrastructure improvements and addressing environmental issues.
Some of those funds have very specific uses, such as paying for electric vehicles charging stations. But other pots of money give states more discretion, such as billions of dollars flowing to Wisconsin to improve broadband internet access. That could give the Legislature a greater role in shaping the debate about those funds, critics worry.
“What problem are we trying to solve?” Giegerich said. “The vast majority of budgeting decisions go through this very robust and transparent state budget process. So it's only in limited circ*mstances where we have the ability of the governor to accept funds. Mostly it's for emergency responses where we want a quick response. What is the problem that we have right now?”
Wittke said the scope of the amendment was intended only to apply to pots of federal money that had the fewest strings attached. He believes the amendment would not apply to disaster relief or things like the broadband money, which is set to be administered by the Public Service Commission.
Vote comes amid standoff between Evers, Legislature
Wisconsin’s Legislature, while considered full time, does not always meet on a daily or even weekly basis. If speed is of the essence, Reschovsky said, the Legislature might not have the resources or bandwidth to move with the same speed that officials in the executive branch could muster.
Evers' administration has argued that part of the reason he needed to handle the ARPA funds is because the Legislature was not often in session during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Having the Legislature, as opposed to the (governor’s) administration, make the decisions is likely to slow down the process substantially,”Reschovsky said. “And in some cases, that doesn't matter. But in other cases it might matter a lot.”
Reschovsky said he could envision fights over which geographical area or program should get the money. But Wittke and Republican legislators have argued that legislators are more accountable to their constituents and that collaboration between branches of government is healthy.
How the amendment would play out in practice remains unclear.
An analysis of the constitutional amendment language by nonpartisan legislative staff noted that legislators could craft rules or pass a measure at the beginning of each legislative session outlining when governors would need legislative approval to spend federal money and when they would not.
Some have speculated this could include specifying that disaster relief, for instance, could be handled unilaterally or that only money over a certain amount would need legislative input.
But the amendment is on the ballot when relations between Evers and the Republican-controlled Legislature have dipped even further. That includes a standoff over spending state money to clean up toxic “forever chemicals” and provide aid to rural hospitals.
Evers has sued the Legislature over that issue, as well as challenging the powers of the Legislature’s budget-writing committee. Top legislative leaders, meanwhile, have taken Evers to court over how he used his line item veto powers in the most recent budget.
It is possible the amendment language will not settle disputes between the two branches of government but instead create new ones.
Wittke acknowledged the risk for legal clashes going forward but said he thinks the amendment could help lawmakers “work something out.”
“Maybe by the way that this is set up in the constitution, if it passes, it would make sure that we are working together to come to a solution rather than ending up in court,” he said.
