All got some, but some got more: Who got the biggest boost in shared revenue deal?

 

SOMERS, Wis. (CBS 58) -- Under an agreement that overhauls how Wisconsin funds its local governments, every community and county will get a bump in state aid. However, some local leaders feel they got a raw deal compared to smaller towns and villages, which tended to see substantial increases.

For those small communities, such as Somers in northern Kenosha County, the boost in annual state distributions -- known as shared revenue -- will have an immense impact. 

Somers Village President George Stoner said the 203% increase in shared revenue the village is receiving will be enough to help create an assistant fire chief position and ensure Somers can keep contracting four sheriff's deputies to patrol the village.

"The growing of these communities is putting a lot of strain on public safety," Stoner said.

Stoner said public safety costs are projected to rise as the village expands toward and beyond Interstate 94. He added the boost in state aid also keeps Somers from having to hold a vote on raising property taxes.

"This year, possibly," Stoner said. "Had we not gotten this increase, we would possibly have had to gone to referendum and asked for the vote to raise our levy limit."

Under the bipartisan shared revenue deal Gov. Tony Evers signed last month, the Village of Somers is going from $107,474 in annual state aid payments to $325,776 per year. 

Salem Lakes Village President Rita Bucur said in an email the 207% increase the village is getting, boosting state aid to $526,518, could help pay for significant public works and public safety upgrades, like sidewalks, roads and stormwater drainage systems, as well as new first responder training equipment.

Under the shared revenue deal, the Village of Somers will see a lot more green.

Stoner said the village also provides services to the Town of Somers, so it'll also benefit from the township seeing a 319% increase from $14,569 to $61,036 per year.

A 15-minute drive to the southeast, Kenosha Mayor John Antaramian is not nearly as pleased with the final shared revenue agreement.

"It doesn't work for anyone, to be honest with you," Antaramian said. "The problem is the legislature needs to make a decision to let communities go."

Antaramian said he wanted the legislature and Evers to allow all local governments to have access to a municipal sales tax.

Evers proposed letting cities with at least 30,000 people have a local sales tax in his 2021 budget, but he did not have that proposal this year.

Republicans, who've previously opposed expanding municipal sales taxes, allowed Milwaukee to pursue a 2% city sales tax as part of the shared revenue package.

The Milwaukee Common Council and Milwaukee County Board are expected to vote this month on whether to enact increased local taxes.

Kenosha will receive the minimum increase of 20% more state aid under the shared revenue deal.

Antaramian said having a local sales tax would generate more revenue from people coming in from outside Kenosha while making the city less reliant on property taxes.

He wanted lawmakers to create two shared revenue formulas: one for communities that enact a local sales tax and one for those who don't.

"It makes more sense to use a sales tax, allow local governments all to have a sales tax, those that wish to implement it," Antaramian said. "Those that don't implement, you need to put a little something into formulas to help them."

Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam), a co-chair on the budget-writing Joint Finance Committee, said Republicans didn't like the idea of creating new taxes when the state already had a $7 billion surplus, which conservatives see as a sign the state had been overtaxing the public.

"We just didn't really see a reason to create new, additional taxes on the people of Wisconsin, even if it was just in specific areas," Born said.

"Look at the dollar amounts"

While the percentage increases are substantially bigger for smaller communities, Jerry Deschane, executive director of the League of Wisconsin Municipalities, noted those municipalities were -- and still are -- getting fewer actual dollars.

"Some of those really big percentage increases are, relatively speaking, pretty small dollar amount increases," Deschane said.

Kenosha is getting the minimum increase of 20%, which will take the city from $11.4 million in annual state aid to $13.7 million. 

Antaramian said that will only cover the increase in public safety personnel costs.

"It at least helps me to cover my costs for new contracts that are coming on board with police and fire, that's what that will help," Antaramian said. "Does it solve my problems? No."

Milwaukee is the only city getting less than the minimum with a 10% increase, but it's gaining the right to pursue a city sales tax that would generate an estimated $190 million per year.

The 10% shared revenue bump takes the city from nearly $217.5 million per year to $239.2 million.

By percentage, the biggest increase went to the Town of Cedar Rapids in Rusk County, which went from $532 annually to $31,138, an increase of 5,748%.

Deschane said it's understandable for mid-size communities to feel left out, since they didn't get a big increase, at least proportionally, nor did they get access to a sales tax.

"One of the unfortunate outcomes of that is the Eau Claires, the Janesvilles of the world, that were not treated particularly well under the old formula, didn't see the sort of increases that their population and needs might suggest they should get," he said.

At the same time, Deschane said it would've been impossible to find a deal that satisfied everyone. Republicans made concessions on letting Milwaukee have a sales tax without a public referendum, while Evers had to give a big funding increase to voucher schools in exchange.

"So, it was more for everyone," Deschane said. "There are a fair number of people that, I think, can make good arguments that it was not enough for them."