State Budget Hearing Gets Under Way After Opponents Make Their Point

The public's input on Gov. Scott Walker's proposed biennial budget continued Monday as the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee came to Milwaukee for an eight-hour listening session at State Fair Park.

The hearing was scheduled from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., but opponents of the budget, upset that the session is being held during working hours, were doing their best to extend the time frame from dawn to dusk.

Scheduling their own press conference for 7 a.m. outside the Expo Center, where the hearing is taking place, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin AFL-CIO and other groups sought to get a jump on the powerful finance committee.

It did not take long for tempers to flare, as 7 a.m. came and went with many of the scheduled speakers unable to reach the Expo Center on time.

"To get into State Fair Park this morning was like being an alien trying to get into a Third World country," said the Rev. Willie Driscoll of MICAH. "They didn't open the gates until 7, and then they sent me to a parking lot more than a quarter of a mile away from here.

"I was supposed to be here at 6:30 for a briefing, but I was turned away from two gates before I was finally sent to a parking lot that's just about as far away as they could find."

A small crowd of 40 to 50 people who arrived early both for the press conference and to sign up to speak at the hearing were left standing in a raw wind when they learned that State Fair security would not open the Expo Center until 9 a.m.

Another sore point was a set of posted rules that ban cell phones and cameras, as well as strollers, from the hearing, and also state that no exit and re-entry will be allowed.

"How can that be?" said Robert Liners of Wisdom, a state faith-based organization that includes MICAH. "Does that mean someone who signs up at 9:30 and is scheduled to speak at 3:30 can't leave and come back?

"We hope that they aren't planning to enforce that – that it's just being posted in case there is some sort of trouble and they decide they need to enforce it."

As to the budget itself, Driscoll was outspoken.

The budget, which makes deep cuts in state funding for public education, public transportation and public health care, "is not a necessity, it's a choice," Driscoll said. "This is clearly and without a doubt an effort to destabilize the unions.

"This takes us back to the '40s and '50s when citizens' rights that were so hard fought for are being taken away."

Among the groups heavily represented and waiting for the hearing to begin was the American Association of Retired People.

Judith Joslin-Cary wore her AARP jacket and came out in the cold to make her feelings known about Senior Care, the program she and her husband enrolled in.

"I'm hoping that they're not going to do away with Senior Care," she said. "We chose this as the lesser of all the evils.

"If they do away with Senior Care, our expenses are going to triple or more. And it makes no sense, because it's a program that's successful, that's paying for itself. Other states have been looking toward Wisconsin and Senior Care as a model.

"Why do away with something that works?"

Before the hearing commenced, the chairmen of the Joint Finance Committee defended the hearing process and said they welcomed the input of the public and would listen.

"We need to balance the budget," said Assembly chair Rep. Robin Vos (R-Burlington), "but we're willing to listen and to talk about how to do this. If you don't like the program cuts that are proposed, show me where you would cut.

"Remember, this is the governor's budget, not (the committee's)," Vos said. He said that Sen. Alberta Darling (R-River Hills), the Senate chairman, "has concerns about cuts in health care for seniors, and I am not in favor of the cuts to recycling.

"This process is not over with these hearings. We will listen today, we've been listening, and we will continue to listen even as we begin the debate on this budget."

As the hearing began, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett led off with pointed comments about the governor's plan to increase spending on state and interstate highways while cutting funding to municipalities that will affect their ability to maintain local roads.

"To say that one group of roads deserves an increase while another group deserves a decrease is unfaired and imbalanced," Barrett said. "Our goal shouldn't be to see that it's easier for people from Illinois to get to Green Bay. Our goal should be to see that our citizens can get to work."

Barrett also spoke in support of the state subsidy that backs up recycling programs.

It was sometimes difficult to hear or understand speakers in the booming Expo Hall.

The opening of newly elected County Executive Chris Abele's talk was lost, but as the sound was adjusted, he came through saying, "This budget hammers Milwaukee County."

Abele went on to describe Milwaukee County as the economic engine of Wisconsin and said that the proposed budget would not promote job growth but stymie it.

The hearing will continue all day, with dozens lined up to speak.