MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A Republican state senator has stepped back from his plans to curtail local sand mine regulations, introducing a bill Wednesday that would shield existing mines from new restrictions but allow municipalities to impose regulations on new operations.
Tom Tiffany of Hazelhurst introduced a bill in October that would have gone much further. That proposal would have barred local governments from imposing mine regulations under their authority to regulate health, safety and welfare as well as prohibited them from adopting their own water and air quality standards, blasting ordinances and collecting fees to cover road damage before it occurs.
Tiffany contended then that the bill would eliminate an emerging patchwork of overzealous local ordinances that were cramping the state’s booming sand mine industry. But the measure ran into criticism; opponents ripped the proposal as a blatant attack on local control and warned the changes could create health hazards.
Under the new bill, existing sand mines wouldn’t be subject to new zoning ordinances that are more restrictive than what they currently operate under. The provision is designed to codify in state law court findings that local governments can’t zone a business out of existence, Tiffany said.
The bill also would protect sand mines from any other new local ordinance or license requirement if they’re operating within the year preceding the ordinance or requirement is adopted. The bill doesn’t include bans on local environmental standards, blasting ordinances and road fee collections laid out in the first bill.
Tiffany said the bill ensured local governments can’t run existing sand mines out of business with unreasonable ordinances. The measure doesn’t go as far as he would like - new mines will still have to deal with what he called a “gauntlet” of local regulations, he said - but he had to scale it back to win support. A statement he released Wednesday quoted the leaders of both the state towns association, which had registered against the original bill, and the counties association saying they don’t oppose the new measure.
“This is the legislative process,” Tiffany said. “Not what we wanted to accomplish at the start, but no less important.”
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MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Gov. Scott Walker promised on Wednesday that property taxes won’t increase through 2018 if he is re-elected this year, an early campaign pledge that echoes the one he made almost exactly four years ago to create 250,000 jobs in his first term.
Walker didn’t reveal any of the details about how he intends to hold property taxes steady during a speech before the Wisconsin Realtors Association. Afterward, in response to questions from reporters, Walker said there would be a mixture of local spending controls and an increase in state money but the ultimate proposal would be worked out with input from the Legislature and others.
“We want to send a powerful message here that it is our goal that property taxes continue to go down,” Walker said. “We’ll be working this year into early next year on the specifics.”
The announcement was the first significant campaign pledge Walker has unveiled so far. And it comes before he’s officially launched his re-election effort, something Walker has said he will do in the spring.
But the promise also comes after a week in which Walker has been dogged by questions about a criminal investigation into illegal campaign activity by former aides in his Milwaukee County executive office. The release last week of 28,000 emails in that case spawned a new level of interest in the investigation, which closed last year with no charges against Walker.
The property tax promise also hearkened back to the campaign pledge Walker made four years and three days earlier - on Feb. 23, 2010 - in which he said if elected the state would add 250,000 private sector jobs by the end of this year. Most recent estimates show the state will only get about halfway there.
The timing of the announcement wasn’t lost on the campaign of Mary Burke, the Democrat who is challenging Walker.
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MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A judge sentenced a Madison man Wednesday to three years in prison for sexually assaulting his younger stepsister while she spent years locked in the family’s basement being abused and starved, bringing an end to a case that shocked Wisconsin’s capital city.
Dane County Circuit Judge Julie Genovese also gave the 20-year-old man an additional two years for sexually assaulting his then-15-year-old girlfriend in 2011. The sentences will run consecutively.
The sentences come about eight months after Genovese sentenced him to 15 months in prison for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girlfriend in 2011. He got credit for time served in jail in his stepsister’s case and didn’t have to spend any time in prison, though.
Assistant District Attorney Matthew Moeser asked the judge to give the man a combined 30 years in prison in the two pending cases, describing him as a conniving sexual predator.
“He has a pattern of sexual offenses that are unrivaled at his age,” Moeser said. “He is a dangerous person who seems to have no ability to stop lying, stop manipulating.”
The man’s attorney, Ronald Benavides, pleaded for leniency. He contended the offenses took place when his client was a teenager, he had been in a relationship with his former girlfriend for seven months, everyone lies and the man grew up in a home with “socially bizarre norms.”
The man gave a rambling 40-minute speech to the judge, pleading with her for another chance. He said he’ll be punished for the rest of his life because he’ll have to register as a sex offender and won’t be able to have contact with minors.
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MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A new analysis finds that Republicans in control of the Wisconsin Legislature raised nearly three times more money for their campaigns last year than did Democrats.
The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign reported Wednesday that Senate and Assembly Republican campaigns raised $3.09 million in 2013. That compares with $1.05 million collected by Democrats.
Republicans have an 18-15 majority in the Senate and a 60-39 majority in the Assembly. All 99 Assembly seats and 17 in the Senate are up for election in November.
Donors and political committees can contribute up to $500 every two years to Assembly candidates and a maximum $1,000 every four years to Senate candidates.
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