Thomas Tiffany

Republican candidate Tom Tiffany’s campaign declined WPR's requests for an interview

The next governor of Wisconsin will have plenty of work ahead of them once they are inaugurated at the state capitol in January.

Wisconsin has a multi-billion dollar budget surplus, and voters surveyed by the most recent Marquette University Law School poll said some of the most important issues to them revolve around affordability, healthcare, taxes and data centers.

WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” invited both candidates for governor to sit down for one-on-one interviews about their positions on voters’ top concerns.

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Republican Tom Tiffany’s campaign declined the invitation, citing his busy schedule of events.

Democrat David Crowley joined WPR host Kate Archer Kent last Thursday to share his plans for the state if he’s elected governor.

The following was minimally edited for clarity.

Kate Archer Kent: We’re fielding questions from WPR listeners for candidates for governor, and one question that comes up a lot is about lowering everyday costs like groceries and gas. Wisconsin ended the last fiscal year with over $3 billion in surplus. What would you propose lawmakers do with that money?

David Crowley: Well, the first thing we have to do is actually tackle the affordability crisis. No matter where you go in the state of Wisconsin, each community member lets you know that they can’t afford the groceries, how that has gone up, the diesel and the gas prices, as well as renting or owning a home.

And so, first and foremost, we want to pass the minimum markup law, repealing that particular sales tax as it relates to gas. That’s 40 cents a gallon that each person is paying at the pump, and we want to make sure that we can lower those costs, not just at the pump, but that will help to lower costs also in our grocery stores because of the amount of gas and diesel that they are utilizing.

It’s also about utilizing that surplus to buy down the property taxes. So many communities across Wisconsin have gone through referendum after referendum just to make sure that our schools have enough resources to make sure that our children have what they need to build upon that foundation of learning. Funding our public schools here in the state of Wisconsin would naturally ease the property tax pressures that many of our older adults are feeling while being on a fixed income.

But we also have to tackle healthcare. So many people have seen their premiums double or seen their doctor’s office, their clinics and their hospitals close because a trillion dollars were cut from the Medicaid/Medicare program with the help of Congressman Tom Tiffany.

So we need to make sure that we expand BadgerCare across this state, which will not only help those who are uninsured and underinsured, but this will help everybody who has insurance to help lower their costs and, more importantly, make sure that you can get access to care whenever and whenever you need it. Also for those who have families or those who want a family, we know that childcare is not just expensive; it’s not accessible. The more we can work with our childcare providers to provide the floor of funding that they need and make sure that we can provide a slot for every working family — that’s going to provide every working adult to enter into the workforce or make the best decision for them and their family to get ahead.

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KAK: One thing I didn’t hear on your list was whether you would put any part of the surplus to send tax refunds to residents. Gov. Tony Evers and lawmakers pushed that bipartisan deal earlier this year. Would you try for one again?

DC: When it came down to that deal, if I was the governor, I absolutely would have signed it. But unfortunately, my opponent actually pushed back and convinced many of the Republicans not to vote for that deal. I know what’s important is that we work with our legislative leaders and the legislature in general to make sure that we can come up with a bipartisan deal that works for everyone. I am open to doing whatever we can to make sure that we’re providing relief for the hardworking Wisconsinites that can’t get ahead.

KAK: Your position on data centers has shifted recently. Over the summer, you said Wisconsin should not repeal state data center incentives. More recently, you’ve said you would absolutely sign a repeal. What has changed?

DC: I’ve always been open to reforming the sales tax exemptions that the data centers have been getting. If we were to get a bill that came to my desk, I absolutely would sign it. I believe in those reforms because we have seen not just billionaires but big tech companies who have already received $80 billion in tax breaks from the federal government — a bill that my opponent actually supported and voted for.

People are struggling to put food on the table, struggling to afford their rent or to afford their mortgage, struggling to put gas into their tanks. We need to be providing relief for them, not for the billionaire tech companies who are steamrolling communities with these data centers. We have to make sure that if a community doesn’t want a data center, they shouldn’t be forced to have one. They need to have a seat at the table. On day one, the legislature and I are going to get right to work to make sure that we have those guardrails in place to protect our communities.

KAK: Would those guardrails entail a pause, a statewide moratorium?

DC: I think right now we are effectively in a de facto moratorium. I know that there was recently a lawsuit, and now we’re going to have our Department of Natural Resources conducting an environmental analysis about what these data centers can actually do to our environment, and so I believe that we should continue to have a pause while this process plays out.

KAK: Wisconsin Act 12 allows the city and county of Milwaukee to raise local sales taxes. You called this a landmark bipartisan bill to bring in revenue. It also led to a tax hike. Would you raise taxes as governor?

DC: I am proud of the fact that as Milwaukee County executive, every single year we have been able to lower the tax rate for all of our Milwaukee County taxpayers. We also delivered the largest property tax cut in our county’s history. I’m proud that we were able to work with a Republican-controlled legislature in a bipartisan manner, not just to put Milwaukee County in a much better financial footing, but every municipality.

It wasn’t just about Milwaukee County. Congressman Tom Tiffany fails to recognize that this helped out every city, every town, every village, and every county here in the state of Wisconsin. As a matter of fact, his own hometown, Hazelhurst, received a 380 percent increase in their shared revenue because of the deal that I led on. You think about every small community; they all got a boost in funding. So I’m proud that we were able to get the shared revenue that we needed for for local communities all across Wisconsin.

But let’s just face it: the state of Wisconsin broke its promise. The reason why we needed that deal is because of the leadership of Congressman Tom Tiffany under Gov. Scott Walker, where they created the tax system that we’re in and can’t deliver the services that people rely on. I’m proud of what we’ve been able to do, and I know that as the next governor, we’re going to make sure that we can continue to lower costs and property taxes for Wisconsinites all around.

KAK: Under Wisconsin Act 12, the county sales tax nearly doubled from 0.5 to 0.9 percent. As governor, would you raise taxes?

DC: The reason we did that is because we didn’t receive an increase in the shared revenue because we wanted it to go to local communities. We know that Milwaukee County has visitors that come from all over the country. We had the Republican National Conven