Maybe the Brewers Won’t Get Their Handout

When Gov. Tony Evers included $290 million for the Milwaukee Brewers’ stadium renovations in his proposed state budget in February I figured the chances of the team getting the taxpayers’ money were about 100%. Now, to channel Bob Uecker when he makes his attendance predictions, I’d say it’s in that, oh I don’t know, maybe 60% to 65% range.

I still think they’ll get the money, but it’s gone from a sure thing to maybe two-to-one odds.

I was so sure of myself earlier this year because I thought that both parties’ movers and shakers wanted it. I was right about the Republicans. As predicted, the Milwaukee business community is all over this. Tim Sheehy heads up both the Milwaukee Metropolitan Association of Commerce and the Southeast Wisconsin Professional Baseball Park District. Last week he said that the city and county should pony up some of their sales tax money for the project.

A local share from Milwaukee is what Speaker Robin Vos wanted when he nixed Evers’ proposal for almost $300 million out of what was then a $7 billion state surplus.

But, as Bruce Murphy reports in Urban Milwaukee, Vos may have thought this was going to be easier than it is turning out to be. In two previous iterations of this kind of story, Milwaukee’s Democratic politicians were supportive of providing a local share. That was true in the mid-90’s when the stadium was first built and it was true again when the Fiserv Forum was constructed for the Milwaukee Bucks just a few years ago.

But these are new leaders, the times are different and baseball isn’t as popular as it used to be. The Milwaukee County Board passed a resolution — unanimously — opposing a local subsidy and County Executive David Crowley signed it. Meanwhile, Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson has said there just isn’t any money in city coffers for this and five city council members issued a blistering statement in opposition to any money coming from the city.

And this is the piece I missed back in February. I just assumed that, as in the past, Milwaukee’s Democratic political leaders would be open to a local share. In fact, I thought Vos would have demanded that as one of the prices they had to pay to get increased sales tax authority from the Legislature. In fact, Vos’ caucus put all kinds of silly restrictions on the new authority, but spending some of it on the stadium wasn’t one of them.

Now Vos has a serious problem. The Milwaukee business community is still very important to his party and Vos himself is from Burlington, which is in that neighborhood. But his caucus is now dominated by hard-right populists from rural Wisconsin. They don’t like Milwaukee and have no interest in providing any state money for anything in the city. And they couldn’t care less about Sheehy, et. al.

Vos could demand votes from Democrats, but with Crowley and Johnson both apparently opposed to a local share and with the Common Council and County Board adamant in their opposition, it’s hard to imagine even Milwaukee’s representatives in the Legislature voting for any plan that requires a local subsidy.

I suppose Vos could round up just enough votes in his caucus to pass a bill that required the city and county to kick in a bunch of money over their objections, but Evers would almost certainly veto that.

All of which is to say I don’t see how Vos gets out of this one, but I suspect he’ll find a way. The fall session will be focussed on how to deploy the remaining $4 billion or so left unspent from the original $7 billion surplus. Maybe something will come of all that back and forth between Republicans who want tax cuts and Evers who wants more money for child care and other programs. Or maybe this can all be punted into the next biennium. The Brewers’ lease runs until 2029, so there’s time for that.

But it would be more than okay with me if nothing comes of it. I love baseball and I love the Brewers, but I would rather see them leave before taxpayers once again pay extortion to billionaire team owners who can easily afford to improve their own physical plants. My disdain for my tax money going to these guys is in that, oh, I don’t know, say, 1000% range.