Senate Leader Still Needs One Vote To Pass Budget

The Wisconsin Senate is scheduled to start debating the proposed state budget at 9:30 this (Friday) morning. After two and a half months of delays, Senate G-O-P leader Scott Fitzgerald hopes to speed up the process by giving Governor Scott Walker the same version of the two year package that was passed Wednesday night by the Assembly. But four Republicans are holding out for changes that would have to go back to the lower house, where Speaker Robin Vos calls the them a “ransom list” of what failed in earlier deliberations. Senate Republicans Chris Kapenga, Steve Nass, Duey Strobel, and Dave Craig are all pushing, among other things, to require referendums for local wheel taxes — allowing local governments to keep regulating quarries — and moving up a repeal of the prevailing wage for state construction projects. If Fitzgerald could get one of those senators to change his mind and support the Assembly package, he’d have enough G-O-P votes to pass the budget in its current form.