Notes from the West Wing
By
State Representative Garey Bies
2004 Underway
The New Year is underway and the legislature has already been on the
floor for an Extraordinary Session to deliberate the Jobs Creation Act.
The Jobs Creation Act was the subject of a Notes from the West Wing
column this past November, but I thought I’d do a quick update here as a
result of action taken by the legislature this week.
Fostering economic and business
development is a priority for both legislative republicans and the Governor.
Last fall, legislative republicans introduced the Jobs Creation Act and
the Governor wanted an extraordinary session of the legislature to consider
economic development. As a result,
legislative republicans and the Governor sat down together to try and reach an
agreement on economic development legislation that could be brought to the floor
of the legislature for debate. The
republican Jobs Creation Act was used as the basis of an agreement that was
successfully reached in late December of 2003.
The importance of the Jobs
Creation Act was made all the more clear this week with the announcement of
Rayovac moving its world headquarters from Wisconsin to Georgia.
This, along with the fact that nearly half of Wisconsin’s CEOs believe
that the business climate in Wisconsin is bad made passage of the Jobs Creation
Act very important. On Tuesday, January 13th with bi-partisan support,
the Assembly passed the Jobs Creation Act on a vote of 80-14.
Opponents of the effort to bring
Wisconsin’s economy into the 21st century are still arguing against
the Jobs Creation Act claiming that passage would bring about significant
detrimental impact upon our state’s environment. Even the democratic governor trying to assure otherwise is
not likely to quiet this backward group! But
we could argue until we are blue in the face pointing out that the Jobs Creation
Act does not reduce any of Wisconsin’s environmental protections and it would
do no good.
With the Jobs Creation Act
successfully passed by the Assembly, it has now been sent to the Senate where
passage is also expected. Wisconsin
deserves this legislation and I look forward to the day the Governor signs it
into law.
Secondly, I’d like to briefly
touch on the high-capacity commercial well that is being proposed in the Antigo
area and has been granted a permit for operation by the Department of Natural
Resources (DNR). I had a number of
contacts regarding this well as to why its permit was granted by the DNR while
other permits, such as one sought by the Perrier company, was denied.
As it turns out, there is very little, essentially no regulation of
commercial wells. The only
regulation of high capacity wells, such as it is appears in the state statutes.
The crux of the statute is that high capacity wells are allowed so long
as the well does not negatively affect other area wells.
On this basis, the Antigo area well is being approved by the DNR, which
is claiming that the water table in that area will be able to support the well.
The DNR also pointed to the fact that there are many other commercial
high capacity wells operating in the area servicing various farms.
Based on this situation, I have
come to the belief that the state needs to take a more active role in regulating
high-capacity commercial wells. Senator
Neal Kedzie and Representative DuWayne Johnsrud are developing legislation that
would regulate high-capacity commercial wells.
I am looking forward to reviewing their proposal.
As always, if you have questions or comments on this column or any other topic you might see or read in the news, I can be reached by e-mail at Rep.Bies@legis.state.wi.us or by telephone, toll-free at 1-888-482-0001.