In February, Wisconsin experienced a tipping point, a fundamental change in Wisconsin’s political climate. While the Capitol is no longer housing tens of thousands of concerned citizens into the wee hours of the morning, the budget bill is still under debate, recall elections have been set and the Legislature keeps moving at breakneck pace. But how have the events from mid-February through today changed the political climate in Wisconsin? Four months later, where do we go from here and what, if anything, will get done?

THE SENSE TODAY

Though Walkerville 2.0 has packed up and the Capitol Square is now crowded with farmers’ market patrons, not protestors, “it would be a mistake to think things have died down,” says Dr. Dennis Dresang, professor emeritus and founding director of UW-Madison’s LaFollette Institute on Public Affairs. “If you go around the state and eavesdrop as some of my colleagues have done, people are still emotional and upset, even if they’re not marching around the Capitol.”

When Gov. Scott Walker previewed his Special Session Budget Bill (SB-11) on Friday, February 11, he made it clear he wanted the wide-sweeping cuts to collective bargaining, Medicaid and other social services to be signed into law the following Friday. But those on the other side knew, to an extent, this was coming and set off a maelstrom that would continue for the better part of a month with rallies, protests and an occupation of the Capitol.
“In November and December, we were depressed. We were waiting for the axe to fall, we knew it was coming,” says Dave Boetcher, government affairs coordinator, IBEW State Conference of Inside Locals, Madison. “Then in February, there’s this big change on collective bargaining, and he just gave us our only possible opportunity. Now it seems like the momentum is 180-degrees reversed.”

That momentum turned out enough signatures to trigger recall elections of nine of the 16 eligible state senators. These recall elections are largely viewed as a referendum on Walker’s collective bargaining law. Republicans up for recall include Robert Cowles, Green Bay; Alberta Darling, River Hills; Sheila Harsdorf, River Falls; Randy Hopper, Fond du Lac; Dan Kapanke, La Crosse; and Luther Olson, Ripon. Three Democrats are up for recall as well: Dave Hansen, Green Bay; Jim Holperin, Conover; and Robert Wirch, Pleasant Prairie.

The current Wisconsin state Senate is comprised of 19 Republicans and 14 Democrats. A loss of three Republican seats would return the Senate to the Democrats; Republicans last held the Senate in the 2005-2006 session. A Republican last held the title of governor in 2003, when Scott McCallum lost to two-term Gov. Jim Doyle.

But none of this should have been a surprise, says Mike Flaherty, president and CEO of Flaherty & Associates and a former political journalist who frequently works with elected leaders.

“Virtually every so-called conservative leader in your lifetime and mine has talked about limited government or limited spending,” says Flaherty. Under Reagan, federal spending was up 60 percent, but he cut taxes; likewise, Bush cut taxes, but federal spending doubled. Walker, Flaherty adds, “is doing what he said he would, just not in the ways he said he would. Some of these reforms — while people may disagree on how most were initiated — had to occur, so you have to give him credit for taking them on. It’s a very difficult and contentious discussion… We were all hoping for a better way, not just a wholesale way to take cuts.”

POLITICS AT WORK

“The issue of collective bargaining rights is a major one, especially for Wisconsin,” where collective bargaining was born, says Dresang. “It was introduced on Monday and they wanted to sign it into law on Friday. Where was the room for deliberation, room for fine-tuning things? They made it a financial matter when it wasn’t. They just wanted to get it done and ram it through.”

To some extent, he says, they were successful. But to another, the actions were counterproductive. On June 14, the state Supreme Court overturned a lower court’s ruling and upheld Walker’s non-fiscal collective bargaining law. The following day, a coalition of unions filed suit in federal court to block the state Supreme Court’s action.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s decision gave way for the collective bargaining law to be included in the biennial budget, which the state Assembly and Senate approved in less than 24 hours of one another in mid-June. (At press time, the budget was on Walker’s desk for approval and expected to be passed by the end of June.) But this should come as no surprise as fast-tracking legislation and other political business has become the nom de rigueur, says Boetcher. “There’s a sense right now that they’re here for the short-term. They’re using their power as much as they can now,” adds Dresang.

Boetcher has been working with legislators on both sides of the aisle as a lobbyist for seven years. His job has changed, for good and for bad. Party affiliation has tightened, and there are fewer moderates willing to vote outside party lines.

Take, for example, recent votes by the Joint Committee on Finance. Many were party-line votes, 12-4, including a rollback on Focus on Energy funding, the voter ID bill, elimination of four regional transit authorities, and slashed state and federal funding to Planned Parenthood, which are all largely liberal issues.

New freshman coming into the Senate and Assembly, a whopping 38 this year, usually take a few months to get acclimated and hire new staffers.

“That’s not what happened this year,” says Boetcher. “They came in with an agenda and purpose. What normally would have been five to six months of negotiation was everyone coming in with their minds made up on their position, with no idea of working toward a middle ground.”

Things are also moving at breakneck speed. “There’s more of a sense of urgency for current leaders to get things done, especially with the uncertainty, particularly in the state Senate,” says Dresang.

That makes it difficult for lobbyists and citizens to make their voices heard on legislation. “There used to be a lot more discussion; now committee hearing to voting is a week or two,” says Boetcher. “That makes it very, very hard to get in and work out any compromises or for citizens to be heard by their representatives, because things happen instantly. That timeframe is gone, unless you knew [a bill] is being written.”

This isn’t to say Boetcher isn’t for efficiency in the system, but he often sees bills going through massive changes in short order.

“Real quick reactions are being made, without insight from people who are there, who know. They’re blowing up things that would have benefits to the state if they’d just taken the time to figure it out.”

Wind energy is Boetcher’s primary example. Passed in late 2009, wind-siting reform set statewide standards established by the Public Service Commission. The PSC assembled a group of stakeholders in 2010 to hash out those standards, which were subsequently repealed by the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules on February 28, the same day the rules would have gone into effect. Since the repeal, four wind farm developers have pulled their projects out of Wisconsin, representing hundreds of construction and maintenance jobs.

“It came down to a question of the distance between towers, something that could have been resolved with time and discussion. Now, it’s not that these wind towers aren’t going to be built, they’ll just be built in another state. How’s that going to help get 250,000 jobs by 2015?”

WAITING FOR THE SPECIALS

For now, everything’s a waiting game.

“Until the special elections are called, it doesn’t affect anything,” says Flaherty. “Republicans have the vote and because they’ve taken such a strong stance, the members truly feel compelled to stick together.”

The recall elections themselves are sticky. To buy additional campaign time, the Republican Party placed recruited “protest candidates” — Republicans posing as Democrats — on the ballots of their six senators facing recall, to force a primary election on July 12 and push the general election to August 9. Because of a later filing deadline for the three Democratic senators facing recall, primaries are scheduled for July 19 with the general election slated for August 16. Court challenges are pending on both sides creating even more confusion. The specials are expected to cost taxpayers upward of $425,000.

Should the Democrats win the Senate, says Flaherty “then it’s deadlock, polarization like you’ve never seen.”

Flaherty believes the Republicans will lose, for certain, two seats. As a regular at the Capitol, he also believes that many of the Republicans up for recall personally would not have endorsed the process and that there were larger forces at work.

“I don’t see how, privately, they would have thought this was a good idea. It was a tough vote and now, there are consequences.”

Adds Dresang: “I think it is fair to draw some lessons that go beyond the state. We’ve seen things that indicate some dark, evil forces are behind all this, and indeed, there are places one can point to. There is a sense that Wisconsin is not alone.”

Not “dark forces,” but all agree outside money will be an issue in the July recalls. “Both parties have access to outside money,” says Flaherty, “and this may be a case where outside money will flip a lot of races. In fact, I would be very surprised if Republicans weren’t already collecting huge amounts of money to flip a race against Scott Walker.”

The wounds are still raw for many voters, but for others, the fact that 2011 tax bills might be lower than the year before for the first time in memory will hold more sway than sentiment. Anything is possible in a state where no single party or ideological group in history has held sway consistently.

“Wisconsin has never been solidly progressive,” says Dresang. “We have all sorts of weird policy that one would not call ‘progressive’ that is part of our legacy and tradition. We can’t forget the John Birch Society, Joe McCarthy, the support of George Wallace, Posse Comitatus.”

All that is to say that what happens in Wisconsin, despite the “Progressive” tag, does not necessarily stay in Wisconsin. “This could be hugely symbolic. What happens in Wisconsin could happen anywhere.”

Photos by Shanna Wolf

By Amanada N. Wegner

Amanda N. Wegner, amandawegner.com, is a freelance writer and editor in Madison and is the former editor of Dane County’s BusinessWatch magazine.

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