Tony Evers vetoes 'forever chemicals' bill, calls for special meeting to release PFAS, hospital funds (2024)

As promised, Gov. Tony Evers vetoed a bill Tuesday that would have created grants to fight pollution from so-called “forever chemicals” over concerns that the measure would limit the state Department of Natural Resources’ authority to hold polluters liable.

The Democratic governor also embarked on a rarely used maneuver — calling on the state’s Republican-controlled finance committee to hold a special meeting and release $125 million in state funds set aside in the budget to combat PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, in Wisconsin waterways. Evers also pressed the committee to release $15 million in funds to support health care access in western Wisconsin after the announced closure of two major hospitals in the region.

“That’s $140 million in already-approved and agreed-upon investments to address urgent, pressing issues facing our state, but these funds are sitting unspent in Madison because the Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee has refused to release even one cent — and that’s just wrong,” Evers said in a statement.

With Republicans refusing Evers’ previous calls to release the PFAS funds, it appears unlikely the money will be spent as communities across Wisconsin struggle to deal with contaminants in the groundwater.

Republican leaders also have pledged to block the hospital funding for anything other than the bill’s original intent after the governor used his powerful line-item veto authority in February to expand how and where the money could be spent.

Budget committee co-chairs Sen. Howard Marklein, R-Spring Green, and Rep. Mark Born, R-Beaver Dam, said in a joint statement that if Evers was serious about addressing the need for PFAS funding and aid to Chippewa Valley hospitals, he would have signed the bills passed by the Legislature.

“Governor Evers failed the people of Wisconsin, not the Legislature,” the lawmakers said.

The lawmakers continued that “there continues to be a legal risk if the JFC undermines the legislative intent of bills vetoed by the Governor, which is a risk we will not take.”

Evers has ordered the full Legislature to convene in special sessions on several occasions since taking office in early 2019, but Tuesday’s actions mark just his second such order specifically calling for a special meeting by the state’s powerful budget committee.

When Evers called on the Joint Finance Committee to convene in late 2019 to release funds set aside in the state budget for homeless initiatives, the committee’s two GOP co-chairs swiftly rejected the call, arguing such a meeting could only be called with their consent.

State law says the Legislature’s budget committee shall meet in special session “upon call of the governor or upon call of the co-chairpersons.” However, a memo prepared by the Legislative Reference Bureau notes that, while the governor may call for the finance committee to meet, he cannot require the committee to convene a meeting or consider a matter.

The Republican-controlled Legislature also has largely rejected Evers’ previous calls for special legislative sessions on matters ranging from gun control to abortion rights. While lawmakers are required to gavel in a special session called by the governor, they do not have to hold debate and can immediately adjourn.

Evers has called on the budget committee to meet next Tuesday to release the PFAS funds to the state DNR and the hospital funding to the state Department of Health Services.

Feud over PFAS continues

PFAS have been linked to health problems that include low birth weight, cancer and liver disease, and have been shown to make vaccines less effective. They’re called “forever chemicals” because they do not break down in the environment and can accumulate in animal tissues and the human body.

Such contaminants have been identified in communities across the nation and Wisconsin, including in Marinette, Wausau, La Crosse and Madison.

Evers and the Republican-controlled Legislature have gone back and forth on the issue of PFAS funding for months now, with the Democratic governor repeatedly urging lawmakers to release $125 million already set aside in the current two-year spending plan.

Republicans have instead pressed Evers to sign Senate Bill 312, which supporters have said was crafted to begin to address PFAS contaminants in Wisconsin while protecting innocent landowners from paying for remediation efforts on contaminations that were out of their control.

The bill would have created a municipal grant program to help communities cover the cost of testing and treating water for PFAS, as well as provide grants for landowners who own property with PFAS contamination out of their control. Another grant program would have provided funds to individuals who own or rent a contaminated private well for treatment and filtration, or the construction of a new well.

“Over the past year, the governor has been spending his time and energy trying to get a $125 million slush fund for his DNR. Meanwhile the Legislature was working to pass a comprehensive plan that will actually make a difference for affected communities,” bill co-author Sen. Eric Wimberger, R-Green Bay, said in a statement. “Senate Bill 312 was vetted extensively through the legislative process and includes detailed policy that quickly gets this money into the hands of those who desperately need it.”

Democrats have criticized the measure as an effort to curb the state Department of Natural Resources’ authority and hamstring Wisconsin’s 1978 “Spills Law,” which requires anyone who “possesses or controls a hazardous substance which is discharged or who causes the discharge of a hazardous substance” to take the necessary actions to restore the affected air, land or waters. The law does not define “hazardous substance.”

Clean Wisconsin’s water and agriculture program director Sara Walling said in a statement last week urging the governor to veto the bill that the proposal “puts the burden of PFAS cleanup on Wisconsin taxpayers instead of polluters.”

“It isn’t fair, and it doesn’t reflect the values of our state,” Walling continued. “This should have been a simple, straightforward spending bill that gets our communities the help they desperately need. Instead, it’s just another source of frustration and disappointment for families that have been dealing with PFAS pollution for years.”

Hospital funding

Officials with Hospital Sisters Health System’s St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls and Sacred Heart Hospital in Eau Claire, as well as all Prevea Health locations in western Wisconsin’s Chippewa Valley, announced earlier this year plans to begin laying off employees and permanently close the facilities later this month.

In response, legislative Republicans approved grant funding to pay for emergency department capital expenses at hospitals in Chippewa and Eau Claire counties to help mitigate the impact of the impending closures. The proposal essentially repurposed $15 million originally approved in the state budget for capital improvements at Sacred Heart Hospital — funding that has not been used.

Democratic lawmakers in the Assembly proposed amending the measure to address the state Department of Health Services’ request to broaden the area covered under the bill to include the entire western region of the state and expand what services funds could be spent on. That proposal was rejected by Assembly Republicans.

But when Evers signed the bill in late February, he used his line-item veto power to essentially accomplish the same thing, expanding the proposal’s scope to cover more broad health care needs, including urgent care, OB-GYN services, inpatient psychiatry and mental health substance use services. The governor’s partial veto also expands the area covered under the proposal to include all 18 counties in the state’s western region.

“It is unbelievable Governor Evers would veto funding that was intended to support emergency services in Chippewa Falls — a community which just lost its last hospital — to allow it to be used in any of 18 counties,” Born said after Evers’ actions on the bill earlier this year. “The committee will not support a proposal that redirects the funding from this high-need area to anywhere in Western Wisconsin.”