Board Adopts 2024 Budget, Setting Up Battle With Crowley

Milwaukee County Courthouse. Photo by Graham Kilmer.

The Milwaukee County Board voted Thursday to approve a $1.4 billion budget for county government in 2024, but the budget process isn’t over.

County Executive David Crowley and his administration have already expressed opposition to some of the changes and additional spending supervisors added through amendments. In a terse statement released shortly after the budget was adopted, the county executive indicated partial vetoes were likely to occur.

The county executive emphasized “maintaining a track record of fiscal responsibility and thoughtful budgeting” and said he would be reviewing the board’s budget “to ensure it keeps us on that path.”

Even with the potential for partial vetoes, the 2024 budget breaks from the cuts and shrinking county services that have been commonplace for more than a decade. The improvement was made possible by the new additional 0.4% sales tax the board approved in July. The new revenue created a $31 million budget surplus in 2024.

Despite the tension and stress expressed during the board’s deliberations over the proposed tax increase, it was hardly mentioned during the budget adoption deliberations Thursday.

The 2024 budget includes an array of new spending on county infrastructure and services unprecedented in recent history. Parks, transit, housing, health and human services, child care and the sheriff’s office, among others government functions, received investments.

The budget was approved 17-1 with Sup. Ryan Clancy voting in opposition.

“The long-term solutions propelled by the County Board position us to save and invest in services that our constituents rely on,” County Board Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson said in a statement following budget adoption. “Through collaborative efforts with Supervisors, constituents, and the community, we have adopted a budget that amplifies the voices and addresses the needs of the people we represent.”

Property Taxes

The county’s property tax levy was reduced by approximately $21.5 million in the 2024 budget. This is down from the $24 million property tax relief recommended by Crowley.

The board’s amendments raised the 2024 property tax levy to $291,434,132, still a significant decrease from the approximately $312 million property tax levy adopted for 2023. The total levy, following the board’s amendments, is still 6.87% lower than 2023, according to Steve Cady, director of the county’s Research Services Division.

Super Amendments

The board approved two out of three major amendments to the 2024 budget that increased the amount of debt the county will take on and chipped away at the property tax relief that the board demanded from the county executive when it passed the additional 0.4% sales tax.

These amendments, often called super or omnibus amendments, are assembled from many disparate spending items and policy priorities to create sufficient political support. Both were sponsored by Nicholson with co-sponsorship from a majority of supervisors.

The first amendment included a salary increase for corrections officers in the Milwaukee County Jail, Community Reintegration Center (CRC) and the Vel R. Phillips Youth Detention Center, bumping them up to $30 an hour; a $500,000 increase to the corrections health care contract to expand mental health and dental services; a $200,000 increase to the transit security contract; $200,000 for a student housing program at MATC; repairs to Bender Park Boat Launch ($820,500); Scout Lake parking lot repairs ($92,630); shoreline restoration at the Mitchell and Kosciuszko Park Lagoons ($400,000); and repairs to Charles Allis Art Museum ($270,000).

The pay increases for correction officers in the amendment added $2.1 million to the Milwaukee County Sheriff‘s budget and $2.7 million to the CRC budget. The county executive also included some funding for the CO pay increases, but not at the level approved by the board.

However, the second super amendment revealed the break between the board and the county executive on the 2024 budget.

This amendment added $1.2 million to the budget for a potential on-demand paratransit program; additional funding for pre-trial services on top of the county executive’s increase ($150,000); additional funding for Aging Services ($100,000); $250,000 for a third-party audit of the jail; earmarking $2 million of the affordable housing funding for Concordia 27 on the Near West Side; and $500,000 for park enhancements.

The spending package is to be paid for by switching a zoo project from cash financing to debt. The county was able to cash finance the zoo project in part because of the budget surplus for 2024. But that budget surplus will shrink in 2025 and disappear altogether in 2026, according to budget projections. And some of the additional expenses in the amendment will not be one-time expenses on infrastructure projects, but recurring operational expenses — like the funding for pre-trial and aging services.

Board Makes Tweaks to Budget Committee Work

The full board only broke from the Budget Committee’s work on two amendments, in sharp contrast the 2023 process that saw the board break up and redraft much of the committee’s work on the floor.

The first break was on another super amendment, sponsored by Sup. Peter Burgelis, that was withdrawn after it lost the support of its co-sponsors on the board floor Thursday. The amendment would have added an additional $1.48 million in debt to the 2024 budget, which will already be over the county’s self-imposed annual debt limit by approximately $5.3 million. It was composed of 11 park projects spread across the county. Given the county’s improved financial outlook, supervisors whose districts would have benefited from some of the projects rose begrudgingly to pull their support from the amendment.

One aspect of the amendment, $50,000 for tree planting, was added back into the budget through an amendment by Sup. Shawn Rolland, but with cash financing instead of debt.

The second amendment was also sponsored by Burgelis. It would have greatly expanded a new marketing and communications position in the Milwaukee County Department of Transportation into a new role that included investigating public complaints made about the transit system and also overseeing the implementation of a new paratransit program. The amendment failed on a tie vote of nine to nine, with Supervisors Willie Johnson, Jr., Patti Logsdon, Felesia Martin, Rolland, Tony Staskunas, Liz Sumner, Steve Taylor, Kathleen Vincent and Sheldon Wasserman voting in opposition.