Massive proposed fee hike follows Supreme Court unleashing of bureaucrats
State agencies have begun their rush through a regulatory back door that will almost certainly cost owners of businesses large and small in Wisconsin tens of millions of dollars.
Exhibit A: a proposal by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection to increase the fee for licensing a livestock market from $420 to $7,430.
First reported by Wisconsin Public Radio, the news comes in the wake of a July Supreme Court decision that eliminated rulemaking authority of the Legislature’s Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules.
Agencies are now advancing more than two dozen rules, nearly all of them blocked at one time by the Administrative Rules Committee because of their negative effects on citizens and businesses.
State Rep. Adam Neylon, co-chair of the committee, told the Badger Institute the fee increases embedded in several of the rule changes are little more than unlegislated, agency-driven taxation.
Conservative lawmakers are helpless, Neylon, R-Pewaukee, said, because the Supreme Court ruling in effect wrested control of the rulemaking process and handed it to the governor.
“I didn’t expect this to be so blatant,” Neylon said. “I think the more people that catch on to it, the more opposed they’re going to be. Public opinion still matters.”
A livestock market is a business with pens, barns, scales and sheltered open areas for the sale and auction of commercial animals, including cows, pigs, horses or sheep. There are more than two dozen U.S. Department of Agriculture-approved livestock markets in Wisconsin.
The DATCP acknowledges its request to increase livestock market fees and to increase the registration fee for livestock truckers from $60 to $370 in 2027 is a budget decision.
Agency officials anticipate their registration programs will be $1.1 million short by then, something that was not publicly discussed during the most recent state budget deliberations, Neylon said.
In August, Evers sent an electronic memo to agency heads telling them that because of the Supreme Court ruling, “There no longer remains any statutory requirement to wait for legislative committee review before promulgating a rule once I have approved it.”
“More specifically,” Evers wrote, “I respectfully request that you analyze areas in which the Legislature’s prior abuse of power forestalled, delayed, or halted prior rulemaking in service of the people of our state.”
Among those rules changes delayed since 2023 is an overhaul of the state commercial and residential building code to align with the standards of something called the International Code Council.
Builders and contractors are furious at the short notice — the new code takes effect Oct. 1 — and have complained the regulatory burden will add millions to construction costs, Neylon said.
“Associated Builders and Contractors of Wisconsin was part of a coalition of construction and business trade associations that wanted a commercial building code that was crafted for Wisconsin weather, conditions and our economy,” John Schulze, legal and political affairs director, told the news outlet Finance & Commerce. “Instead, we will have ‘one size fits all’ that will increase construction costs onto businesses and apartment renters.”
“Elections have consequences,” Schulze continued. “The Wisconsin Supreme Court disregarded decades of its own decisions that allowed the Wisconsin Legislature to review regulations being proposed by governors of both parties. Now, thanks to the new liberal majority on Wisconsin’s top court, any governor can change and create any regulation without legislative oversight.”
Myriad other agencies are also pushing costly or progressive rules.
The Department of Natural Resources is pushing ahead with tighter regulation of surface water across the state, rules the Neylon’s committee had held up since 2023.
Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce had, at the time, threatened to sue the state, saying the tightened regulations would cost at least $50 million over a two-year period.
The Department of Health Services is asking for some of the same language changes in its rules that the Legislature has kept out of the state budget since Evers took office.
A mother would become a “member,” and a father would become an “other parent.”
The department chose not to revive the controversy Evers stirred when he proposed in a budget document that a mother be referred to as an “inseminated person.”
Neylon and other Republicans have so far tried to re-establish some kind of oversight by reminding agency heads that rules are still reviewed and reshaped by other standing committees in the Assembly and Senate.
“These rules should be reviewed by standing committees and in public hearings,” Neylon said.
Those committees, however, never had the legal authority to block or shelve an objectionable rule, as the joint rules committee did before the Supreme Court ruling.
Short of associations such as WMC, companies or individuals suing to challenge rules changes, Neylon said, his committee’s hands are tied. Neylon thinks that when the impact of egregious fee increases or debilitating code changes begins to be felt, public support for the court ruling and the current governor benefiting from it will quickly wane.
“This is going to be a really short-term victory for his administration,” Neylon said.
Mark Lisheron is the Managing Editor of the Badger Institute.
Any use or reproduction of Badger Institute articles or photographs requires prior written permission. To request permission to post articles on a website or print copies for distribution, contact Badger Institute Marketing Director Matt Erdman at matt@badgerinstitute.org.
