Last
week, the Assembly met twice for session, most likely for the last time
this year. While I'm disappointed we are ending so early in the year, I'm
thrilled with some wonderful bipartisan legislation we passed.
Here is some of the good work we did on the Assembly Floor:
- Water quality bills - Everyone in Wisconsin
deserves access to safe and clean drinking water. After Governor
Evers declared 2019 "The Year of Clean Drinking Water,"
the Water Quality Task Force was formed and came up with several
legislative proposals. The Assembly passed 10 of those bipartisan
proposals aimed at fighting water pollution. Here are just a
handful:
- Assembly Bill 799 would
create a new Office of Water Policy that
would coordinate efforts to manage, conserve, protect and
enhance the productivity of the state’s water resources.
- Assembly Bill 796 would
give $1 million to a "nitrogen optimization pilot
program" that would award grants to farmers and
universities to work on projects that reduce the amount of manure
used when growing crops.
- Assembly Bill 789 would create a
grant program for county groundwater and well testing, as well as
assessments of water quality, geology and well construction.
- Many constituents
contacted my office about the dangers of PFAS in our drinking
water. I'm happy to report I voted for Assembly Bill 792, which passed
and would create a program to collect and store or dispose of
firefighting foam that contains PFAS, so-called "forever
chemicals" that have seeped into some Wisconsin groundwater
and are known to cause health problems.
- Flood mitigation pilot projects - This session, I
authored Assembly Bill 266, which would
allocate funds to support the design, implementation and evaluation
of demonstration projects to test natural flood reduction practices
in Ashland County. I'm thrilled to report that it passed
unanimously in the Assembly and the Senate, and it's now on its
way to the governor's desk. This is a great step forward for
Wisconsin to fund more of the innovative work of using natural wetlands
to mitigate flood damage and will provide valuable insights to areas
across our state as floods have potential to be more severe and
frequent in the coming years.
- Pharmacy benefit managers - Assembly Bill 114 would allow
pharmacists to tell customers about cheaper prescription drug
options, including paying cash if that would be cheaper than their
insurance co-payment. Pharmacists are currently banned from doing so
by a gag rule imposed by pharmacy benefit managers.
- Smoking age - Assembly Bill 422 will raise the
legal age for purchasing any tobacco or nicotine products to 21.
This is an important health issue, especially as the rate of
teenagers using nicotine products through vaping is becoming a
serious concern.
- First responder PTSD compensation - Senate Bill 511 will
allow police officers and fire fighters to claim worker’s
compensation for post-traumatic stress disorder.
- Dairy Farming Bills - Governor Evers ordered
a special session to address the growing crisis our
state's dairy farms are facing, an important tradition and
economic sector in Wisconsin. We passed two bills from the special
session:
- Special Session Assembly Bill 6 would
require the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. to partner
with the state Department of Agriculture Trade and Consumer
Protection (DATCP) to promote Wisconsin dairy exports. The
partnership would be tasked with increasing dairy product exports
so that Wisconsin’s milk exports equal at least 20 percent of the
nation’s milk supply by 2026 and increasing Wisconsin’s meat and
crop product exports by 2026.
- Special Session Assembly Bill 7 would
set aside $600,000 per year for dairy processor grants.
- Public Defenders Pay - Assembly Bill 501 would
increase pay for public defenders in Wisconsin. This will be a major
help to Northern Wisconsin where we struggle to retain and recruit
public defenders who provide an important public service and are
constantly overworked.
Thank you to all
my constituents who weighed in on these bills, and I hope to see them
become law.
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