Wisconsin lawmakers release COVID-19 response bill; Legislature poised to act this week

Wisconsin lawmakers are poised to take up a bill that would ease licensing requirements for medical professionals, waive a one-week waiting period to collect unemployment and more to bolster the state’s response to the novel coronavirus pandemic. 

The draft was released by Senate Republican leaders Monday as the Legislature prepares to meet in extraordinary session this week to act on the plan, capping off more than four weeks of back-and-forth over proposals between Gov. Tony Evers’ office and top legislative leaders. 

The latest action in that saga came last week, when Evers’ office released a draft memo of Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald’s and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos’  plans to give the powerful budget panel the ability to cut state spending as it saw fit. 

But that language is officially out of the measure. Instead, the proposal would allow the Joint Finance Committee to be able to transfer a max of $75 million in certain funding streams toward COVID-19 relief efforts through up to three months after the state’s public health emergency declaration ends. 

Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, said in a statement the plan was crafted with consideration of Evers' proposals and "input from both parties in the Legislature."

"This bill extends a lifeline to the recently unemployed and provides the Joint Finance Committee flexibility to respond to future challenges caused by COVID-19," he said. "There is no such thing as a perfect piece of legislation, but action is desperately needed right now."

Among Assembly Republicans, Vos, R-Rochester, and Majority Leader Jim Steineke, R-Kaukauna, in a joint statement applauded "the bipartisan work that went into the creation of this important bill."

While it was unclear at first if the Assembly bill would be identical to the Senate one, a Vos spokeswoman confirmed Monday afternoon it would be.

Much of the bill focuses on allowing the state to get more federal money to deal with the fallout from the pandemic, including for Medicaid and unemployment benefits. 

Evers told reporters Monday afternoon he hadn't yet seen the language, but added if it looked like previous drafts he had reviewed, "there are things we can agree on" including tweaks to the one-week waiting period. 

"Hopefully this won’t be a one shot answer to the crisis here in Wisconsin but an opportunity to establish a dialogue," he said. 

Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling echoed that call, saying while she backs the bill, the plan "still falls short of what's needed to address this ongoing pandemic." 

"This bill acknowledges the immediate need to help Wisconsin workers and capture federal health care dollars but we need to do more to help businesses, families and communities struggling with the long-term impacts of COVID-19," the La Crosse Democrat wrote in a tweet. 

The proposal will be officially introduced in both houses Monday. Under extraordinary session rules, lawmakers aren't required to hold a public hearing on the proposal, allowing them to act more quickly.  

In that vein, the Assembly expected to convene Tuesday and the Senate on Wednesday in separate virtual sessions, the first in Wisconsin history, allowing lawmakers to participate in the proceedings remotely rather than attending the action in-person. Both chambers have held dress rehearsals in recent weeks. 

Still, Steineke on Twitter wrote that "nearly half" the members of the Assembly will be meeting in person in Madison Tuesday, while the others will be doing so electronically. 

Four weeks after emergency declaration, Wisconsin leaders still working on COVID-19 relief bill

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The legislation would address what Evers and Republican leaders have been publicly talking about for weeks: temporarily suspending the one-week waiting period to collect unemployment for workers who have been laid off. The language would apply retroactively to claims that began after March 12 and until Feb. 7, 2021. 

But the 87-page bill draft would do a number of other things as well, including bar certain insurers from prohibiting coverage based on a COVID-19 diagnosis, require health insurance policies to cover COVID-19 testing without charging a co-pay until after March 13, 2021 and mandate that vaccinations be covered under Wisconsin’s SeniorCare program.  

The bill aims to ease licensing by allowing former health care providers to get temporary credentials; waive fees for physicians, nurses, dentists, psychologists and others for initial or renewed credentials; and allow health care providers licensed in another state to get a temporary credential in Wisconsin and practice here.  

Further under the legislation, health care providers would be immune from civil liability tied to death, injury or damages stemming from services provided to address the pandemic; and align Wisconsin’s nurse aide required training hours with the federal government, cutting it from 120 hours to 75.

Households would also be able to apply for heating assistance through the Department of Administration’s low-income home energy assistance program anytime during 2020, rather than before May 16. An analysis from the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau said the federal stimulus package gave Wisconsin an estimated $8 million for the program. 

And the Board of Commissioners of Public Lands, which makes loans to school districts, municipalities and others, would be able to offer loans to nonprofit municipal utilities during and up to 60 days after the current state of emergency. The aid would come as commercial and residential ratepayers wield the ability to suspend utility payments without losing service during this period. 

Further, the state jobs agency would need to come up with a plan by June 30 to support Wisconsin's major industries that have been negatively impacted by COVID-19, including tourism, manufacturing, agriculture, construction, retail and service. 

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Changes for public, private K-12 schools

Schools and districts wouldn’t have to meet student testing requirements for the academic year, and the state Department of Public Instruction would be barred from publishing accountability reports measuring school performance for the 2020-21 academic year under the bill. 

Those reports — which must be posted by Nov. 30 for the preceding year — are based off of students’ performance on the assessments from the previous school year. 

Meanwhile, DPI wouldn’t be allowed to withhold payments to schools participating in the state’s choice programs stemming from the mandated school closures. If those schools are also able to show to the agency that they weren’t able to meet program requirements because of the statewide closure, DPI also wouldn’t be able to bar them from participating in the program this year or next year. 

The language would also allow DPI to waive educational rules that apply to the state’s charter schools and Wisconsin’s Special Needs Scholarship Program, as well as waive the minimum amount of hours requirement for private schools after receiving a request from those officials. 

Separately, students would have more time to apply for choice programs in the 2020-21 school year, as well as full-time open enrollment programs, under the legislation. 

The choice schools would be able to accept applications until May 14, rather than April 16; and officials at the schools would have until the end of May, rather than May 1, to tell DPI how many applications they received. 

As for open enrollment participation, students would have another month to ask a nonresident district to accept them for next school year, moving it back from April 30.