Earlier this month, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley released his $1.4 billion recommended budget for 2025. The County Board of Supervisors will amend and finalize this budget in the coming weeks.
A year ago, Milwaukee County officials were celebrating a historic budget surplus. But that surplus has evaporated and questions about the county’s financial health in 2026 and beyond are back.
The Wisconsin Policy Forum released a report on the Milwaukee County budget proposal, detailing the financial challenges ahead. Lake Effect’s Sam Woods sat down with the Forum’s immediate past president Rob Henken to discuss the report.
Here are three takeaways from their conversation:
Act 12 provides financial boost short of expectations
"Act 12" refers to a 2023 state budget bill that allowed Milwaukee County to raise its sales tax, which has provided a boost in annual revenue. The bill also allowed for the city of Milwaukee to institute its own sales tax, in exchange for policy provisions including changing the makeup and power of the city's Fire and Police Commission and mandatory staffing quotas for fire and police officers.
New revenue from the higher sales tax provided Milwaukee County with an extra $84 million this year. However, this amount is below expectations.
Additionally, the report said Milwaukee County received $7.6 million in additional state revenue this year thanks to Act 12. But this is juxtaposed with a $10.8 million increase in public safety costs. These costs include an 8.3% increase in the Sheriff's Office budget, as well as health care, food service, and overtime costs at the Community Reintegration Center, the county's correctional facility in Franklin, Wis.
Henken said Act 12 gives Milwaukee County a better guarantee of annual revenue growth, after years of facing financial challenges with little flexibility for raising revenue. Now, Milwaukee County can expect a boost in annual revenue from sales tax and state shared revenue, but this does not mean the county is now flush with cash.
"The county can expect five to eight million dollars of growth in those two sources in a given year, and that's far better than they were before Act 12," Henken said. "But the problem is, particularly in the area of public safety, those costs are growing faster."
Additional future revenue may come from property tax increases. The recommended budget calls for property taxes to rise this year by 2.8%, comparable to the current rate of inflation. Property tax rates were cut by 7.7% last year after nearly a decade of increases.
Future of MCTS remains uncertain
The Milwaukee County Transit System, or MCTS, is once again facing an uncertain future. In recent years, Milwaukee County has used federal pandemic relief dollars to make up for operating deficits within MCTS. This federal money is projected to run out in 2026.
In August, a second Bus Rapid Transit line, or BRT, was indefinitely postponed. The money earmarked for the BRT project will be reallocated elsewhere within MCTS.
"MCTS has always been one of the most precarious areas of the county budget," Henken said. "The pandemic really exacerbated the financial challenges of the transit system because ridership plummeted, and it still has not fully recovered."
Other regional transit services across the country are also struggling. Henken said some are experimenting with free transit services to attract riders who can later be charged.
Henken said a possible solution could be increasing the county's vehicle registration fee. This could help keep bus lines operating but might be a tough sell to taxpayers.
"It's not a great solution for people who are being asked to pay more in sales taxes and property taxes to see the size of their vehicle registration fee [increase]," Henken said. "At least there is a solution available... but I don't want to minimize this, it's a serious problem."
Capital backlog looms over future budgets
By 2029, Milwaukee County is projected to face around $1 billion in capital backlog—referring to needed repairs to infrastructure now or in the near future. This number includes repairs to the county courthouse, park pavilions, and other county-owned buildings.
This backlog is partly due to the county needing to tighten its financial belt over the last two decades, making it difficult to justify infrastructure investments that are not immediately necessary.
Henken compared the situation to a household that needs a new roof but has been struggling to put daily food on the table. The big roof investment is put off to service short-term costs, but eventually, the roof becomes too big of a problem to ignore.
"Eventually the costs grow, and maybe whereas you only needed to patch your roof when the problem first started, now you need a whole new roof," Henken said. "Essentially, that is what happened with county government since the early 2000s."
What happens next
The County Board of Supervisors is currently working on amendments to the County Executive's recommended budget and will likely finalize the 2025 budget in early November. Between now and then, supervisors are holding town halls to get resident input on what should be prioritized.
On Monday, Oct. 28, the County Board of Supervisors will hold a public hearing on the budget, giving speakers 2 minutes for testimony. A budget committee meeting is scheduled for Friday, Nov. 1, to amend the County Executive's budget, sending the amended budget to the full Board of Supervisors for adoption shortly thereafter.