MON AM News: Dem legislative leaders plan new guardrails on data centers; PSC signs off on smaller We Energies rate hike than requested

November 9, 2026

— Incoming Dem legislative leaders Dianne Hesselbein and Greta Neubauer told WisPolitics their caucuses will look to place new guardrails on data centers after they take control in January and will start with bills their members have already authored.

Still, neither favors a moratorium on the projects, as some in their party have called for.

“That’s not the frame we’re in right now,” Neubauer, D-Racine, said in a phone interview. “We understand that the economy is changing here, and our goal is to make sure that the people of Wisconsin get the best deal possible.”

How the Dem majorities deal with data centers will be one of several key issues facing lawmakers as they convene next session amid the growing public backlash against the huge projects. That’s particularly true as Dems try to balance those concerns with labor supporting the projects, which have helped drive job growth in some areas of the state as well as nationally.

They’re also coming off a campaign cycle in which both sides used data centers to attack the other. GOP gubernatorial candidate Tom Tiffany, for example, sought to label Dem David Crowley as “data center David” after the Milwaukee County executive declined to embrace a moratorium on the projects. As the campaign wore on, Crowley expressed an openness to repealing a sales tax exemption for the projects that Republicans inserted in the 2023-25 budget that Dem Gov. Tony Evers signed.

Neubauer, whose Assembly district includes the Microsoft data center in Mt. Pleasant, said among other things, “we do need to look at that sales tax credit.”

Hesselbein said legislation placing new restrictions on data centers is a priority, though “It’s not going to be SB 1.” She said members heard concerns from voters on the doors about the projects, but she wanted to speak with her caucus before publicly commenting on a possible repeal of the sales tax exemption.

The exemption allows qualified developers to avoid paying the sales tax on most purchases supporting the construction and operation of a data center. The Legislative Fiscal Bureau estimated Wisconsin will lose out on $1.5 billion in revenue related to data center construction between 2024 and 2028. In addition, the state is expected to forgo $369 million annually in sales tax revenue related to their operations.

“It’s a lot of money, and it’s something that is a serious conversation that we have to have,” Hesselbein said.

In July, Crowley, during an interview with WisconsinEye and WisPolitics ahead of the Dem primary, said he would like to see the sales tax exemption repealed. In August, he suggested if data centers want any kind of tax break, they should have to earn it through relying solely on renewable energy with a guarantee that powering them wouldn’t increase consumer rates, among other things.

He’s also suggested there could be a pause on data center development until new guardrails are put in place, and during a gaggle with reporters on the UW-Madison campus two weeks ago, Crowley expressed an openness to signing a repeal of the sales tax exemption if lawmakers approved one.

“This is something that we’ve heard all across the entire state, and I think that when you look at the fact that these billionaires as well as Big Tech companies who are receiving tax breaks on the backs of hard-working Wisconsinites’ healthcare, we can’t continue to just give them a free ride, and I’ve been very clear on that,” Crowley said.

Data center ads played outsize role in election communications

Microsoft Corp. announced plans in spring 2024 to build a $3.3 billion data center in Racine County at a site that had been cleared for a planned Foxconn development that fell well short of initial expectations. Though originally hailed as a massive investment that would drive job growth, the public began to sour on the projects not long after.

The latest Marquette University Law School Poll found 76% of registered voters said data centers weren’t worth the cost, compared to 55% a year earlier.

At the same time, data centers ranked ninth when voters were asked to list their most important issue this fall. Forty-eight percent said the cost of living, while 4% answered data centers.

Still, they were one of the most prevalent topics in campaign ads during the general election, ranking fourth in terms of spending, according to a WisPolitics review of AdImpact data.

AdImpact tracked more than 80 different creatives that mentioned data centers and over $29.2 million spent.

See the full story.

— We Energies and WPS customers will see their utility rates go up next year, though by a smaller margin than the two utilities sought.

We Energies asked the Public Service Commission in April to let it increase residential customers’ electric rates by 15.2% over the next two years, while its sister utility sought to increase its residential rates by 12.7% over the same period. Both companies are subsidiaries of WEC Energy Group.

Commercial customers for both utilities would have also seen rate increases around 10%, per numbers WEC Energy Group provided in April.

In a nearly 12-hour hearing last week, commissioners trimmed down the utilities’ request, lowering the amount customers will pay for decommissioned coal plants and cost overruns on a solar and battery farm and reducing the guaranteed profit the utilities could collect on their pool of energy assets.

Final rates will be released in the coming weeks.

Commissioner Kristy Nieto said the PSC was being asked to weigh the concerns of residents, manufacturers and municipalities against the utility’s needs, noting electric bills in Wisconsin had gone up 24.6% since 2020.

“We’re looking at a utility that, by a number of measures, is among the most profitable in the country. Its rates are already among the highest in Wisconsin, in the Midwest, while many of its customers live in communities with some of the greatest energy burdens in our state,” Nieto said. “When you put those circumstances next to each other, I think it’s reasonable to ask whether the balance is where it needs to be.”

The utilities will see a smaller guaranteed profit on their capital investments than their current 9.8% return on equity, which they sought to increase to 9.9%.

Commissioners scaled that back to 9.5%, at PSC’s staff’s recommendation.

Watchdog group Citizens Utility Board of Wisconsin had argued for a 9.1% return on equity, while other intervenors sought to push the utilities’ profit margin even lower.

“The savings could be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, but unfortunately not enough to stop an increase from taking effect,” CUB Executive Director Tom Content said in a statement, noting PSC staff testimony that placed the cost of We Energies’ requested rate increase at $449 million over two years.

Customers will pay less over the next two years for decommissioned coal plants after the commission elected to level out those payments, in accordance with a proposal by another intervenor, Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group. That’s expected to cut costs by $31 million next year and $32 million in 2028.

Commissioners also decided that the utilities could not collect a return on cost overruns from a solar and battery farm located in the town of Paris.

Commissioner Marcus Hawkins said the body of evidence showed that We Energies and WPS, who together own 90% of the facility, had known the project would exceed its estimated project cost when the PSC approved the purchase of the solar and battery facility in 2022, and criticized the utilities for withholding that information.

WEC Media Relations Director Brendan Conway in a statement said the utility company “recognize(s) our responsibility to continue providing safe and reliable energy, while keeping customer bills as low as possible.”

“During this months-long process we worked with customer groups and Commission staff to reduce costs to customers by tens of millions of dollars,” Conway said, touting investments in “Wisconsin-produced energy” as well as spending to place power lines underground and trim trees to cut down on power outages.

— While the share of K-12 students in Wisconsin meeting minimum immunization requirements rose slightly in the last school year, a report says the “long-term downward trend” in vaccination is likely to continue.

The Wisconsin Policy Forum published its latest issue brief last week, the same day state health officials reported Wisconsin’s first measles death since 1990. WPF found the statewide rate for K-12 students meeting minimum vaccination requirements ticked up to 87.4% in the 2025-2026 school year, noting that’s “much lower” than what’s needed for broad protection against outbreaks. The prior year’s rate was 86.4%.

On a historical basis, the share of students meeting these requirements has fallen by more than 10 percentage points from 97.1% in 1986. Authors note this has coincided with expanding immunization requirements, from five diseases in 1975 to 10 diseases five decades later.

Over that span of time, Wisconsin has had five years in which the immunization rate fell by two percentage points or more. In four of those years, new vaccinations were being added to the state’s requirements, the report notes. Those same years, Wisconsin saw greater shares of students behind schedule on vaccinations.

“This correlation suggests that the drops may have been connected to the administration of new guidelines,” authors wrote.

The fifth year with at least a 2% decline, 2022, did not have any changes to vaccination requirements but it did coincide with the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, authors note data collection issues may have skewed that year’s results.

Meanwhile, the report found changing attitudes around vaccination are the other main cause for the accelerating decline in vaccination. The share of students opting out of one or more vaccines has more than tripled from the 1990s, from below 2% to 6.5% this year.

The report also highlights Wisconsin’s greater susceptibility to outbreaks statewide. It comes as the state’s total measles case number has hit 477 for this year, and officials say their tally is likely an underestimate.

While most of this year’s measles outbreak has occurred in southwestern Lafayette, Iowa and Grant counties, school districts in those counties don’t have the lowest vaccination rates in the state.

Their rates for the 2025-2026 school year were 88.4%, 89.8% and 86.7%, respectively. By comparison, the lowest with 78% is Burnett County.

“The cases are illustrative of the increased risk of outbreak in any area within a state given the low rates,” authors wrote, stressing the greater risk for those who aren’t vaccinated.

See the report.

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