"Video Competition" Bill Has New DATCP Fiscal Note: The Fix Is In

So my question last week, "Will Joint Finance Get Honest Revised Fiscal Notes?"  has been answered.

No.

The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection (DATCP), faced with amendments to AB 207 that greatly increased its responsibilities in video, and then added satellite dishes, submitted an "updated" fiscal note that went from $219,500 supporting 5.0 FTE when the bill let DATCP do almost nothing, to $65,000 supporting 1.0 FTE to do a great deal more.

Why?  Because after acknowledging that there will be greatly increased responsibilities regarding satellite service, fielding complaints that the municipalities currently take, and enforcing the anti-discrimination provisions in the bill, DATCP chose to offer a political punt: "Since these are new responsibilities, it is difficult to determine at this time how much additional work (and staff) will be required. Only experience with the bill will make that determination possible. As a result, we are currently requesting 1.0 FTE until experience with the bill's provisions permits a better assessment."

Here's the absurd job of this poor DATCP employee, as AT&T's new "U-Verse" service gets rolled out, and local complaints about cable get routed to DATCP: "The FTE will have the responsibility of: (1) responding to individual consumer complaints generated as a result of this bill; (2) investigating patterns revealed by the complaints and taking enforcement action where appropriate; (3) analyzing and tracking the consumer issues arising from this legislation."

So consumer protection for video in Wisconsin for the next year or two would literally be a one-man or woman band.  And DATCP employees signed off on this with a straight face.

(This updated fiscal estimate was done upon orders from the Governor, a senior Capitol reporter told me today.)

So the Fix is in.  The fiscal notes that Joint Finance will consider will be minimal in terms of costs to the taxpayers, at least "...until experience with the bill's provisions permits a better assessment."

Nobody can any longer claim that the consumer protection problems with the bill have been fixed; it's only the bill's passage in the Assembly and Senate that has been Fixed.

- Barry Orton

Comments

[Liber Al]

Thank God Weinike is on the case.