It is starting to appear that despite the opposition of Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), reforming, if not eliminating, the state prevailing wage law may happen through the back door that is the 2015-17 state budget.

A growing number of Republican legislators, most recently state Sen. Duey Strobel (R-Cedarburg), are saying they won’t vote for the state budget unless it includes prevailing-wage repeal. Strobel specifically said he wouldn’t support the budget unless it repeals the prevailing-wage law for local budgets.

Which would positively impact other pressing fiscal issues, reports Collin Roth:

The Joint Committee on Finance will not meet this week because the Republican-controlled State Senate reportedly cannot find consensus on the Transportation budget and the proposed Milwaukee arena deal.

The situation, in a nutshell, is the amount of borrowing in the Transportation budget and the taxpayer liability for a Milwaukee arena that is largely unpopular with out-state constituencies.

Some Republican legislators are still enamored by new revenue (read: gas tax increases) to help pay for roads and decrease bonding. If passed, this would almost certainly get vetoed by Walker ahead of his presidential run.

And the now-“fluid” arena proposal is very close to unacceptable in its current form for most fiscal conservatives.

So, how can Republican lawmakers cut this Gordian Knot?

It may sound like a broken record coming from me, but Republicans must look at prevailing wage repeal.

In comments to Charlie Sykes in January, Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald explained just how prevailing wage could be the key to the Transportation budget.

This prevailing wage is huge. Representative Hutton dropped his bill last week… That’s a game-changer as well because this is something we have tinkered with but no one even had the guts to talk about full repeal. And I don’t even know if we end up there, but it’s a game changer because here we are on the verge of considering a massive Transportation budget… it’s not going to include a gas tax increase, but it is going to include bonding. It is probably going to include some fee increases. And at the same time, you’ve got these unions who do all of this road work as well as horizontal construction… all these taxpayer funded projects, I don’t care if they have one dollar or millions of dollars, nobody is protecting the taxpayers. Which is so reminiscent of Act 10. 

Want to offset some spending, bonding, or fee increases? Repeal the prevailing wage.

And what about the Milwaukee arena? Lawmakers and taxpayers are worried about the cost and the taxpayer liability. So Republicans could separate out the arena proposal and hope for Democratic support. Or they could consider the repeal of the prevailing wage as an outlet for cost savings.

As Sen. Duey Stroebel revealed in a request to the Legislative Council, the Milwaukee arena would be subject to the prevailing wage. With full repeal, the cost of the building could be cut by around 10%, or $50 million.

Lawmkers need to start asking themselves some tough questions. Would you rather run on massive bonding for roads and public money for a Milwaukee arena? Or would you like to make the case that you were looking out for the taxpayers and ensured that spending on transportation, infrastructure, and an arena were all done with the greatest efficiency and cost effectiveness?

The common slogan when it comes to budgets is that they are about priorities. By repealing prevailing wage, Republicans could prioritize taxpayers while getting more bang for their buck in big ticket items like Transportation and a Milwaukee arena. A potential win-win-win.

Not just big-ticket items like big road projects, but city streets, and locally big-ticket items like school projects are also inflated in cost due to the prevailing wage law. Nothing is more important than spending taxpayer money in the most efficient manner possible, so if such taxpayer-funded projects can be cut 10 percent in cost by eliminating the prevailing wage law, the prevailing wage law needs to be eliminated.