(The Center Square) – Menomonie’s leadership on Monday unanimously approved regulation changes in zoning that will classify data centers in the northwestern Wisconsin community as such rather than in the same designation as warehouses.
Zoning, lot sizes, and land use for large artificial intelligence data centers is included in the changes.
Balloonist is considering building a data center in Menomonie. The new regulations mean Balloonist will need to reapply for zoning and permitting.
The community of about 17,000 off Interstate 94 between Minneapolis and Eau Claire is not alone in looking to set rules for data centers. Madison and Milwaukee are also looking at adopting data center regulations, as are state lawmakers.
State Rep. Shannon Zimmerman, R-River Falls, and Sen. Romaine Quinn, R-Birchwood, on Monday introduced legislation that would create new statewide regulations.
“With guardrails in place, Wisconsin can be a leader in the digital economy while protecting residents and ensuring responsible development,” Quinn said.
The plan from Quinn and Zimmerman would:
• Prohibit energy costs for data centers from being passed on to other customers.
• Require any renewable energy used to power data centers to be located at the site.
• Require water used by a data center for cooling purposes to be recycled.
● Require data centers to annually report the total amount of water used.
• Require a data center to file a bond or security sufficient to cover the cost of any required reclamation.
• If construction of a proposed data center is not completed, the owner must restore the parcel to the condition that existed prior to any construction
“The bill I am introducing will prevent utility companies from passing their electricity costs on to any other customer. Wisconsin is open for business – just not at the expense of ratepayers already here,” Quinn added.

(The Center Square) – Some of the loudest opposition to the Trump Administration’s raid in Venezuela is coming from Wisconsin’s progressive lawmakers.
Democratic candidate for governor Francesca Hong was one of the first to accuse the president of breaking the law and starting a new war.
“Trump’s rogue attack on Venezuela and the abduction of Maduro sets an alarming precedent that does nothing to make our country safer or improve the lives of working Americans. It is not only unconstitutional, but a violation of international law,” Hong wrote on X.
President Donald Trump on Saturday announced that U.S. special forces went into Venezuela to capture now-former president Nicholas Maduro. Maduro has been indicted on drug trafficking charges. He’s due in a New York City courtroom today for an arraignment.
Wisconsin Democratic Socialist Ryan Clancy cheered the weekend protest in Milwaukee against the Venezuelan raid.
“I’m grateful to the folks who braved the cold [Saturday], with just a few hours’ notice, to stand with the people of Venezuela and against the Trump regime’s unlawful act of war,” Clancy wrote on X. “This isn’t about one person. This isn’t about drugs (and Trump has been explicit about this, noting that he wants to hand control of Venezuela over to oil companies). It’s unacceptable and dangerous for one country to accuse a leader of a crime and to invade that country to abduct them. When regime change is external, it shatters countries’ autonomy and costs lives.”
The protests in Milwaukee saw a few dozen people turn out. Milwaukee state Sen. Chris Larson, D-Milwaukee, also took to social media to blast President Trump and the Venezuelan raid.
“Trump and his regime are not only a national embarrassment. Today, they made themselves into an international pariah,” Larson added on X. “It is distinctly unAmerican to ignore history and rekindle the worst mistakes of our previous attempts at regime change. No more wars for oil.”
Wisconsin’s Republican state lawmakers were mostly silent on the raid, but the state’s Republican congressmen all supported the raid on X over the weekend.

(The Center Square) – 2025 was a deadlier year in Milwaukee after the city’s police department reported a jump in homicides last year.
Milwaukee’s homicide database shows 142 people were killed in the city in 2025, compared to 132 in 2024. That is an 8% increase.
Milwaukee Police are not offering any thoughts as to why more people were killed in 2025 than 2024.
Mayor Cavalier Johnson told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that the spike in homicides is “vexing.”
The murder increase in Milwaukee stands out, in part, because 2025 saw fewer murders in most big cities. Washington, D.C reported a 31% drop in homicides, while Chicago reported 30% fewer killings. New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and New Orleans also reported a drop in homicides in 2025.
Nationwide, the FBI said homicides fell almost 20% in the last year.
Milwaukee did see a double digit drop in other crimes, however.
The police database shows a 19% drop in non-fatal shootings. Milwaukee Police say 515 people were shot and survived in 2025, down from 637 in 2024.
Aggravated assaults fell 22%, and robberies dropped 28%. But the biggest year-over-year decline in crime in Milwaukee came from carjacking cases.
The police database reported a 49% drop in carjackings, from 513 in 2024 down to 264 in 2025.

(The Center Square) – As legislation continues to move on $210 million in tax incentives for a new $1.5 billion pulpwood facility in Hayward, Synthec Fuels’ chief operating officer said that the decision on whether to put the facility in Hayward or another state is not solely dependent on the state funds.
The plant would take pulpwood and turn it into aviation fuel in what is called sustainable aviation fuel made from CORSIA wood mass operated by a German company working with Wisconsin-based Johnson Timber.
A bill dubbed the Forestry Revitalization Act would provide $60 million in enterprise tax credits and use the state forestry account to back $150 million in bonds for an incentive toward the project.
“You’re not selecting your site because of any incentives, you know, there are other factors which each are important,” Synthec Fuels CEO Matthias Mueller told The Chronotype of Rice Lake. “This is a significant amount, and even though we are fully funded, it creates positive effect on our side, and so we will have to weigh everything if decisions are being made. But I think this is premature, right now, to say that.”
The bill had a public hearing in the Senate Committee on Insurance, Housing, Rural Issues and Forestry in October but has not seen a vote or an Assembly public hearing.
Senate President Mary Felzkowski, R-Tomahawk, is a bill sponsor along with Rep. Chanz Green, R-Grand View.
“This facility would be a great boon to Wisconsin, directly creating about 150 jobs at the facility and supporting over 200 additional jobs for loggers, truckers, foresters, etc., and converting 880,000 tons of wood residue into 48 million gallons of biofuel annually,” Felzkowski said in testimony supporting the bill.
Mueller told the paper that Hayward was the “first choice” for the plant over options in Minnesota and Michigan and that access to pulpwood, energy and both rail and highway transportation are important factors along with the tax incentives.
“The good news is that our business plan is not relying on it, but obviously, you know, it’s enhancing the bottom line, and it’s lowering the risk at our end,” Mueller told the outlet.
Part of the need for the sustainable aviation fuel is European regulations, which require a mix of the fuel.
The European Union will require 2% blends of the fuel by 2025, or 1.2 million tons, and 20% by 2035, or 13.6 million tons.

(The Center Square) – Krause Funeral Home and Cremation Services workers in the Milwaukee area are no longer represented by a union after an employee-backed petition was filed earlier this year, the company withdrew recognition of the union and the Teamsters Local 344 union dropped a complaint in the case.
Krause employee Noah Watry and fellow workers filed a decertification petition in October and National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys filed a motion to intervene in a case in front of the National Labor Relations Board.
The petition asked the NLRB to hold a vote to remove the union from the three Milwaukee-based Krause locations. Those represented included funeral directors, embalmers and apprentices at the locations in Milwaukee, Brookfield and New Berlin.
The union then accused Krause and the NLRB from withdrawing recognition illicitly and filed unfair labor practice charges.
“This case illustrates clearly the lengths that union officials will go in order to hold on to power in a workplace where workers would prefer to be independent,” National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix said in a statement. “The Foundation is pleased to have been able to aid Mr. Watry and his colleagues in navigating the convoluted federal labor bureaucracy that places hardworking Americans like them at a disadvantage whenever they seek to exercise their rights.”
Wisconsin is one of 26 states with Right to Work laws that make union affiliation and dues payment strictly voluntary, even though union officials can impose exclusive bargaining control upon all workers in a workplace.

(The Center Square) – The woman who was almost Wisconsin’s state superintendent of schools says 2026 needs to be the year that the adults in charge of education in the state do their part to help children read.
Brittany Kinser, who lost the 2024 race for superintendent and now leads Kids Win Wisconsin, said 2026 starts the second year since Act 20 was supposed to overhaul how teachers teach kids how to read.
But, she said, it hasn’t.
“Nearly 100,000 early-grade students, or 36.8%, were identified as at risk for reading difficulties. In first grade alone, 47% of students fell below the reading benchmark,” Kinser wrote in her latest Kids Win Wisconsin newsletter.
She, however, doesn’t blame the kids.
“We know what works. When the science of reading is fully implemented early, children succeed. What’s left now is adult responsibility – following through on implementation, being honest about results, and restoring high academic standards,” Kinser told TCS.
Act 20 is supposed to retrain teachers, with a focus on the science of reading, to boost student reading levels by the fourth grade. But its roll out has been slow, and in some places scattered.
Official training began in July, and not every teacher has completed the course.
Some school districts say it is expensive to comply with the new law, and some have said they would not have changed anything about their reading lessons unless forced to by the state.
Kinser said that puts even more focus on adult decisions in Wisconsin’s schools.
“Kids don’t control schools or policy – adults do. And adults have to take responsibility when kids can’t read,” Kinder added. “Our kids have all the potential in the world. They deserve adults who are willing to match that potential with high expectations and real accountability so 95% of children can read well and build a bright future.”
Kinser’s Kids Win Wisconsin has an online tool that shows parents just how well their kids’ school is doing with literacy proficiency.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin lawmakers will again work to alter the state’s unemployment laws when bills increasing weekly unemployment pay by $25 and creating a website for employers to report job ghosting along with adding identity verification procedures to initial unemployment claims.
The bills are scheduled to be voted on in the Assembly Workforce, Labor and Integrated Employment Committee on Tuesday.
The stipulations were the result of negotiations between both labor and management through the state’s Unemployment Insurance Advisory Council, which has five members representing labor unions and five representing employers.
The unemployment pay increase in Assembly Bill 652 would make the maximum weekly benefit $395, the first increase since 2014. The bill adds a $5,000 fine for attempting to fraudulently obtain benefits in another person’s name.
“Like any negotiation and compromise, employers did not get everything we wanted into the agreed bill,” Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce Executive Vice President of Government Relations Scott Manley said in testimony on the bill. “Similarly, we know our friends in the labor caucus did not get everything they wanted either. But what both sides ultimately agreed to advances priorities for both workers and employers.”
The bill seeks to eliminate employment ghosting – an employee not showing up for an interview, declining a job offer or failing to show up for the first day of work – by eliminating unemployment benefits if any of those occur. The bill does have a clause for circumstances considered “good cause” for any of the mentioned job ghosting.
Department of Workforce Development Legislative Director Rachel Harvey testified on the bill, saying the unemployment pay increase is insufficient, comparing it to rates in Minnesota ($948), Illinois ($593), Iowa ($622) and Michigan ($614).
She also objected to a part of the bill that would reduce unemployment payments is someone is also receiving Social Security disability payments after a court ruled the state cannot block unemployment for those receiving disability.
“This bill package includes law changes that are inconsistent with current payments under a federal court’s order, have previously been vetoed by Governor Evers, are redundant requirements that mirror measures DWD already has in place to protect the integrity of Wisconsin’s Ul system, and create new barriers to benefits, all while failing to provide adequate resources for the department to implement these provisions in their entirety,” Harvey wrote.

(The Center Square) – No official complaint has been filed after a co-owner of a Sister Bay restaurant and bar allegedly burned a bartender’s Charlie Kirk hoodie.
The Door County Sheriff’s Department said that an officer did receive a call about the incident but the caller did not want to report the incident as the victim of a crime.
A co-owner of Husby’s Food and Spirits in Sister Bay, Chad Kodanko, wrote that he is “stepping away from the business and all of its affairs” after the incident, where he is accused of burning the shirt. Kodanko also resigned his post as a Sister Bay village trustee.
Bartender Robert Meredith said that he will no longer work at Husby’s, according to Fox 11.
The sheriff’s office said that the caller who asked about the incident said that he would speak to an attorney before deciding if he would file charges.
“Recent media coverage has implied that the Sheriff’s Office failed to investigate this matter,” the department wrote on social media. “That implication is incorrect. As of today, December 30, 2025, no party with firsthand personal knowledge has reported this incident as a crime to the Door County Sheriff’s Office.”
Kodanko wrote a post on the Husby’s Facebook page regarding stepping away from the business.
“First and foremost, I want to apologize for my inappropriate behavior and for all of the damage it has caused to the employees, the community, our patrons and my business partners,” Kodanko wrote. “My goal has never been to divide people and my actions did that. Due to threats of violence towards our employees and myself, effective immediately, I am stepping away from the business and all of its affairs.”

(The Center Square) – One of Milwaukee’s most prominent education reformers says it is good to hear Milwaukee Public Schools’ new superintendent talk about closing school buildings, but he says she needs to do more than talk.
Colleston Morgan Jr., the executive director at Milwaukee’s City Forward Collective, said MPS Superintendent Brenda Cassellius told the Journal Sentinel she may be open to a plan that could close some under-utilized schools but not before 2027 at the earliest.
“MPS faces a $100M+ budget gap. Rightsizing 5-6 schools, 2-3 years from now simply isn’t enough,” Morgan wrote on social media Tuesday.
Milwaukee Public Schools have lost more than 35,000 students since 2006. In all, Milwaukee is seeing more than 11,000 fewer students at all schools in the same nearly two decades.
“MPS enrollment declines stretch back to at least 2006,” he added. “And, to be clear – for at least the last decade, this hasn’t been about exits to public charters & private schools using vouchers.”
The two plans presented to MPS leaders earlier this year would close either five or six schools but would then see more money spent on the new schools where those students go.
Morgan said this is not simply a problem of open or available classrooms. He said this is a fiscal problem that MPS has largely ignored for years.
“MPS has a $1.6B annual budget – and a larger tax take than the [City of Milwaukee],” he wrote on X. “What’s needed now is stewardship.”
Morgan is touting a City Forward Collective Poll from last fall that shows 57% of voters support closing or consolidating schools, compared to just 31% who want to raise taxes to keep Milwaukee’s half-empty schools open.
“[Milwaukee’s] residents understand this reality: they support rightsizing, especially when given information,” Morgan added on X.

(The Center Square) – A new Wisconsin law requires both parties in a child support or maintenance agreement to notify the other parent within 10 days of a significant change in gross income or a change of job.
Previously, only the person paying child support and maintenance needed to notify the other party of an income change. The bill was signed into law by Gov. Tony Evers and is now in effect.
“Raising a child is a shared responsibility, and so is the duty to ensure that child support payments reflect each parent’s actual financial situation,” Rep. Ron Tusler, R-Harrison wrote in testimony on the bill. “When only one party is held accountable for timely updates, the system becomes unbalanced, and in some cases, that imbalance means children are caught in the middle of a dispute that could have been avoided with better communication.”
Wisconsin Act 82 of 2025 also clarified that the notice is related to gross income rather than income, which was not defined previously.
The Family Law Section Board of the State Bar of Wisconsin supported the changes, including the clarification on what income counts toward the child support or maintenance calculations.
“Providing clear guidance to both parties, as well as ensuring both payors and payees are expected to be transparent with their income, will provide parity between parties and ensure accuracy of child support or maintenance payments in a timely fashion, while also providing safeguards when appropriate,” the group wrote in testimony on the law.
Another bill signed into law clarified that “miles” related to relocating a child or custody of a child refers to driving miles rather than simply the distance between two locations.
“Because the statute does not expressly specify that the 100-mile standard refers to road miles, valuable court time and expense has been consumed by those who have claimed the 100 miles can entail a straight-line or ‘as the crow flies’ distance that is not backed by precedent,” Sen. Andre Jacque, R-New Franken, wrote in testimony on the bill.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Superintendent Jill Underly continued her attacks of an investigation of her department’s handling of sexual misconduct allegations related to teachers this week, saying “that headline was completely false” regarding a series of stories from the Capital Times.
She went on to tell Channel 3000’s ‘For the Record’ that she felt the series of stories that led to hearings, new proposed legislation and an audit was unfair.
“Our job is to investigate any allegations of misconduct with teachers,” Underly said. “That’s our job.”
Underly previously demanded a correction on the story from The Capital Times but never specified anything that was inaccurate in the stories, which depicted the way that the department handles investigations and the lack of transparency on teacher license investigations after sexual misconduct allegations.
Underly’s interview led Capital Times Editor Mark Treinen to speak out again about the accuracy of the stories. He previously told The Center Square that he stands by the reporting.
“Underly claims the information was readily available to the public, but it took @danielle_duclos months of work to get public records and make sure she understood them,” Treinen wrote on social media. “The Department of Public Instruction’s own staff didn’t have sufficient tracking to be able to easily produce a full accounting of all these cases.”
The headline she calls false was: “200 teacher sexual misconduct, grooming cases shielded from public.” Underly claims the information was readily available to the public, but it took @danielle_duclos months of work to get public records and make sure she understood them.— Mark Treinen (@MarkTreinen) December 30, 2025
DPI later said that it launched a new online database related to teacher licenses in response to the investigation.
“As for her continued demand for a ‘correction,’ Dr. Underly has not identified a single inaccurate fact in the reporting,” Treinen wrote. “I get that she doesn’t like the scrutiny and doesn’t agree with the headline, but we continue to stand by its accuracy.”

(The Center Square) – A group of Wisconsin lawmakers are looking to make it easier for 70 or older bus drivers to maintain their ability to be school bus drivers.
A bill scheduled for a committee vote Jan. 7 would reduce the frequency of commercial drivers’ license testing for those 70 or older from every two to every four years while also allowing drivers to return to work when they are medically cleared by a medical professional instead of when a state medical review board approves that clearance.
“Roughly a quarter of school bus drivers are 65 years or older,” Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Two Rivers, said in testimony supporting the bill. “Overregulation, such as CDL frequency testing and a burdensome medical review process, is deterring these drivers from entering, re-entering, or staying in the profession.”
Statewide numbers show that Wisconsin has 20% less school bus drivers than it had 20 years ago and lawmakers say they are concerned it will lead to school cancellations or delays along with overcrowded and unsafe buses.
“This is verging into a crisis, as these drivers perform the essential service of transporting our kids around safely,” Sen. Jesse James, R-Thorp, said in testimony on the bill. “Without them, schools would have to look to radical new ideas for getting kids to school, field trips, and away games.”
Assembly Bill 393 also allows for physician assistants and advanced practice nurses to join the medical review boards, which are scheduled to meet once a month.
“The volunteer review board is supposed to meet monthly with applicants at two locations in the state, however those meetings are often cancelled because one of the three medical professionals cannot attend the scheduled meetings or if there is only one driver that would like to be seen, the meeting is cancelled,” wrote Cherie Hime, executive director of the Wisconsin School Bus Association. “The time allotted for these appointments is 15 minutes. It takes many drivers a day to drive and attend this short meeting.”
Hime pointed out that surrounding states do not change bus driver eligibility requirements at age 70, like Wisconsin has since the rules were altered in 1989.
“This is yet another rule that may have been well-intended when it was created in 1989, however it is another reason school bus drivers are leaving the workforce,” Hime wrote.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin schools must now inform the parents by the end of the day if they receive a credible report that their child was the victim or target of sexual misconduct by a member of school staff.
Bill sponsors said that, since the notification wasn’t already required, it was important to spell out the requirement in state law.
Gov. Tony Evers signed the bill into law earlier this month. The law applies to private, public and charter schools.
“Doing everything we can to keep our kids safe at school, at home, and in our communities is a top priority for me, as well as our schools and education professionals, who are frontlines of doing what’s best for our kids every day,” Evers said after signing the bill. “This bill will strengthen transparency by making sure parents and family members are notified if any misconduct at school affects their kids’ safety or well-being and bolster accountability by ensuring they know what their rights are and what their kids’ rights are.”
Rep. Benjamin Franklin, R-De Pere, cited a U.S. Department of Education estimate that one in 10 children will experience some form of sexual misconduct by school employees during their schooling.
The bill applies to credible threats of sexual misconduct by a staff member, if someone working at the school is convicted of a serious child sex offense or if a sex offender has intentionally captured a representation of a minor pupil without the parent or guardian’s written consent.
The school’s notification can be either in person, via phone or via voicemail and must be completed before the end of the day unless the report is received after normal business hours, in which case the notification must come by noon the following day.
Franklin noted that quick notification to parents allows them the chance to file a timely Title IX complaint.
The Wisconsin Chiefs of Police Association testified in support of the bill.

(The Center Square) — Some of the people who ride the bus in Milwaukee could soon be paying a lot more after County Executive David Crowley announced he signed a new MCTS service plan for 2026.
Crowley called the service plan an investment “in public transportation that reinforces our shared commitment to protecting essential services while balancing fiscal responsibility.”
“Working families who rely on our bus system will still have access to this essential service,” he added.
Crowley said the new plan “addresses MCTS’ budget deficit through targeted adjustments in service frequency on select routes during non-peak hours,” as opposed to across-the-board route cuts.
Crowley announced that Milwaukee County is using $9 million in remaining federal American Rescue Plan Act dollars, and $4.7 million in funding that “was approved by the County Board to maximize service levels while minimizing disruptions to the community.”
Some of that money will come from riders. Crowley’s plan relies on across-the-board fare increases.
MCTS will, on Thursday, increase the cost for a single ride from $2 to $2.75. In addition, MCTS will increase the daily fare cap from $5 to $8. The weekly cap will jump from $20 to $33, and the monthly fare cap will increase from $75 to $99.
Crowley said MCTS is facing a $14 million shortfall in 2026. In part because many people simply don’t pay to ride Milwaukee County’s buses.
MCTS said earlier this year that as many 33% of riders refuse to pay a fare.
Crowley and other county leaders said they hope to get that number down to 30% by the end of 2026.

(The Center Square) – A pair of bills to fund law enforcement databases in Wisconsin, one requiring a statewide database of certain offenses through the Department of Justice will begin on Jan. 1, and another to fund grants for internal police database sharing, recently became law.
The new statewide public database of crimes will not include personally identifiable information but instead will include information on the county where a crime took place, the name of the prosecuting attorney and court official assigned, the criminal charge filed and arrest charge, whether any charges were dismissed, and if the case resulted in a conviction.
Rep. Bob Donovan, R-Greenfield, sponsored the bill and said that the state’s Consolidated Court Automation Programs works but has limitations.
“The public demands transparency from our legislative and executive branches—and for good reason,” Donovan wrote in testimony supporting the bill. “However, our judiciary is often exempt from similar scrutiny. Time and again, we’ve seen court officials making questionable decisions with dangerous consequences. These decisions, combined with a judicial system that confuses the average citizen, erode trust in the institution.”
Donovan was also a sponsor of the pilot grant program to promote inter-agency sharing along with Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine. That bill was recently signed into law by Gov. Tony Evers.
The bill was supported by several police groups, including the Wisconsin Professional Police Association and Wisconsin Chiefs of Police Association, along with Peregrine Technologies, which produces software systems for data sharing.
“Employing advanced data-sharing technology can be a force multiplier, leading to more efficient police work, reducing overtime, and improving morale within departments,” Kyle Whyte, a Senior Account Executive at Peregrine, said in testimony on the bill.
Donovan’s testimony cited a 2022 homicide in West Allis and the difficulty in identifying a suspect despite having a description of the getaway vehicle as an analyst had to search a list of 1,000 vehicles matching the description in siloed data platforms to determine if the registered owner matched the description.
“The suspect was eventually identified, but not after approximately a month of manual data searching that could have been expedited through the use of data sharing technology,” Donovan testified. “Senate Bill 279 seeks to streamline inter-agency collaboration to boost closure rates, ensuring criminals are brought to justice swiftly.”

(The Center Square) – The penalty for impersonating a police officer, firefighter or emergency medical officer is now a felony in Wisconsin.
Lawmakers pushed for the change from a misdemeanor to felony after several incidents in the state and when Minnesota House Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband were shot and killed by a man impersonating an officer in June.
The bill was signed into law by Gov. Tony Evers along with 33 other bills earlier this month.
Bill sponsors said that the update was requested by law enforcement, which cited an incident where a man impersonating U.S. Border Patrol joined an officer at a scene where a teenager had collided with a deer.
“This bill sends a powerful message that impersonating a law enforcement officer isn’t just lying, it’s weaponizing public trust that puts citizens at risk, it underminds confidence in real officers and it enables serious crimes,” said Jim Palmer, Executive Director of Wisconsin Professional Police Association.
Police and lawmakers also cited a 2018 case where a Franklin man impersonated an officer and 2023 cases where a man impersonated a Sun Prairie police officer in a phone scam and one where a Germantown man impersonated a Washington County sheriff’s deputy and claimed he could get charges dropped in exchange for explicit photos and sex.
Now the charges will match those in Wisconsin for impersonating someone who works for a state utility or public officer.
The new law makes impersonating an officer, firefighter or medical first responder a Class I felony punishable by up to 3 ½ years in jail and a $10,000 fine instead of the current misdemeanor where the maximum punishment is nine months.
“At its core, this proposal is about public safety. When someone pretends to be an officer, they put innocent people at risk,” Palmer wrote in testimony on the bill. “We’ve seen cases in Wisconsin where individuals conducted fake traffic stops, wore tactical gear, and claimed authority they did not have. These encounters are not harmless stunts — they are dangerous situations that can escalate quickly, particularly when weapons are involved or when the victims are children, seniors, or others who feel powerless to question authority.”